Reading a book in a single go is closer to watching a film than to normal reading. Nothing leaks out between sessions. The mood holds. You come out the other side still inside it — which is an experience most readers only get a handful of times a year, usually by accident.
Why it's the best cure for a stalled reader
Finishing is the feeling that keeps people reading, and long books ration it severely. A one-sitting book hands it over the same day. If you haven't completed anything in months, this is a far better move than starting something ambitious — the argument we make in short books to beat a reading slump.
Two hundred pages you finish beats six hundred you abandon. Every time.
Ten that fit an afternoon
Small Things Like These — Claire Keegan. Of Mice and Men — John Steinbeck. The Old Man and the Sea — Ernest Hemingway. Convenience Store Woman — Sayaka Murata. We Have Always Lived in the Castle — Shirley Jackson. The Stranger — Albert Camus. Animal Farm — George Orwell. Binti — Nnedi Okorafor. A Monster Calls — Patrick Ness. Metamorphosis — Franz Kafka.
Several of these are out of copyright and free to read.
How to actually set it up
Pick a real window — three hours, not "sometime". Phone in another room, not face down. Something to drink so you don't manufacture an excuse to get up. And choose a book with momentum rather than one that demands notes; this isn't the session for a dense literary novel.
Read one together
A one-sitting book is the ideal thing to read alongside someone, because the window is small enough that you'll both actually finish. No scheduling a six-week buddy read. On Arwy you can see who else is currently in the same book and talk while you're both still inside it — and with something this short, "still inside it" lasts an afternoon rather than a month.
Finish something today. Get Arwy on Google Play.