This question has come up a lot in the past few months. It's 2026, and the world is falling apart around us, so you would think that there were more important topics to focus on. But instead social media is permeated by discourse about whether or not audiobooks count as reading. Spoiler - they do. And I'm not just saying this because I LOVE audiobooks. Which, I do, for several reasons. But also, it's science. Audiobooks engage the same parts of your brain that visual reading does.
So yeah, I will continue to read audiobooks. Because I can read while I am cooking, driving, and doing a million other things. But, more importantly, because I often have to read a page multiple times to absorb the information. And lately, I have been struggling with the focus necessary to sit and read long books at all.
That brings me to another type of story. This year, more than full novels, I have been consuming large amounts of those short stories that you read on phone apps. You know the ones - released a chapter at a time, and frequently advertised in app ads. Mostly romances or high drama. They are great for short focus. And they are addicting. Sadly, they are also quite redundant, signaling that the writers follow a set formula, and at least some of them are probably written by AI.
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| Shun the AI books |
Another downside to those stories is that many of them are ongoing, and even the completed ones aren't traditionally published. Since they aren't proper novels they do not have entries on things like Goodreads or TheStoryGraph, making it nearly impossible to log my reading. I have read a lot this year, but my reading count is low because most of what I have read is not trackable.
Another type of short reading that I have increased in the last year or so is graphic novels. Last year I read several web comic novels, but they had the same issue with tracking difficulties, so now I try to get more from the library. Libraries are a great source for graphic novels! Recently we had an Ollie's Bargain Outlet open in town, and they also had a great selection, including the majority (and the rest are on my PaperbackSwap wishlist if anyone has them lying around) of two different series that I have wanted to read - Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation and Heaven's Official Blessing. Okay, so HOB turned out to be in novel format, which means it will take longer to read that one. But I'm going to because it was suggested to me based on how much I like the genre - which I fell in love with after watching The Untamed, a live drama adaptation of Grandmaster.
I may be reading more short dramas, graphic novels, and audiobooks, but my days of reading full novels are not behind me. And as far as I am concerned, all these formats are valid and all reading is good reading.
Will I make the reading goal I set at the beginning of the year? Probably not with less loggable books, but who knows?
As always, I am excited for the opportunity to share my literary experiences with others and to hear other people's opinions and have great discussions on the books that we read. So stop in any time and please feel free to interact!