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Would you count graphic novels? then I'm up there with you :)
At 50, with some perspective, I can see the heaviest reading period of my life was between 10-28 yrs. For instance, I read Atlas Shrugged twice but I was around 16 and 25 when I did so. I read Guns, Germs and Steel around 30--that's 20 years ago! So, maybe, as a Mottizen, the answer is simply that a lot of us already "did the work." We value books and have the knowledge, it's just a bit dated.
Here's another thing that happened: at some point in middle age, I realized I was just zoning out and getting through books but not absorbing much. Now when I read, I (almost literally) go over every page three time to make sure I really 'get it.' Maybe this is my brain crusting over or maybe I've become a better reader, but it definitely slows my pace. 50 pages an hour seems recklessly high to me, though I could surely do a 100 page Dog Man book in under an hour.
Also, my interest in literature has plummeted that has had a pretty big effect on the number of books I read. I read more non-fiction lately, but removing fiction (almost entirely) has put a pretty big hole in my overall time window. I suppose I replaced it with comics, but no one wants to hear that!
I watch almost no TV (5-ish hours a week of Netflix), my doom-scrolling is minimal (though I waste hours writing replies that I often end up deleting), and I spend most of my free-time recording music in my studio. As a family man, start-up, artist guy, reading is a hobby I have limited time for and don't enjoy as much as I once did.
Regardless, 89 books in a year is a lot by any measure, IMO. Go ahead an flex. Regardless of wasted time, most adults just don't have it in them to do that. Joyfully wasting a day with a book is just not a possibility. Still, I know people who haven't read a book since they graduated from college. I don't think that's actually rare and it's a damn shame. If someone told me they read a ~300 page book every month, I'd probably give them a cookie.
Depends how long you spend appreciating the pathos and moral depth of the redemption of Petey the Cat.
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