Tax Day is coming (April 15, in case you’ve been living under a rock), and I’m sure many of you are having the annual panic of gathering receipts and trying to remember which deductions are legal. But I’ve got a different kind of audit on my mind: the one where we all confess how much we actually spent on books this year.

Go ahead, do it. Open your Goodreads, your Amazon history, your bookstore app. Add up those purchases. Now add up the number of books you’ve actually read from that pile. Sit with that number for a moment. (I’ll wait. And judge you. Lovingly.)

Here’s the thing: every single reader has told themselves the same lie. “I’m going to read all of these.” You buy the book because it’s pretty, or because the premise is irresistible, or because it was on sale, or because your bookish bestie said it was life-changing. You stack it on your TBR with genuine, unshakeable faith that you will devour it within weeks. Months, maybe. You wouldn’t buy it if you didn’t plan to read it.

And yet. The TBR pile grows. Month after month. Year after year. It becomes a physical manifestation of optimism, ambition, and denial all rolled into one towering monument of glossy spines and beautiful covers.

I know this intimately, because I’m sitting here in my office surrounded by books I have written (yes, that’s my claim to fame) and books I will probably never read but bought anyway. (The irony is not lost on me.) My TBR is less a pile and more a small library. A beautiful, guilt-inducing small library.

The real audit, though, isn’t about the money. It’s about the hope. Every unread book represents a version of yourself who had time to read, energy to focus, and the luxury of being transported. That’s not wasted money. That’s an investment in the person you’re becoming, or at least the person you’re desperately trying to convince yourself you still are.

So this Tax Day, skip the calculator (or don’t, that’s between you and the IRS). Instead, pick one book from your TBR that’s been calling to you. And read it. One.

(The other 47 can wait until you’re caught up. Probably.)