How to annotate books

How to Annotate a Book in Just a Couple of Easy Steps

As we all know, reading is a great activity. Whether you read for pleasure, to pass the time or in order to learn a new skill or gather information about a historical event, the benefits you get from reading are countless.

If you want to take your experience to the next level and better understand and remember more of what you read, it may be a good idea to look into how to annotate a book.

While annotating books does have several benefits, which we will explore later on, learning how to do it efficiently and without ruining your books takes a bit of practice and experience. But first, let’s see what annotating a book actually means.

What does it mean to annotate a book?

Book annotating is defined as the action of highlighting or underlining text in a book or even making notes directly on the pages read, in order to achieve a better understanding of the information or to remember the key elements of the material.

While the reasoning behind book annotations can differ from one individual to the other, the habit of making notes on books has been around for centuries. Let’s see how annotating a book is justified and what benefits it can bring a reader.

Why should you annotate books?

Whether you’re a student learning basic skills from school books or simply a casual reader who enjoys spending time leafing through an interesting novel, we are sure that you felt the need to make an annotation in a book or to highlight part of the text, at least once. Well, your instincts were correct, as annotating can help you tremendously while reading. Here’s how:

Better understanding of the book

The fact that reading and writing activate different parts of the brain is old news. How that affects our understanding of the texts we consume is a different story. By writing, we activate parts of our brains responsible for analytical thinking (among others).

This, in turn means that by writing notes or annotating books while reading makes us understand the text more in depth, since we are more invested in the content and we are actively looking for details or important ideas.

This process is called active reading and it involves a different level of determination to understand the information you are reading.

Remembering the main ideas from what you read

In a pretty similar way, writing things down has a huge effect on the amount of information we remember while reading.

By activating our brains in a more complex manner, we ensure that the reading we do has a more notable impact on our minds, which in turn means that the amount of information we will remember will be considerably bigger.

Whether you simply underline the important parts of the texts or highlight sections you find interesting or even make side notes directly on the book, this process increases your chances of storing the relevant information in your long term memory instead of simply forgetting it hours after you’ve finished reading.

Great way of keeping track of the main ideas in case you need to write a book summary

While reading a book you know you need to write a summary about, you will surely try to pay more attention to some of the important details, you will follow the action timeline more carefully and you will try to remember the content in a way which will allow you to recreate it in writing later on.

A good way of keeping track of all the details is to simply take notes in one form or another, while reading. You can underline or highlight the parts of the text which contain information that is essential for the summary. Alternatively, you can even write short notes of your own thoughts directly in the book, and this whole active reading and annotating process will be of tremendous help when it comes to actually putting pen to paper and writing your summary.

What things to annotate in a book?

There’s a huge number of things you want to jot down while reading a book, especially if you’re reading actively, with a clear intention of being able to use one way or another the information you’re getting from it. Here’s a couple of the most common things readers like you annotate in books.

Main ideas from the book

Especially if you’re supposed to also write a book summary or review about the novel you’re reading, the main ideas are an essential thing you’ll be looking to find. Obviously, it’s always a good idea to write those down as you discover them in the text, so you don’t forget them.

You can either highlight relevant paragraphs which reveal them, add notes directly in the book when you identify them, or use an app like Basmo to scan the pages that are important and add your notes digitally.

All you have to do is:

You already know which option we would choose, but the way you decide to do it is obviously up to you.

Quotes

There aren’t many things that are more satisfying than finding a quote you love in a book you’re reading. Whether it’s a saying that is relevant for you, an idea you relate to, or a couple of words that you think could motivate you in the future, if you love it, you must write it down and use it somehow in the future.

You have the option to underline or highlight the quotes directly in the book, but among the many disadvantages of this method, the most important ones are the fact that you will not have access to your quotes without carrying a bunch of books with you and the fact that those books will clearly not be as new.

A little fun fact about reading apps: some of them, Basmo included, offer you the option to write down your favorite quotes (for example, your favorite quotes about reading books) and save them for later use. Basmo, for example, gives you the option to write notes while reading, format them in many different ways to make them as compelling as possible and also offers you a feature that can convert your favorite quotes to images. All this, while keeping your books intact.

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Track the books you read, monitor the time you spend reading and keep notes on your reading habits and how it makes you feel. You can set yourself targets for the time you spend reading and you can get notified whenever you’re behind on your reading time.

