I review a lot of books. When I was in seminary, I read 1 book every 5 days for 3 years and have continued that pace for the last 9 years. If you are a leader and you aren’t reading at least one book at a time, you are falling behind and short changing your church and those you lead.

I get asked a lot why my reviews always seem to end with “if you are a leader, you should read this book.” Or, “if you are a parent, or married, you should read this.” All my reviews tend to end with “you should read this book.”

Here is a principle that guides my reading and leads to write “positive” book reviews:

You don’t need to finish every book that you start.

Now, if you are a list person and love crossing things off your list, this will be difficult. But every book doesn’t need to be finished. Sure, someone took the time to write it and you took the time to buy it, but you don’t need to finish it.

For me, if a book has not grabbed me by page 40-50, I put it down. It isn’t worth finishing. If you can’t convince me to read it by then, it isn’t going to get any better.

So, I start a lot of books that I never finish, that never get reviewed. Doing this, helps me to read only the best books.