Or to put it another way: what books do you buy because you feel you should, and they live on your shelf while you read other things?
Every day on BookBub, or in any bookstore I walk into, there are catchwords and phrases and awards prestige that catches my eye, and I’ll buy the “glorious tour de force” -New Yorker, or the Booker Prize Finalist, or “the book I wish I’d written” -Respected Author.
Then I mostly read thrillers.
I think it’s ok to buy books aspirationally, and it doesn’t hurt the author for their work to sit on my shelf or in my Kindle library, but I was made aware of this recently and now I’m trying to be more mindful of how soon I intend to read a book when I buy it, and what really interests me apart from wanting to be a person who has read this book.