I came to this a bit late, but the topic is relevant in recent years as we contend with the harmful effects of the type of life that we've set up for ourselves and the harmful expectations of capitalism. It was a good examination of technology and psychology, as well as productivity, and how our relationships to those can be scrutinized and transformed.

From the description of this book and what I heard, it was quite different than expected. The case studies and examples belaboured the points early on and took multiple chapters to set up the framework of the book. A story about hippies living together on a compound and why that didn't work out was discussed extensively but didn't make a strong point. Taking time in nature and having regular places to go back to and visit are commonly accepted as good ideas, so I was left looking for more from this book.

I really wanted to like this book. It’s an interesting premise about activism and what we could be doing with our time; however, it’s so academic, slow, nearly inaccessible, and written as almost a navel-gazing session.

You can tell the author is a professor because the purpose and themes are buried in obscure references.

I was very excited to start this book, the title and topic were of high interest to me, the cover art was also fantastic, the perfect combination to draw me in. I can appreciate the work that went into this book, and I definitely learned things I hadn't been aware of before, but ultimately it fell short of expectations. The title makes you think it's going to be somewhat of a self-help book on how to resist the attention economy and be more present, etc. But instead of being self-help it was really more of an analysis and dissertation on attention. I also felt that it was far too autobiographical (without any warning or indication of such going in), to the point that it could have been classified as a memoir.

How to Do Nothing is an amazing exploration of our current attention-competing, dizzying world of information overload—and it would be a fabulous book if it just stopped there. But Odell actually offers insights into how to fight this modern cacophony of too-muchedness, leaving us with an improbably optimistic and refreshing view on a decidedly 21st-century problem

Very good book, but hard to describe. Surprisingly (in a good way) focused on ecology. I mostly listened to this book on daily isolation walks, and it was a perfect fit for that. The kind of book where I made sure to add most of the books she mentioned to my “to read list”

With such a title as "How to Do Nothing," one might have the mistaken idea that Jenny Odell's book is a self-help guide. Instead, it is Odell's thoughtful musings on the attention economy and the ways that she attempts to resist its lures and snares in favor of a more thoughtful life.

Featured in a column on the Beauty of Boredom:

"Up next on my own reading list in this category is How to Do Nothing (Melville House, $25.99) by Jenny Odell, which promises suggestions for "resisting the attention economy." (Shelf Awareness for Readers, June 4, 2019)

A book of essays lyrically written not exactly a self help book but a book that will capture your thoughts a special read a book to use while disengaging from the busy world.I will be gifting this to friends.#netgalley#melvillepress

This book is very important - it weaves together beautifully so many threads of thinking that matter for the issues our society is facing today: the attention economy, the importance of maintenance, the value of art, how we value production versus caregiving, the importance of place and time, and the need to care for our surroundings.

That said, I think this book is tripped up by being too focused on late 2010s buzzwords like "resistance" and just more political than it needs to be in general. Also I think more emphasis on the value of temporal bandwidth (knowing our history in order to increase the diversity of our thinking) would have been helpful.

But despite those disagreements I had with the book, this is a valuable read for anyone who wants to be prodded to think about how to live well in the world we currently inhabit.

Thanks to NetGalley, Jenny Odell, and the publisher for a chance to read an eARC of this book.

A timely title indeed! While it may be harder to follow for some rather than others, it's a great book to have and to gift! I bought this because I have trouble relaxing myself.

Really enjoyed it. Brings a lot of attention to the "attention economy," which is a phrase I've been using in my everyday speech. I've always hated social media, and this book gave me a lot of insight on its creep into the lives of everyone.

This book, as others have said, was not what I expected. It was slow-going for me to get through (and there are chunks of it I skimmed, pledging to come back to when I was in more of a state to process the information I was being given), but wow, is it powerful! It's not an easy read, despite what the cover or title may tell you. I, like others here, feel like this book would benefit a little more from a more accurate title and cover. However, I feel like it's vital reading, and I'll continue thinking about it and returning to it for months -- maybe years -- to come.

Thank you Melville House Publishing and Netgalley for this ARC.

I was attracted to this book for the title of ‘How to do nothing’ and also beautiful cover!

I was not able to finish this book. It was very different from what I had anticipated and rather than being a book on simplicity, creating space in life etc it felt bogged down with politics, academia and just too heavy for what I was hoping for,

I feel a different title and cover page may attract the market this book is designed for.
Thank you for the opportunity to review this book.

Like others, this book is not what I was expecting. I was expecting more of a how-to, self-help book but instead this is a very heady, very academic and well-researched treatise on attention, culture, and our society at large. I didn’t get to finish because of a slew of family events, but what I read I did...respect? I never was excited to pick the book back up, but once I did I always found the author’s arguments original and well-founded - I found myself wanting to highlight a LOT. This book is for deep thinkers, armchair philosophers, and those interested in peeling back the layers of our constructed reality.

Thank you for the opportunity to review "How to Do Nothing" by Jenny Odell. I've been working my way through this work slowly- 'tis the season for academics to be swamped with competing interests, but hey... isn't that the point of this work? To lift our eyes from all of the things that distract us and take moments to simply be present and notice the world around us? (I'd say something about being mindful here, but that isn't a word that Odell puts forth; of course there are many ways to take in the world...)
In any case, I've read most of HtDN, and so far, so good. I'm inclined to recommend it to friends based on my progress thusfar, and I look forward to making some moments to see how she wraps things up.

Not quite what I was expecting--based on the subtitle, it sounded like a handbook or self-help guide for mindfulness--but this collection of essays by Jenny Odell is lovely and lyrical, and will encourage you to slow down and do some deep thinking of your own.

I think my expectations for this book were different from what I got. When I initially heard the title, I thought the book was about how to find more space in your life, and that it's ok to take time for yourself. Even after I read that the book was more about "resisting the attention economy," I still was expecting something more in the realm of self-help, and less academic. I think How to Do Nothing is well-written, well thought out, and has terrific examples of how to resist and reconnect while seemingly doing nothing. I just think maybe this book wasn't for me.

"How to Do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy" is a call to action from American artist and writer Jenny Odell. Dealing with the ubiquitous right-now phenomenon of social media and big-data advertising, aka Facebook and Google (but many others as well), Odell exhorts us to move beyond "turning off" or quitting, to finding new ways (which are just old ways rebadged) to be present in the world while attempting, best as one can, to bend social media and the rest to our ends. Odell doesn't come at this most fascinating and vital issue with the eyes of an academic but as an artist and activist, and the book isn't easy going for a generalist and novelist like me. As she herself admits, her eagle eye skates all over the place, referencing all manner of art and politics, and her arguments can be dense to the point of loss of meaning, again when looked at from the perspective of an ordinary person like me. But in my reading, I forgave her all of that, because she offered exactly what I sought: intellectually fresh and lateral ways to view the issues. And she delivered in spades. I have tons of quotes from her pages to help me tease out my own views on this strange world I now inhabit. If, in the end, Odell's climax cum conclusions offered me little, the journey was more than worth it. Highly recommended for its careening intellect and visions.

In the great tradition of Emerson and Bookchin you will find in this book by Jenny Odell, "How to Do Nothing", a slidelong journey to find the hopeful possibilities of life in the Twenty-First Century. It is a remarkable book not the least for its range in discussion, bridging the very personal with the global and universal. Its as practical as it is reasonable and adventurous. I would say epic in scope, but if anything Odell reasons for a different sought of engagement, one where we understand ourselves and the world around us more fully. I don't know if this is a self help book for a person or a planet, either way she does a great job of engaging the reader.