Two years ago someone gave me an audio book  (“Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less” by Greg McKeown, read it!) and it changed my life. Without altering time with work or family, I listened to 100 books in 2018, and I listened to 150 books in 2019 – audiobooks literally changed my life.

Between Audible and the apps provided by libraries (Libby and OverDrive), I listen to books in all cracks of my day (from when I wake up until I leave the house, through my commute into the Pentagon, as I walk to my office, while working out, during my walk out of the building and commute home, while making dinner if my kids are playing, and after they go to bed while my husband and I are cleaning up the kitchen / making lunches / doing laundry / etc.).

I’m lucky that my office has the news on all day, or I would need to adjust some of this battle rhythm to ensure I’m caught up on the news.

Some Tips:

1) Goodreads is a great app for managing books you’ve read and books you want to read. You can customize your shelves to reflect your interest. For example, my shelves consist of: Biographies, Communication, Fiction, Global Issues, Health/Mind/Body, History, Leadership, Military, Parenting, and Presidents. (An old 1SG gave me a lifetime goal to read a book about every president.)

2) An Audible subscription is $14.95/month and you can buy 3 credits (3 books) for less than $30, so you can listen to 4 books/month for about $11/book. I believe money spent on books and salads is money well spent.

3) Every library has an app (either Libby or OverDrive) that you use to download audiobooks to your phone without ever going to the library.  Since these systems are electronic based on your library card barcode, I use the libraries for my current address, past address, and the Pentagon library – this increases my access to more books.

4) If you think you won’t like listening to books, start with an autobiography read by the author – it will feel really engaging and help to adjust your ears.  I’ve listen to books read by Ellen DeGeneres, Michelle Obama, Jimmy Carter, Trevor Noah, John McCain, Ash Carter, and Anthony Bourdain.  It’s special to listen to a book after the author dies, and also listening to the person narrating their own book feels extremely personalized.

5) As you get used to reading audiobooks you can listen at 1.25, 1.5, 1.75 or even 2x speed.  I listen to books at double speed, so a 28-hour listen only takes 14 hours.

6) Since back to back long 28-hour listens on national security issues can feel heavy, I rotate in light hearted fiction reads to balance the mood.

7) I am in many virtual book clubs with friends, some groups trade professional development recommendations, while others share fiction recommendations.  Audible books allow one free share per person, so if you read a book that really excites you, you can share it with multiple people.

8) While my 2019 goal was to listen / read 150 books, my 2020 goal is to listen to more podcasts.  Listening to books also primes you to absorb more information verbally, so podcasts like NPR’s “Up First,” the New York Times’ “The Daily,” and BBC “Global News.”

9) iPhone users can also configure their phones to read e-mails and PDFs out loud to them.  One of my colleagues uses this so her phone reads her morning news e-mail to her on her way to work.  To enable this feature, Settings > General > Accessibility > Speech.  Enable “Speak Screen” and use two fingers to swipe down from the top of the screen and an iPhone will start reading.  As with audiobooks, you can adjust your speed.

10) In “Call Sign Chaos: Learning to Lead,” former Secretary of Defense James Mattis said, “If you haven’t read hundreds of books, you are functionally illiterate, and you will be incompetent, because your personal experiences alone aren’t broad enough to sustain you.”  As a professional military officer, he makes the argument for following service and senior leader reading lists, all which are available here.

And finally, the best books I read in 2019 were:

Nonfiction:

• Inside the Five-Sided Box: Lessons from a Lifetime of Leadership in the Pentagon by Ash Carter
• Directorate S: The C.I.A. and America’s Secret Wars in Afghanistan and Pakistan by Steve Coll
• The Moment of Lift: How Empowering Women Changes the World by Melinda Gates
• Leadershift: The 11 Essential Changes Every Leader Must Embrace by John Maxwell
• Dare to Lead by Brene Brown
• Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies by Jared Diamond
• Americans at War by Stephen Ambrose
• Leadership in Turbulent Times by Doris Kearns Goodwin
• American Lion: Andrew Jackson in the White House by Jon Meacham
• I Hear You: The Surprisingly Simple Skill Behind Extraordinary Relationships by Michael Sorensen
• Facism: A Warning by Madeleine Albright
• Army of None: Autonomous Weapons and the Future of War by Paul Scharre
• Drive: The Surprising Truth About What Motivates Us by Daniel Pink
• Warriors and Citizens: American Views of Our Military by Jim Mattis
• Washington: A Life by Ron Chernow
• Destined for War: Can America and China Escape Thucydides’s Trap? by Graham Allison
• The Open Organization: Igniting Passion and Performance by Jim Whitehurst
• The Accidental Superpower: The Next Generation of American Preeminence and the Coming Global Disorder by Peter Zeihan
• The Hundred-Year Marathon: China’s Secret Strategy to Replace America as the Global Superpower by Michael Pillsbury
• No Good Men Among the Living: America, the Taliban, and the War through Afghan Eyes by Anad Gopal

Memoirs:

• Small Fry: A Memoir by Lisa Brennan-Jobs
• Maybe You Should Talk to Someone by Loi Gottlieb
• The Happiness Project by Gretchen Rubin
• The Choice: Embrace the Possible by Edith Eger
• Five Presidents: My Extraordinary Journey with Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, and Ford by Clint Hill

Fiction:

• The Library Book by Susan Orlean
• Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng
• Ghost Fleet: A Novel of the Next World War by PW Singer
• Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion
• American Royals Katharine McGee

Parenting:

• Simplicity Parenting by Kim John Payne
• The Whole-Brain Child by Daniel Siegel
• Parenting With Love and Logic by Foster Cline
• How Toddlers Thrive by Tovah Klein
• The Gift of Failure by Jessica Leahy

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LTC Allie Weiskopf is a public affairs officer in the office of the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.  The views expressed are those of the author and do not reflect the official policy of the Department of Defense.