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The 18 Best Ways to Make Money by Reading Books
For anyone who loves to read books.
When I was younger, it was always my dream to become a professional reader. I wanted my entire day job to be reading books, thinking critically about what was good, what was bad, and what I would change, and then sharing my thoughts with other people. I really expected this to be a full-time job.
Unfortunately, there’s no book-reading degree. You can’t get a nine-to-five job as a professional book reader. (At least not yet.) But it is possible to make money by reading books online and offline. I’ve got 18 ways listed right here. Some of these are pretty typical, and some of these are a little more unconventional, but all of these will result in you earning money from reading books.
I’ve separated these into four different categories of ways to make money from reading books: social media, jobs, review sites, and others.
Make Money Reading Books for Social Media
One of the most standard and fun ways to make money by reading books is to create a social media profile where you gain a reputation for reading books, having interesting thoughts, and influencing others to read or not read particular books.
All you need to get started is a way to post. You don’t even need to buy books at first — use a library card or a Hoopla account to read books for free.
Here are a few of the best ways to make money by reading books using social media.
1. Post your video thoughts on BookTok (and BookTube, and BookStagram).
TikTok gets a bad rap, but it’s actually boosting literacy rates in America. I personally have read plenty of BookTok books that I loved, including The Hating Game, anything by Emily Henry, and The Song of Achilles, to name a few.
The good news is that BookTok is one of the best ways to make money by reading books.
Here’s how it works. This process is similar to any of the video-format book reviews.
First, create an account. Make it clear that it’s about book reviews. Explain what genre of books you like.