Important information about the plot

Clearly one of the most important aspects of any novel is the action that is being narrated. Therefore, many of the notes readers have the tendency to make are directly related to the plot.

Especially if you’re supposed to write a summary of the book you’re reading, annotating the essential parts of the action is a must in order to be able to recreate the timeline effectively.

Unfamiliar words

We all know that reading is one of the most effective ways of enriching our vocabulary. Depending on the complexity of the book we’re reading and our experience, we are likely to discover words we never encountered before.

While sometimes we can easily deduct from context what their meaning is, we will sometimes need to look them up online or in a physical dictionary. If you uncover words you’re unfamiliar with, it’s a good idea to simply mark them directly in the book or even to make a note of their meaning next to them.

Doing this will help us remember them and will make it easier for us to include them in our day-to-day vocabulary.

How to Annotate a Book?

Now that you have an idea about why book annotating is a good habit and how it can be beneficial to you, let’s dive into the most common methods of book annotating.

Highlighting or underlining text

Whether it’s a quote you want to be able to find later, an important part of the text you need to remember or a new word you want to learn and introduce in your vocabulary, highlighting or underlining them directly in the book is definitely one of your options.

You can use a colorful sharpie to highlight the relevant text, which will make it pop on the page and be more visible for you the next time you go through the book.

Alternatively, if highlighting doesn’t do it for you for whatever reason, you can use a pen or a pencil for underlining. The effect is quite similar, the main difference being the use of color and the general aspect of the book once you’re done reading it.

Writing directly in the book, on the sides of pages or at the end of the chapters

Whenever you encounter an interesting paragraph or you feel the need to make a note of your thoughts while reading, you can simply write them down directly in the book, on the side of the pages they are located on.

Alternatively, if you’re about to write longer annotations, such as a summary or the main ideas from a chapter, you can do so at the end of the chapter. There is usually plenty of room there for your thoughts.

Making notes on the bottom of the pages with asterisks

Don’t be afraid to use asterisks whenever you are annotating a book. They are a very effective way of making sure you remember what your notes from the bottom of a page are in relation to.

Simply add an asterisk next to the part of the text you want to write something about and then add the asterisk on the bottom of the page where you will write your own thoughts about that phrase or paragraph.

How to annotate a book without writing in it?

For those of us who love books not only for their content, but also as objects, the annotating methods I presented above come with the huge disadvantage of leaving a mark on the books.

While some readers enjoy having the books annotated and showing the signs of the work that has been put into reading, understanding and remembering them, others prefer to have them immaculate, in mint condition.

If you’re in the latter category, you may want to have a look at the annotating methods below, which are guaranteed to leave no trace in your beloved books.

Stick post it notes in the book

Yes, it could be that easy. Simply keep a couple of post it notes handy whenever you are reading a book you plan to annotate. Whenever you encounter an interesting paragraph or you feel the need to make a note, paste a post it note to the page, next to the part of the text you want to write about and write on it.

Not only will this leave no marks on the book, it also gives you a lot more space than you would have to write on if you were to do it directly on the pages. You can even use different shapes, sizes or colors if you want to take the organization of your thoughts to a new level or if you want to be particularly thorough with your notes.

While this is a pretty clever way of keeping your books looking like new, it does have some disadvantages. For starters, every post it note you add will obstruct the visibility of the text behind it. Also, in time they may become unstuck, potentially leaving you without your precious notes.

Write the main ideas from the book in a dedicated notebook

An alternative to the post it notes method is to simply have a separate notebook where you can add your thoughts. Obviously you will have to come up with a system to keep track of your notes and to mark somehow what parts of the text they are in relation to.

This will leave you adding small asterisks or numbers in the book to match the order of your notes, which will mean that your books will not be completely immaculate, or will force you to add a lot of additional information to each note like the page and paragraph the note is referring to, which will end up taking a lot more of your time than it should.

Use a reading app

Since we’re in the digital era and the technology required to help us in most aspects of our lives exists, it would make perfect sense to find ways to implement it into our reading to a certain extent.

Reading apps are amazing tools that can become available to you on your smartphone or tablet with just a couple of taps, with a plethora of features that can boost your reading experience.

How can Basmo help?

If we take Basmo as a concrete example, let’s have a look at how it can be the perfect solution for your book annotating needs.

While a reading session is ongoing, you can write your notes directly on your smartphone or tablet. The app also has an integrated feature which allows you to scan the pages of a book, making it extremely easy for you to jot down your thoughts and keep them relevant to the parts of the book they are connected to.

