Book Buying Addicts Anonymous discussion

I don't need glasses or anything, but lately I prefer reading larger print books (such as the type used in YA fiction) because I am less likely to feel tired while reading them. Whereas, when I read fine/small print books I get tired after only a few pages. Can anyone relate?

I wear glasses. But yes, small print makes your eyes work harder to read making you tired faster. I also wonder about the long term effects, especially with the increased use of i*whatever*. ;)

without my glasses, I do get tired easily when I read.

It depends on whether I haven't read smaller print in awhile.

Kind of. It's for sure more straining for the eyes to read a book in small print. But if the book is interesting enough it keeps me going. But generally speaking I can't read for long stretches at the time - my max in one stretch is about 30 minutes, give or take.

For me it depends on how often I've been reading my Nook lately. I prefer to have small print on my nook because I don't have to turn quite as many pages that way. But if I have been reading print books a lot then my eyes are generally not accustomed to it anymore and it makes me tired and get headaches.

I prefer larger print but small print doesn’t bother me. As people age, they generally have to surrender to reading glasses. I have needed glasses almost all of my life but remove them to read.

Not at all. It all is preference though.

Last month I read a book that had the smallest print I have ever seen.........it was a chore to get through it and I don't have close vision problems. I found that I actually was getting a headache. Regular print is fine but this was tiny.

How small of type? I find typeface selection and design are as important as the size. Some books are laid out in a way that makes them far easier to read, i.e. they are well designed. Others are not and yet they may have average size font for body, title, and caption text.

Two years or so in the past I thought maybe age was catching up. It was; finally getting the right prescription update made all the difference.
*%$(&$ -ed presbyopia combined with my life long astigmatism and myopia really had played tricks.

A book that I find hard to read because of the overall layout, bad type selection and design is The Irish Civil War by Tim Pat Coogan. Great information and photographs. There are portions of the book it hurts my eyes to read it for even 5 minutes! Technically I know exactly what is wrong, but that doesn't help!

Reading a regular print book makes me tired... especially if I don't have my glasses on!

i prefer large print on my6 kindle. don't have to go searching for large print bks.
ha

Absolutely! But what I do is simply put the book down for a while!

Not really. I do feel like I’m just crawling through the book until it catches my imagination and interest then the pages fly by; regardless of the print size.

It does sometimes, but I think it depends more on the subject matter than anything else.

While smaller text does make me feel like I'm moving more slowly, I had no problem reading through my copy of Ender's Game, whereas I'm having to almost force myself through Les Miserables. Both books use about the same size font (looks to be about 10 pt), but one is a bit more action-packed than the other.

I prefer the smaller print books. For some reason the large print is just so odd to me that it's a bit distracting...

I've found some classics have tiny print and coupled with the language can need a great deal of concentration which I find pretty tiring. One thing I like about having an e-reader for free books is that some of the classics I've given up on quickly in the past due to poor/tiny print I can now read on this device with a larger and clearer font.

I wonder if not having to turn the pages often when you have tiny text has an effect on drowsiness too in that there's a longer period of time between the little kicks of stimulus when you have to move to flip the page? It's a minor thing but in a regular print size book it could be enough to keep jogging the brain out of sleep mode.