Let’s Talk Bookish: Freebie!

Let’s Talk Bookish is a weekly meme that was originally created and hosted by Rukky @ Eternity Books starting in August 2019, and was then cohosted with Dani @ Literary Lion from May 2020 to March 2022. Book Nook Bits has hosted since April 2022.

Freebie weeks are great, as they really give me a chance to go back and explore some of the older LTB topics! So far, starting in April 2022 (when Book Nook Bits started hosting), I’ve done April 1st, April 8th, and April 15th so this week I’m moving onwards with April 22nd.

Let’s Talk Bookish September 29th: Freebie!
To Annotate or Not to Annotate…
(ARIA @ BOOK NOOK BITS)

Prompts: …that is the question*. Do you like annotating books? If so, how do you annotate them? Is there a difference for you between ebooks, physical books, and audiobooks? If you’ve ever had to annotate books in school, does this affect your willingness to annotate the books you read for fun? What are some downsides to annotating books in your opinion?

I don’t annotate books, actually. I can understand why people do, and I do like it when you pick up a second-hand book someone has made notes in, but I’ve never quite been able to bring myself to do it! Even when studying, if I needed specific notes for a specific page, it’d be a combination of jotting down the page number or making a note on a post-it or similar. I don’t know why, but it’s just not something I do. I think ebooks make it slightly easier, but even then I’ve found myself a little lost trying to make notes on them. I’m not great at making notes on books anyway, though now and then I’ll get it into my head to try, and make it a habit, and eventually after a few times I lose track.

Downside to annotating books is that you are marking the book, though I think in some ways we hold books as physical objects to a fairly high standard. If it’s a special or rare edition, maybe you want to avoid marking it in case you ever look to sell it on, but as for any other book, I think if you’re the type of person who annotates books, I hope one day I get to stumble across a second hand copy of a book you’ve owned and see what you’ve noted down – it really is lovely when it happens, can be funny or enlightening, and makes the act of reading feel a little more shared.

What about you – have you done this prompt before? What do you think about annotating books?