Needless to say, using a reading app like Basmo to annotate your books will leave them intact, while being as effective, if not even more so, as any other option I presented above. The fact that you would always have access to your notes, even without carrying the book with you is clearly a huge advantage. Plus, your chances of ever losing your notes are practically zero.

Also, it’s important to know that our reading app is available both for Android and iOS devices and our team of engineers, developers and UX experts have put in tremendous work in order to make it as useful and user-friendly as it can possibly be.

Basmo will allow you to find the book you’re reading, add it to your list and track your progress while you’re reading, and you can record each session in order to keep track of your reading habits.

Ready to take your reading game to the next level?
Try Basmo book tracker today!

It’s 100% free to download, so what have you got to lose?

How to Annotate Your Books to the Fullest: A Comprehensive Guide

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How to Annotate Your Books to the Fullest: A Comprehensive Guide

Raise your hand if you write inside your books, keep special sticky notes handy, or dog-ear your pages, naysayers-be-damned! And, you know, hopefully the books you own and not public books you’ve borrowed. We admit we’re not personally huge writers, but we have a very specific system for bookmarking quotes we love, and there’s nothing wrong with taking pen/ pencil/ highlighters/ ink and quill to paper. Because, just like there are different types of readers, there are different types of note-takers! However you do it, we bet you’ll feel so much more connected to the story.

If you don’t, then you might be wondering why someone would bookmark quotes or scribble in the margins. Simply put, we’re trying to remember key points, beautiful moments, themes, phrases, and ideas so that we can return to it later and get lost in it all over again. If you’re ready to start getting lost even deeper in all our YA feels, check out some of our key tips to annotate below!

How to Annotate Your Books

TO GET THE MOST OUT OF READING

An annotator’s go-to tools

A good annotater never starts a job until they have their tools ready! Here’s what you need:

Get to know the characters

You know what they say: Understanding the characters in a book is one of the most important parts of understanding the story. Is that not a saying? Well, to us book nerds it is!

When you’re reading something for the first time, one of the most important things you need to do is track the characters in the story—especially the ones who stand out to you. The former is so that you can understand what’s going on, but the latter is for pure reading entertainment.

If you really connect to someone early, be sure to have those tools handy. We can guarantee there will be many ‘a quote for you to mark down and return to later once you’re missing them. And if the cast is too sprawling for your liking, it’s helpful to right down a key few! You can use the inside of the front cover as a cheat sheet, and be sure to keep the summaries short and sweet to save space. Like the perfect Instagram caption!

Use it before you lose it

If you’re the type of person who tends to forget things once you’ve closed the book, annotations can be super helpful. For example, the little bit of white space just above the chapter heading is the perfect place to write a quick summary! Right after you’ve finished reading the chapter, flip back to the beginning and write a few short notes about what happened.

Get your marginalia on

Margins filled with notes are just as annoying as really long text messages, so it’s important that you’re smart about what you include in your

. Clear and concise margin notes will be a lot more useful to you than lengthy annotations, so all you need to do is follow these few simple tips and you’ll find yourself an annotation superstar:

Annotate your heart out

The next time you pick up a book that you need—or want—to know like the back of your hand, or a book you just want a deeper connection with, keep this annotation guide handy. With a little bit of practice and a nice routine, the process will get easier and you’ll be a stronger reader overall. You’ll always be on the lookout for details! Think of annotation as a superpower to learn.

Do you annotate your books? What are some of your favorite tips and tricks? Tell us in the comments!

How & Why I Annotate (9 Methods)

A few weeks ago, I posted a picture of my copy of Normal People by Sally Rooney and got a few messages about how & why I annotate my books. Someone requested I write a blog post on it, so here it is!

Annotating books just means to add notes and thoughts as a kind of commentary to the story. You can keep this in a separate notebook (if you’re super organised), on your phone, or do what I do and just write directly onto the page. Sometimes, especially if it’s a special edition or was a gift, I will write on sticky notes and add them into the book so as not to ruin the pages.

Why Do I Annotate?

Annotating books is familiar to me, but I haven’t done it much since university.

At uni, I would annotate all the time so that I could

Amongst other reasons…

After university, I stopped annotating because I was focused on reading as many books as possible – and annotating slows me down. I always had a pen on me when reading to underline quotes I loved, but most of the time, I would just dog-ear the page or write the quote out into my phone notes.

