I agree, It depends upon which type of book you are going to read.
For me I start from the introduction of the book, then i read from first chapter, and if i enjoy the book i continue reading it to the end, but if the book is boring i just leave it,
It depends on what type of book.. for a novel i want to finish as fast as possible. for a textbook, i go to the chapter i am interested in. i have learnt over the years though that it is important to read through the preface section of the book
If it is a novel, I will just start reading and enjoying it. Otherwise, I will skim the catalog first in order to have a priliminary understanding of the book.
It depends on the book in question. if it is a technical book I scan through the Table of Contents to identify the content I am interested in reading; if a novel, I read all the pages but I read 2 pages per day, especially in the night.
It would be great to have this discussion read by young people who do not read books at all. There are books that you read for pleasure without stopping in one breath as Alexandre Dumas's famous novel "The Count of Monte Cristo". There are books like textbooks that simply give knowledge that you need to patiently comprehend. My strategy in reading fiction is in the following:
1 step. A brief acquaintance with the content of the chapters of the book to have a general idea
2 step. A detailed reading of the sequence of chapters, sometimes several times, if it particularly enthralls
3 step. Selective reading of key chapters, which contain a lot of interesting information
As for reading scientific books on my specialty, the strategy here is completely different. I do not read many chapters at all, I try to catch the main idea only. Why? Because the detailed presentation of the material is the author's creative laboratory and only he deeply understands his theory very well. I'm not trying to understand the sense of his book in detail, I'm trying to solve this problem myself in autrhor's book in order to create my own creative laboratory. Sometimes it works out. It may be very bad, but I like such approach.
The main goal of reading is to understand the text and help the reader to understand the required, so it was our duty to identify the skills and strategies of reading to increase their absorptive capacity and improve their educational attainment.
Despite the multiplicity of reading strategies in the curriculum, but all of them are under one vision, which is done before reading, and during and after reading, and all of the above depends on the type of book you read.
For my liking subject I wish to prefer the collection of the book for my individual library as I may not refer & to read a book immediately as in the line of my thinking phase or while referring my reading for another subject if i come in the notice of my reading for the subject in which i have also purchase a book i may start my reading .
It is not necessary for me to complete the book of the same sitting line as for writing i used to make out the subject of heading ,& subsequent with the understanding knowledge inspiration & sometime intuition i may start my writing for my own .