How to Annotate Books for Fun – Plus my Favorite Book Annotation Supplies

When I used to think of annotating, my head would immediately turn to school. Being forced to highlight and write notes about a piece of text is a classic school assignment. But as I have grown older (ew) and moved away from my years in school, I have grown to love the act of annotating my books. If you are interested in learning how to annotate books for fun, stick around, I am writing an entire post about it!

The first thing that drew me into annotating books was the aesthetic of it. I would scroll through my feed on bookstagram and would constantly see these beautiful images of annotated books using 10 different colors and 100 different sticky notes. I was mesmerized by the process and outcome.

This led me to look more into the subject where I found Youtube videos of people teaching others how they annotate their books. I found so many wonderful creators giving readers a peek into how they mark up their books.

A few of my favorite annotating videos are linked below:

I also love reading other bloggers’ takes on annotating! Here is a fantastic post from The Wordy Habitat all about annotating. They go into so much detail, please go check out their post! I also love this post from Mollie Reads! They give so many examples of how to annotate books for fun!

After all my research, and once I got the hang of it through photos and videos, I decided to try it for myself. The first book I decided to annotate was about one year ago, and it was The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins. I started with my favorite book that I have read multiple times already so I could really focus on analyzing the text I was reading. If you are trying to figure out what the first book you annotate will be, I recommend choosing something you’ve read before, or a book in your favorite genre.

Rereading my favorite book and adding my thoughts and emotions throughout was such a special experience. I was immediately addicted to annotating books for fun. It has become such a relaxing and creative pastime. In this post, I am going to talk about the art and joy of annotating books in detail, along with all the supplies I keep in my annotation kit.

Disclaimer: This post contains affiliate links. I make a commission through these links with no impact on your purchase. Thank you. For more information, click here!

---

What Does it Mean to Annotate Books?

The definition of annotating a book is reading and analyzing a piece of text, and then adding the thoughts, feelings, and ideas that pop into your head directly into the text.

You can probably remember being given paragraphs or pieces of text and being forced to annotate them in middle school and high school. At least I remember that vividly. I always hated it. I would highlight random sentences and rephrase things without actually taking any of the information in. But looking back, it was a good skill they were trying to teach. I was just lazy and didn’t like doing things that felt unnecessary.

But like I said, the further away from school, the more I have started to fall in love with the art of annotation, especially for the books I read for fun.

Why Should You Annotate Books?

There is no right or wrong reason for annotating books for fun. You can choose to annotate every book you read or you can choose to never touch a sticky note and highlighter in your life. One option is not better than the other.

BUT, if you are looking for some reasons why you should, here are a few benefits of annotating books:

1. Actually Remembering the Plot of the Book: Am I the only one who reads a book and then completely forgets the entire plot and cast of characters as soon as I close the last page? Because I don’t remember nearly as much as I should. However, when I annotate books for fun, I tend to remember a lot more about them because I am being more analytical with them.
2. Becoming a Better Writer: If you didn’t know, one of my goals is to become a published author. So, one of the steps toward that goal is taking a deeper look at the books I am reading. I am going that through annotation. I look at what I liked and what I didn’t like in a book and try to figure out what the author did to achieve it.
3. It’s Fun and Creative: The first thing that attracted me to annotating books was the creative/aesthetic aspect of it. The end result is just so pretty, you know what I mean? So obviously I love having fun with it when I am highliting lines and adding my thoughts to the margins of my favorite chapters. For example, one of my favorite methods of annotation is adding doodles and images to a block of text.
4. Makes You More Observent: When you are annotating books for fun, you have to pay more attention to the words you are reading. That’s why you remember the plot and characters better. But it also makes you more observent in your every day life as well. Annotating books has opened my eyes and made me see things in my daily life I normally would have brushed past.

What Supplies do you Need to Annotate a Book?

All you need to annotate are two things:

1. A book
2. A writing utensil (pen, pencil, crayon, whatever you want)

The basics of annotation can be done with literally any writing instrument in any color you can get your hands on. Although, I wouldn’t really recommend a crayon…

But if you are looking at being extra like I am, and you want the aesthetic, here are some book annotation supplies in my collection that I love and use regularly:

• Sticky Notes (Click here to see my favorite)
• Book Annotation Tabs (Click here to see my favorite)
• Colorful pens (Click here to see my favorite)
• Ruler for underlining (Click here to see my favorite)
• Notebook (Click here to see my favorite)
• Notecarfs (Click here to see my favoirte)
• Colorful highlighters (Click here to see my favorite)

How do you Annotate a Book Without Ruining it?

The first time I annotated a book, I had to go out and find an extra, used copy so if I messed up I still had my original… I was terrified.

So, if you are like me, and you are terrified of writing in your books out of fear of ruining them, or messing up don’t worry! You can still annotate your books without ruining them with sticky notes, reading journals, and more.

1. Sticky Notes

I mentioned these earlier, but these are great for annotating without writing in the book. You can purchase stick notes in a ton of different sizes and shapes to fit the thoughts you are having about a book.

Getting a sticky note set like this one from Amazon, which you can find here, is perfect for annotating. It gives you options for sizing and shape to perfectly fit the annotation you are making. You can also get packs like this in other colors from Amazon if this doesn’t match your aesthetic.

2. Clear Sticky Notes

One of my absolute favorite ways to annotate books without actually writing in them is clear sticky notes. These went viral on Twitter a couple of years ago because someone posted about them and the bookish Twitter community went crazy. (I can’t find the original post but credit to them for this idea lol)

Anyway, they are absolutely ingenious, especially if you want to underline specific lines in the book without putting ink to paper.