I never use tabs that show on outside of the books, as I don’t like the way this looks.

I rarely took notes on the book – until last year. I found myself scribbling notes in the margins of books such as Conversations With Friends and A Tale For The Time Being. The reason I did so was because these books were packed with so much goodness that just reading them wasn’t enough to squeeze out everything I wanted.

So I annotated. I annotated to underline quotes I loved, comment on the characters, note things I liked/disliked for my own writing journey, ask myself questions, analyse the text and generally just have a conversation with myself about the book.

And now – that’s what I’m doing still. This year my goal was to annotate every book that I read so as to take my time over each story. I wanted to stop myself from zipping through literature and not taking it all in. I wanted to stop, slow down and get serious about words that people spent years writing.

It hasn’t always been good notes and good analyses. I’m often very critical (as you’ll see from my review of T h e Flatshare) but annotating has helped me understand why I like or dislike something. Plus, it also helps me organise my thoughts so I can write a review on the book.

A huge reason I annotate, though, is so that when I’m old (or gone) people can read my books and communicate with me, see how I was feeling, what made me laugh, what made me cry, what made my heart break, so that when they read the book, they don’t feel alone. Annotating books immortalises me in the time of reading and keeps the whole experience alive.

So that sums it up for why I annotate – but now for how exactly I annotate.

Someone commented on my annotations being really simple – and I think that’s a good place to start if you’re new to annotating. Keep it simple. Don’t pressure yourself to get your books to look a certain way or be aesthetic or super detailed.

I’ll break down a few things I do into categories.

#1 – Underline Quotes I Love

The main thing I do when annotating is underline quotes I love. I use a black or a coloured pen to do so. Every time I read a book, I use one black and one coloured pen – and I make sure I only use that one colour throughout. I have no idea why – I guess just to be consistent and not to get too messy. (I usually colour coordinate this with the front page of the book.)

When I find a quote that I find relatable or can be quoted on its own, I underline it (with either pen, it doesn’t matter).

I also underline or put brackets around quotes if I find them helpful for my own writing. For example, if I like a particular description of the weather, I’ll underline or put brackets around it and put a note as to why I’ve done so in the margins or on a sticky note.

#2 – Thoughts at the End of a Chapter

Normally, I’ll gather my thoughts at the end of a chapter. I like to write these on sticky notes to protect the page and because it looks cute. I’ll just write a thought about a favourite theme, character or moment. Or I’ll theorise about what might happen next.

If I don’t feel I have anything to say – then I won’t.

Doing this helps me when I revisit a book. I can kind of get a feeling about a certain chapter without needing to fully reread it.

5 Ways to Annotate Your Books

To annotate or not to annotate: that is the age-old question of avid readers. On one hand, highlighting and writing in the margins is a great way to interact with the text and leave a physical reminder of how a book made you feel at a certain point in time. On the other hand, it’s hard to get over the mental block of writing in books. They can be expensive and it’s hard not to overthink what’s worth writing down. For many of us who have to annotate though (or who love doing so), the question becomes: how to annotate a book so your marks are done quickly and effectively? Here’s how.

What does it mean to annotate a book?

Simply put, annotation refers to adding your own thoughts or insights into a book or text.

As a non-fiction reader, I’ve always been a fan of annotating my text. Annotation allows me to come back to favorite passages, useful facts, or meaningful quotes.

If I decide to re-read a text, it’s always interesting to see what parts of a story were meaningful to me at that point in my life. Sure, I may be embarrassed at something I didn’t understand or a weird comment I made, but it’s a snapshot of the person I was.

How to annotate a book

If you’re ready to start marking up your books, there are five different ways you can go about it. My favorite methods are to:

1. Stick to highlighting

If you are new to annotating your books or are still too skeptical about ruining the pages, highlighting passages is a great place to start. It allows you to remember favorite quotes or scenes without the pressure of writing things down.

I suggest finding a highlighter that won’t bleed through your pages!

2. Use colorful tabs

Trying to learn how to annotate a book without writing in it? This is your method.

One of the lowest-pressure ways to annotate your book is by using tabs. While this is the least permanent method, you will have to remember to carry around your pack of tabs wherever you carry your book. There are a few ways to approach annotation via tabs:

3. Create a key and use symbols

Similar to the approach of using color-coded tabs, symbol-based annotation is a simple and cheap way to interact with text.

