Let's see what our people like to read, eh? Or do they like to read? After all these years, I've only had one character who read books religiously. She was a paladin, and literally would read whatever she was carrying, while sitting in chapel. Usually on Sundas. Hence, she actually did "read religiously".

But I haven't been with Dyan phor a'Cauz in a very long time. Most of my other characters, if they read at all, do so rather lightly. Their life is already full of enough adventure in most cases; so reading is rather secondary.

But anyways, let's see what our characters like to read. I am gaming with http://i.imgur.com/iziFkaq.png?1 tonight. Saga is my infamous Bosmer archer from Valenwood. I've been gaming with her since October of 2011 on three different platforms, for those who don't know her. Here are the books she's carrying ....

Cleansing of the Fane -- (Her 'main quest' is mostly the things Umbacano wants us to do).

Mysticism -- (Saga has always loved this magic school the most. She used to 'dual-wield' Detect Life when she was up-and-coming).

The Wild Elves

The Witches of Cyrodiil -- (this one is mod-added by Witchcraft, created by the lovely SubRosa, and has a lot of thoughtful things to learn about spirituality, beyond Aedra and Daedra). Lady Saga cares nothing about The Nine, or any of the Daedra, she is in pursuit of those areas of Nirnly life which are much more subtle.

Well, that's it for Saga, or at least, that's all she's got with her on her horse. What about youse guys?

Lothran used to read a lot, especially while in Bruma, but after having read the many books he likes 97 times he doesn′t feel like reading them for the 98th time. So nowadays he basically only reads a book he hasn′t come across before. It′s rare but it happens, it did in fact happen not long ago. Don′t remember what book it was, though.

Laying on his kitchen table in Bruma is one copy of Surfeit of Thieves which is a favourite. He also has Ransom of Zarek, The Buying Game, A Game at Dinner, The Black Arrow series and a few other books laying about here and there.

I love the 'A Dance in Fire' series. It is an epic tale that reminds me much of The Lord of the Rings. A common nobody who finds himself in circumstances fit for a renowned adventurer.

That is one thing which can wind up becoming an unofficial quest: trying to find the complete set of editions of one book series, and then bringing them all home (wherever home is) safely to rest. If I ever have another avid reader, I think this would make a cool mini-quest.

I've done that a fair amount in Morrowind, but I've never bothered in Oblivion, just because Havok is a pain in the butt, I can't really work up the interest in collecting books then stuffing them in containers and I haven't found a book placement mod that seemed worth the hassle.

For the most part then, my characters' preferences for books are expressed, to as great a degree as they exist (or not) in the houses I build for them.

Claudia's house, for instance, has enormous bookshelves stuffed full of things. I even created new versions of many of the skill books in the game so I could include them in her library without them being skill books. Her favorites are adventures - The Argonian Account, A Dance in Fire and the like, but there's nothing she doesn't like.

Cressida has an extensive library too, but she tends more toward histories and texts. She's very practical-minded, and values the knowledge gained more than the simply pastime of reading.

Jibran has a small but important collection of books in his Niben shack - mostly dramatic biography/adventures - Palla, The Mystery of Talara, Fall of the Snow Prince, that sort of thing.

It's rare for one of my characters to read in-game, just because it's not really something that's conveniently roleplayed. Most of the ones who do read do it in their spare time, when I'm not hovering over them, waiting for them to do something.

Maybe oddly, one current character that I actually roleplay reading is Clive the scumbag. I'm not even quite sure now when that started. Somewhere along the way, he was waiting for someone to show up for one of his assassination contracts and there was a book nearby that I hadn't read for a while (The Real Barenziah, all five volumes), so he read it while he waited. That established the precedent, and now he often reads while he waits for whatever it is he needs to wait for while he's doing a contract. He particularly likes biographies, and the more loathsome the better. He loves anything about the Wolf Queen.

I'm toying with the idea of giving Elenin a religious text to carry with her, but I haven't figured out yet just who it is, if anyone, to whom she's devout, so for the time being, it's just a notion.

I never had a character that'd actually collect books because almost none of my characters owned any kind of home, most of them prefer to live under moon and star and drift from town to town.

However, some of them liked reading, most notably my first character Amadeus. He liked reading because as I said, he was my first character and I was intrigued by reading as well.

Raven was probably my most avid reader, he spent a lot of time in the library of the AU, reading rare books. He also took some books which he found when exploring and brought them to the nearest mages guild.

Lothran found a new book today!

At least we didn′t recognize it; Thief. He found it upstairs in S′krivva′s house. As per usual, good story

Yes, Thief is a good book, Crow. I believe this is one of the only books Kahreem (my Redguard thief) has on the Marie Elena.

gpster: i was wondering what Clive would read. I figured Barenziah would fit his bill. Yes, the Havok system is terrible for book placement. If I could manage to get a book on a shelf at all, I'd usually just lay it sideways, and hope to be able to place another book on top of the previous one, also sideways. But mostly, bookshelves are for putting rare items on, while the actual books wind up laying horizontally on a floor, or some other surface.

This is one of the areas Skyrim trumps Oblivion: books get automatically placed on bookshelves if we activate these shelves. Otherwise, Skyrim is even worse than Oblivion is, so far as object placement goes.

My decrepit avatar is not much of a reader. At least he's not been during our association. I suspect his eyesight is a bit weak for it nowadays. Also, due to the sort of life he led for some years leading up to his fortunate unfortunate incarceration it is doubtful he would have had the opportunity or funds to invest in reading material.

As of late he's derived much pleasure from having his ward read aloud to him at the end of the day. He's not over picky about what she reads. I think he's more enamored by her voice than anything else . . . as if he doesn't get ample opportunities to hear it in the course of their daily routine.

My characters speak and read Cyrodiilic and trying to read books written in English doesn’t work out very well for them. They do open up all the books they run across just to see if they can get a skill boost out of them.