Reading habits · August 9, 2026

How to Annotate Books: A System That Survives the Second Read

Tabs, marginalia, highlighters and sticky notes — here's a simple annotation system that makes a book more useful the second time you open it.

The rule that makes annotation work

Mark why, not just what. A highlight with no reason attached is a mystery to your future self. Two words in the margin — "compare Ch3", "disagree", "use this" — is the whole game.

A four-symbol system

• Underline — the claim itself.
• Star — this matters to the argument.
• ? — I do not believe this, or I do not follow it.
• Box — a word or reference to look up.

Four symbols is enough. Systems with twelve get abandoned in week two.

Colour-coded tabs, if you like tabs

Pick three meanings and hold them across every book: one colour for quotes worth keeping, one for plot or argument turns, one for anything you want to look up. The value is consistency, not the palette.

Fiction annotation is different

For novels, mark texture rather than argument — a line that does something unusual, a foreshadow you spot, a character choice that felt wrong. Reading your own annotations on a reread is one of the genuine pleasures of the habit.

Do not annotate library books

Obvious, and worth saying. Sticky tabs and a separate note come out cleanly.

Get it off the page

Annotations trapped in a physical book are invisible when you need them. The passages worth keeping deserve to live somewhere searchable, tagged by book and page — that is the difference between a marked-up shelf and a working reference.

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