Come up with a personal book annotation key for yourself and assign symbols for favorite quotes (underline), favorite passages (asterisks), confusing passages (question mark), funny dialogue (smiley face), etc! The world is your oyster.

4. Annotate Fast, like a student

All grades and subjects will teach annotation differently, but here are some basic practices to annotate like a student:

5. Talk to the text

Finally, as you read, write your thoughts, comments, and reactions in the margin as if you were responding to the story or author.

You can throw in other styles of annotations if you’d like (circling words, underlining phrases) – this method is all about interacting with the book on a personal level. Looking back at your annotations, you will be able to remember exactly how a book impacted you at that moment in your life.

Annotating book is something personal and customizable for every reader. Try to avoid putting pressure on yourself and have some fun with it! What ways do you annotate your text?

How to Annotate Books When You’re Reading For Fun

I absolutely love to annotate books.

The habit started with highlighting and taking notes in e-books. I was not ready to actually write in physical books. But after a while, I simply could not hold myself back. I HAD to highlight and comment on things, so I picked up a pencil and began annotating Children of Blood and Bone.

That was like breaking a dam. Since then, my annotation methods have evolved but my love for annotation has only grown.

I really want to encourage more people to pick up the habit of annotation even when you are reading for fun.

If you want to know how to start annotating books, this is the only guide you need. And no one may have asked me how I annotate my books, but I will share that anyway further below in this post. Let’s go!

why should you annotate books?

There are several benefits to annotating. But to name a few major ones..

A ton of people relate annotating to studying and hence don’t want to do it when reading for fun. I personally did not always annotate for studying because it somehow was not encouraged explicitly in my academics, but I understand the sentiment.

You have to separate the act of annotation from studying. The benefits of it are why it is encouraged in academics. But annotating can be fun too!

Writing comments, including drawings or illustrations, and conversing with the text makes the experience of reading much more fun. Annotating is not just for critical thinking, quotes or discussions. It can also be a commentary on funny dialogues, shocking turns, or rants on annoying characters.

Authors spend years working on their books. Take a few extra minutes to annotate and fully experience the books.

If you still need convincing, read the essay How to Mark a Book by Mortimer J. Adler. I came across this essay through Naya and absolutely loved it. It reinforced my love for annotating and reassured me that, despite tons of people in the book community saying “it’s a sin”, it is actually a good habit. I’ve also taken a print of the essay like Naya because it is that good.

tools for annotating books

There are several ways to annotate. I will list and suggest different methods later in this post. But there are some basic tools that you need to get started.

Depending on the annotation method you choose, you can use one or more of these tools.

sticky tabs/notes

Sticky tabs are the small tabs that are used to point to a specific line in the page. There are various types available such as arrow tabs, rectangular tabs, and different coloured tabs.

Sticky notes can be used when you want to write a lot of content.

highlighters

There are different types of highlighters that you can use. Regular highlighters work just fine but if you don’t like the neon colours, you can use mildliners. Highlighting using brush pens is also really nice.

I prefer Tombow brush pens because they provide more control when highlighting due to the thickness of the brush tips.

pen/pencil

These are classic tools used for annotating. If you want to get started with underlining and writing in the margins, but don’t want to commit to permanent annotation, you can use pencils. Blunt pencils work best to erase later on.

If you’re using pens, you can use different colours of pens for different types of annotations too.

notebook/phone/another device

You may not want to mark the books themselves due to whatever reason. At those times, you can keep a notebook with you to write in. If you have an iPad with a really nice note-taking app, that helps too. I personally like making notes in GoodNotes.

Note-taking on your phone also works but generally, phones tend to pull our attention away from whatever we’re doing, so I don’t suggest this unless there’s no other way. If you do use your phone, keep it on “do not disturb” mode so that you can read without distractions.

before you begin annotating

Don’t assume that you will annotate the book. Go in without that idea. Otherwise, you will spend time looking for lines to underline or thinking about what to comment on for each paragraph.

To keep it genuine, annotate only when you really feel like it. You’re reading for fun! Don’t make annotating a chore. Let it come naturally.

Mark sentences by underlining only if they call out to you, or they feel important to the story. Write comments if you have something to say or if the passage made you feel something.

If you’re holding a pen or pencil in your hand, ready to mark anything of consequence, it will distance you from the story. Don’t look for reasons to use your tools. Let them be a little away. Pick them up when you have a reaction to something in the book.

