In a word, focus. I suppose it makes sense, routines bring about familiarity, a sense of comfort and efficiency. I mean, practice does make perfect..

I'm going to be totally honest and admit that my eyes glazed over when the author started recounting the details of the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic. Aside from anything else I really wasn't sure what purpose this served and didn't seem to segue smoothly into the topic the book was supposed to be covering and frankly was starting to trigger flashback anxiety. Even before this, the opening vignette, of comparing life to an emergency c-section and repeatedly being born was somewhat self-serving and...off-putting? Skimming past the opening, I found the book's lack of organization distressing, and saw no profit in continuing.

The Art of Routine was not quite the book I was expecting. I was hoping for a practical book on building and establishing routines but this was like a brain dump of stories, examples, and studies randomly selected on everything. The author seemed to veer off on tangents and spend a long time on issues not connected to the theme of the book. It rambled all over the place to way back in history, to religion, to babies etc., but there was no coherence or organisation. The authors writing style was good and easy but the whole book needed a serious edit and someone to pull it all together. I am a bit disappointed because the cover was so inviting with its fabulous picture, and the blurb seemed very promising. Maybe the author could produce a purely practical version with methods and tips for setting up and maintaining routines.

Parts of this book were interesting but I felt that it could have been a lot better. The author did a pretty good job of convincing me that routines were important for mental and physical health, though I wasn't completely convinced by the stories of super-elderly people who did things like routinely drank alcohol or smoked cigarettes (I'm pretty sure other factors led to their long lives despite their small unhealthy routines). The author switches gears halfway and then proposes that routines can be terrible for us if they are influenced by technology and the way it limits our choices. For instance, he talks about how our apps suggest music, routes, venues, etc. based on our previous decisions and it makes our worlds more and more narrow. He talks about one guy who created an app to give him totally random suggestions for music, places to go, etc. and how much better his life got. And then it goes into something about the workplace that didn't really seem relevant to the book or routines.

Nowhere in the book does it actually tell you how to establish routines, which I think would have been the most useful aspect of the book.

There were little points in here that I'll take with me, but on the whole I think it would have benefited from some ruthless editing and reworking. I enjoyed it but I don't think I'll remember most of it in a few weeks.

I read a digital ARC of this book via NetGalley

When I saw this title on NetGalley, it felt like the timing couldn’t have been more perfect – I am indeed pondering routines, setting myself up some better ones, for all sorts of things. And here’s a book about just that, right?! Urm, nope. The description wasn’t quite clear, it seems, and despite the mention of ‘routineology’, this book has – in my opinion – very little to offer to those looking to form better routines.

If that’s not what the book contains, then what is it? Well, it’s a bit of a random amble through some stories that might possibly if you squint have something vaguely to do with routines – maybe. I mean, early on I described it to someone as “waffling a bit about the Knights Templar and the Rolling Stones” and no, I’m still not entirely sure why. Chapters head off on all manner of tangents, with very little coherence or appearance of structure. It’s vaguely like an exam essay, starting off in all sorts of directions, semi-academic in tone, often leaving thoughts a little unfinished. Or maybe I just feel the whole topic was unfinished. Time bubbles, right got it – we want stability. Oh, but next chapter: we want to break out of predictable routines. Riiight. I mean, you can pull those together – but, nope. Off on another chat about sports or something before finally telling us that technology is bad, except when it was really good as mentioned previously.

I still might possibly have scored this a little higher – I mean, it’s not the book’s fault that I got the wrong end of the stick – but quite frankly I ended up loathing the author for taking every opportunity for some self-aggrandisement. There are far, far too many instances of some ‘cool’ little story that makes the author look like a hero and genius – “this time I saved that guy’s life, because I’m an amazing doctor, and I also ran super-impressive companies, and I write fantastic books” – urm, no, thank you. I don’t care, and trying to shoehorn the concept of routine into these was just the wrong way around anyway.

Oh, and then we’re also going to throw in as many references to COVID-19 as possible, to make it all very ‘now’ and super relevant. Except that doesn’t go anywhere, either – and a proper (or any, there’s none here) discussion of routines and lockdowns, for instance, could have made for a whole book. Still not the book I wanted, but more cohesive at least.

So, big fat ‘no’ from me. This is a disjointed meander through some weird topics supposedly under the theme of routine, but that’s a bit too much of a stretch. Not what I was looking for in the slightest, a waste of great cover art, and also just not a particularly interesting read altogether.

This book does not make the case for routine or explain how to develop and stick to a routine to achieve results. It is not a how-to book, rather it is a collection of stories/case studies that tell how people lived by routines and when I was reading that was insufficient for me because I had expected it to reveal how-to.

It's good for reading to acquire knowledge and bear in mind experiences from other people and maybe that does serve the purpose the authors intended.

Thanks Netgalley for the eARC.

I received an ARC in exchange for an honest review. I had such high hopes for this book. The topic really interested me and the cover is eye-catching, however the book missed the mark by a lot. This book is highly unorganized. The author starts by discussing routine as an unborn baby, then as a toddler then jumps to adulthood in a matter of a few pages. The remainder of the book is filled with stories that only loosely tie back to the topic of the art of routine. This book also gave itself a short shelf life by referencing COVID19 and policies regarding COVID19 that will be null and void within a few years time.

This wasn't the book I thought it was - I expected a book on how to build routines but in fact it was about how routines in and of themselves are important - with lots of stuff about how babies are protected in a bubble so you should be too. I gave up on this one

I actually agree with the author about the importance of routines and the need of structure of the human being. I just do not think we should avoid novelties because boredom is also a risk. Anyway an interesting reading even if I didn't like all the examples used to prove a point.

Sono d'accordo con l'autore sull'importanza delle routine e sul bisogno di struttura dell'essere umano, sono meno d'Accordo sull'Evitare le novitá anche perché la noia é anche un fattore di rischio. Comunque una lettura interessante anche se non tutti gli esempi mi sembravano poi cosí utili a provare un certo tipo di affermazioni.

I received a complimentary digital copy of the book in exchange for a honest review.