This pack from Amazon, which you can find here, is a great value and you get clear sticky notes in a bunch of different sizes. Just make sure to use ballpoint pens, not gel, and allow the ink to dry before you close the book or turn the page!

Note: These are made of plastic, so they aren’t the best for the environment. But in the grand scheme of things, you using a couple plastic sticky notes isn’t going to end the world, creating legislation that checks large corporations is going to make the biggest difference.

3. Note Cards

Another one of my favorite ways to annotate without writing in the book is using notecards. When I was annotating The Starless Sea by Erin Morgenstern, I kept a pack of notecards beside me and I would summarize each chapter after reading it. I would then slip that notecard into the pages of the book.

I personally like using colorful notecards, like these from Amazon, but they also sell them in white and neon colors. When I use notecards to annotate, I select the color I write notes on based on my feelings about the chapter (I will go into more detail on my annotation color key later in the post). Then I can go back and easily find which chapters made me feel which emotions.

4. Reading Journal

Finally, a great way to make notes while reading is simply by using a notebook. You can note the chapter or page number you are referring to and write down any and all thoughts you have while consuming the story.

You can get a fancy reading journal specifically created to take notes about the books you read, like this one from Amazon! Or any old notebook will do. You can even fold some pieces of paper, staple them, and make your own notebook!

A note on this topic, books are just objects, so if you want to write directly in the book but are too afraid to ruin it, don’t be! What is the worst that can happen? That you have a scribble in the book? Gives it more character in my opinion! I have always wanted to pick a used book up from a thrift store and see someone’s annotations in it. That would be such a fun reading experience.

Writing in books doesn’t ruin them!

Anyway, here is an example of book annotation without actually writing in the book:

What is a Book Annotation Kit and How Do you Make One?

Once I started really getting into annotating my books for fun, I realized I needed a little kit to bring with me whenever I was reading a book. This is especially true if you like to take your books to a coffee shop and pretend you are the main character of a movie, reading, annotating, and sipping a latté.

Many people use different things when creating their kits, and you can even buy premade ones on Etsy. But for me, I made my own annotation kit, which consisted of a zipper pouch full of the pens, highlighters, tabs, and sticky notes I am currently using.

I use this “BOOKS!” pouch from my Redbubble shop. Just so everyone knows exactly what my priorities are when they see my book annotation kit. Here is a picture of it without any actual annotation supplies in it lol…

What’s included in a book annotation kit?

• Multiple colors of pens or pencils
• Highlighters
• Sticky Notes
• Note Cards
• Annotation color key (more on that later)
• Book annotation tabs

What Books Should You Annotate?

When looking at what books you should annotate, anything and everything you want is perfect! Literally, anything with words in it can be annotated. But if this is the first time you are entering the world of annotating books for fun, here are some of the best places to start:

• Your favorite book
• A piece of non-fiction (to get in the annotating mood, it is easier to annotate non-fiction, and most people have done this before)
• A book you really hated (It is so fun writing why you hate a book, maybe I’m just a hater)

What is the Difference Between Annotating Books for Fun and for Learning?

For some, the transition between annotating for school and annotating for fun is a difficult one. You can look at a piece of fiction and have no idea what you should be highlighting except maybe some metaphors because that is what we have learned in all our years of school.

However, with annotating for fun, there are completely different things to focus on. Think about why you read for fun. There are one million different reasons, but a few include escapism, feeling something, and simply for fun. So when you are annotating these books, you want to focus on those aspects. What made you smile, what made you angry. Emotion plays a larger role in annotating for fun rather than for learning.

How to Annotate Books for Fun

Alright, we have talked about all the supplies you will need along with different methods and purposes of annotating. But what should you actually annotate while reading a book for fun? It isn’t exactly like school, where you are just trying to find the most important pieces of information. It is certainly different.

Deciding what to annotate in books you are reading for fun is completely personal but here are some ideas to get you started:

• Highlight some favorite quotes
• Note characterization you found successful or unsuccesful
• Highlight aspects of the book that made you feel something
• If you didn’t like something, write why
• Sensory details that caught your attention
• Doodle something inspired by the book on one of the pages
• Did the story give you an idea? Write it directly into the pages
• Record random thoughts that pop into your head while reading
• Note the motifs so you can look back at them later
• Is the author using a trope you love/hate? Note that!

As you can see, these ideas for annotation are a lot different from academic annotation. There is a lot less pressure, so have fun with it, and mark up your book as much or as little as you want. You aren’t being graded on this!

Here is a book annotation example from my copy of The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins:

I make note of descriptions that I love and sensory details that Collins includes in the writing. Usually, I annotate anything that sparked my interest while reading the pages. I am not too detailed in my annotation because I let salient details come out of the page rather than searching them out.

Book Annotation Color Key

With all the different highlighter and pen colors I have in my book annotation kit, I always create a color code for my book annotations. It makes it easier to identify my notes, and it looks pretty. Below is an example of the color key I use when annotating books for fun. Don’t mind my messy handwriting…

I will use these colors to both highlight and write notes, so when I look back at my annotated book I know exactly what I was thinking before I even read the note. It creates a wonderful rainbow of thoughts and ideas in my book.

---

Annotating books for fun is one of my absolute favorite activities, so this post was a lot of fun to write. Remember, there is no right or wrong way to do this. You don’t have to do it at all if you don’t want to. That is the beauty of hobbies, they are completely at will!

What is your favorite way to annotate books? Let me know in the comments below, I am always looking for more ideas!