Annotating will feel weird in the beginning but the habit will grow over time. Don’t expect yourself to go all-in the first time you start.

how to annotate books

There are multiple ways to annotate books. You can either pick one beforehand or decide later based on what you want to mark in the book.

Don’t stick to a system immediately. Try out different methods. Be open to exploring and changing. Annotation is supposed to improve your reading experience, not to put your thoughts in a box.

underlining/highlighting

These are two of the most basic ways to annotate.

When you read a line that is powerful or lyrical, mark it. If a dialogue made you laugh, mark it. If you want to highlight multiple lines or entire paragraphs, do it!

You can use different colours to underline and highlight. The colours can signify different meanings like yellow for important facts and green for good writing.

Different colours can also mean different readings. For The Poppy War, I used one colour for highlighting during my first read and another colour during my second read.

For singular words or short phrases, circling them with a pen also works. For marking multiple lines or passages, you can draw a bracket to mark those sections.

writing

Another classic annotation method. This is a little more in-depth because it involves you writing your opinions and conversing with the text.

Annotating with writing doesn’t mean you have to write a lot. Comments can be short forms or small sentences too. You can fit smaller comments right after the end of paragraphs or in the margins.

Longer comments do take up more space. When I was reading The Burning God, I took up almost half the page’s empty space once because I had so much to say about a certain theme.

Writing comments can change based on genres and themes. For example, I barely write in romance books. The extent of my annotations are generally “this is so cute!” and “OMG” unless I’m ranting about something.

But when I was reading The Right Swipe, I added longer comments to highlight how CTE was spoken about, note my thoughts on the dating industry, etc.

Tip: if you are prone to rephrasing a lot or are not good at space planning (like me), try writing with a pencil instead of a pen. That way you can erase and write again if needed. The downside is that pencil marks can fade over time.

Annotating with writing is really fun because you’re almost conversing with the book. It’s also fun because you can see your old notes during rereads and have conversations with your older self through new annotations.

dog-ear pages

Dog-earing, or folding corners of pages, is helpful because you can easily find your favourite parts of the book later. Or you can refer to important parts that you’ve marked.

This is probably the most argued-about method of marking a book in the book community. But it is very easy to do and requires no extra tools.

You can mark your favourite scenes, important parts, or pages that have a lot of annotations by dog-earing those sections. I would especially recommend this method for the last reason. If you’ve annotated a lot by writing or highlighting on one page, you might want to refer back to it later, so dog-ear it.

drawing/doodling

This is not a method that I personally use a lot but I have seen other people use it.

One way is to doodle small symbols to signify specific themes and maintain a key for these themes at the beginning/end of the book. You can also simply draw hearts or stars to mark parts you like.

If you’re reading non-fiction books that explain topics, you can draw mini mind-maps to remember things better (I did this for The Power of Habit).

If you found this post helpful, do consider buying me a coffee in appreciation! ☕️

how to annotate a book without writing in it

If you want to start annotating and are not comfortable with marking the book yet, this is for you. There are ways to annotate without writing in the book. You can use these methods to get into the habit of annotating, and you will probably work up to writing in the books later on.

These methods are also useful if you don’t own the book you’re reading or you are planning to sell it later on.

use sticky tabs

Whoever invented sticky tabs are a GENIUS because they are so useful.

There are so many ways to annotate using sticky tabs. Since they are available in different colours, you can assign themes to colours and add a key at the beginning like Myonna. Some readers use the same key throughout their books and others switch whenever.

You can also use tabs to mark quotes, favourite lines and passages, or parts of the book that made you feel something.

Or you can simply use the page tabs wherever without caring about the colour. Since I don’t assign colours to themes and usually just use one colour per book, I choose a colour that matches the book cover.

use sticky notes

Annotating with sticky notes is helpful when you have a lot to say about something as they provide more space. You can use sticky notes instead of writing in the margins.

Some readers stick the notes in the middle of the page, others stick them near the part that they’re commenting on. You can also stick the notes sideways so that a little bit of the paper peeks out of the notebook similar to page tabs, making it easier for you to find later on.

The one drawback to this is that it covers up a part of the page. Hence, you have to write and stick after you’re done reading. And when you’re referring later, you can’t read the page that you wrote about without removing the sticky note.

