How do you work through books?

Alright, so I've gotten myself a few chessbooks. Do you guys just read the book itself, playing through the scenarios in your head, or do you actually pick up a board and play through the lines?

It's better to actually play the moves on the board. But tha's because i can't visualize the moves on my head yet.

Depends on the book, which ones did you get?

"The Amateurs Mind" by Silman and "My System" by Nimzovich.

I play the moves out on a board but then I play out the variations in my head. I've had good success with this method. 

I would recommend starting with "The Amateurs Mind". Both are great books but I think "The Amateurs Mind" would be a good introduction into the other. 

I generally get comfortable, open the book, focus in, fall asleep, wake up a couple of hours later.

I have a real hard time using chess books. I prefer interactive or video teaching as oppossed to 4 lines of notation to prove something.

You'll need a chessboard while reading My System, I don't know about Amateur Mind by Silman.

Just books in general, according to speed reading techniques, you get a general idea of the contents of the book by looking at the table of contents and the actual pages, pretty quickly. 

Then you go over it again seeing what jumps out at you. You go over it a few times to see what else jumps out at you. Then you can revisit whatever parts of the book you want to look at in more detail. 

Is there a book on how to read chess books? ;-)