First, get rid of "should." There is actually no moral high ground in reading, in spite of the fact that it is demonstrably good for you. Exercise and vegetables are also good for you: we already know these things and don't need to be told.
Let's say you enjoyed reading a long time ago, maybe when you were a child, and you don't enjoy it now and would like to try to enjoy it again: this might be the blog post for you.
I agree with Zadie Smith that reading takes practice, and with Maryanne Woolf that one's skills can get rusty.
My advice?
* Start small.
Maybe you try reading a short story or two? (I have Abbey Mei Otis's Alien Virus Love Disaster: Stories by my bed right now).
Or maybe that's still too much: flash fiction is a great genre: entire stories in 300 words or less (Dan Rhodes's Marry Me is one of my favorite collections in this genre).
Or maybe a novel that has short chapters (Bonnie Garmus's Lessons in Chemistry is great. I think the series tanked? I didn't watch it. Don't let that put you off the book.)
* Start simple.
Maybe you don't want a complex cast of characters in a multi-generational family epic to contend with at first. Maybe something that keeps you in the head of a single narrator over a relatively simple plot line (Elizabeth Strout O William!, Allegra Goodman Sam).
Or maybe you start with a travel narrative, which will also keep you in the head of a single narrator and, while there is generally some kind of arc to the narrative, the basic premise is "person travels from A to B with interesting results," one's focus can fade in and out a bit and the narrative will forgive you (J. Martin Troost The Sex Lives of Cannibals, Alexa Bruie Cathedrals of the Flesh: My Search for the Perfect Bath ).
*Start with something YOU want to read.
It doesn't have to be Shakespeare, Dostoyevsky, or Faulkner. Vampire novels intended for adolescents? Great. The Kama Sutra? Wonderful. Whatever you want to read is a great thing to be reading.
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