There is one way to make sure that they don’t cover up the page. Stick the notes at the bottom of the page, so that the sticky parts are on the empty space, and fold them into the book. This way you can flip them open to read your notes and they don’t cover up the page as well.

reading journal/make notes

If you want to annotate but don’t want to do anything to the book, you can maintain a notebook as a reading journal to write your thoughts in. This also works for audiobooks as bookmarking in the audiobooks itself can be messy.

For non-fiction books that give a lot of information or books that you’re learning a lot from, making proper notes works well. Reading the content properly such that you can write the most important points by memory vastly increases comprehension.

You can also make notes on an app on your phone since you will have your phone with you most of the time. This can result in distraction as you can fall into the phone’s black hole through notifications and messages.

Both of these methods can be tedious compared to other methods of annotation because they remove your attention from the book. If you can manage to just write the notes and not fall into social media, these are great.

Leonie uses these methods of annotation so you can check out her video to know more on how to use them.

things to annotate in a book

If you are new to annotating and don’t know what to annotate, I’ve got you covered.

These are some ideas that you can try out but know that annotations are very personal and what works for others may not work for you. Different people annotate different things. Try a few of these and your specific annotation method will develop once you get the hang of it.

This is not an exhaustive list. I’ll probably come back and update whenever I think of something else. But this should be enough to get you started!

*Foreshadowing is basically hints dropped by the author which subtly leads up to the future plot.

best books to annotate

Technically, any book can be annotated. You have the build the habit of annotating your thoughts using whichever method instead of keeping your opinions in your mind while reading.

But there are books that will make it easier for you to start annotating.

how I annotate books

No one has asked me how I annotate but I am jealous of the creators who get asked to share their systems, so I’m sharing mine anyway.

While my annotating habit started with e-books, I annotate more when I read paperbacks. There’s just something about holding the book and using a pen or a brush pen that makes it more engaging.

I don’t annotate all the paperbacks that I read but I usually can’t hold back if I have comments. My habit has fully developed so I get a pen in the middle of a chapter if I don’t have one because I NEED to annotate.

My system used to be mostly sticky tabs and a few sticky notes. But now I barely use sticky anything and directly annotate on the page.

My books contain highlights of lines that are impactful and full of meaning or lines that evoke emotion in me. I use the Tombow dual brush pens in pastel shades for this.

Note: these images contain spoilers for The Poppy War!!

I love writing comments and my reactions on the margins more than highlighting. My comments range from intellectual opinions to “OMG” and “are you serious. ” depending on my mood.

It’s fun to read my past annotations and see how I notice different things as I’ve grown as a person. I especially noticed the difference during my reread of The Poppy War. I picked out different themes as “main” in my two reads and it is interesting to see the difference because it was partly influenced by my life events.

After annotating the first two books of the series, I went to TOWN with The Burning God. I completely marked the book and made it my own. It was so fun and I truly feel like I gave the book the attention it deserves.

Another book that I recently annotated was The Palace of Illusions. While I did annotate my reactions, I commented a lot about the themes portrayed and the writing style. My review came out quite sophisticated (if I can say so myself) but my annotations are way more in-depth and worthy of discussion points.

Note: these images contain spoilers for The Palace of Illusions.

Annotating non-fiction books is a completely different type of joy. When I read Maybe You Should Talk to Someone recently, I used THREE forms of annotation. I highlighted lines that resonated with me, tabbed the highlighted lines which I want to come back to, and wrote chapter summaries at the end of each chapter with sticky notes.

Another non-fiction book that pushed my annotation limits was Atomic Habits. While I highlighted lines on the book with two colours, I also made notes on my iPad using GoodNotes. This was the first time I made proper notes and it was great.

Because I annotated while reading the above two books, my reading comprehension and memory retention improved. I remember a lot from them even though my memory is generally not great.

endnotes

There is no right way of annotating. And there is no best way of annotating. This is a deeply personal habit that is different for every single person.

When we read a book without annotating or noting anything, we are mostly simply absorbing what the authors put in front of us. Marking a book when reading is a way of making it your own. You take the story and put your spin on it through your opinions and the parts that you pick out as “main.”

I believe that the best way to know if someone has loved a book is to see the condition of that book. Keeping it neatly on a shelf without even breaking the spine is a form of love, yes. But the people I relate to are the ones who have worn down copies of their books with annotations, showing how much they’ve read and loved it.

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let’s chat!

Do you annotate your books? What are your favourite methods of annotation?

If not, are you here to start annotating? Did you find this post helpful? If you have any more questions, feel free to drop them in the comments or DM me on Twitter or Instagram.

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