2018 Reading Goals

I used to just read.  I never thought about how many books I was going to read or what kind of books I would read.   I never made goals.  I simply read.  So why make goals now?  A couple of reasons - when you have a lot of demands on your time, reading can easily fall by the wayside so planning for it says 'this is important and therefore I must make time for it,'   Also if you have a book journal, a blog, a book tube channel or bookstagram, you need content and making goals helps ensure you will have something to talk about.

I saw a book tube video recently where the person said they set their GoodReads Reading Challenge Goal to 1 book so they wouldn't feel pressured if they weren't making their goal.  I get it, especially since I did not meet my original 50 book goal for 2017 and had to lower it.  Still I want my challenge to reflect a reasonable number of books that I expect to read this year.  I know I will at least read 2 books per month which would be 24 but more likely I will read 3 books per month (2 book club and one for me) so that would be 36.  To stretch myself a just a little more I have set the goal at 40 and that feels comfortable.  If it starts to look like I will not make that target, I hereby give myself permission to change the goal.  Problem solved.

I do have a few specific reading goals I would really like to accomplish this year.  If I write them down one of two things will happen.  Either I will try harder to achieve them or I will ignore them completely.  Let's see what happens

1.  Finish the Series

The 4th and Final book in the Wicked series

The 3rd Book in the Shades of Magic Series

The 3rd Book in the ACOTAR series

2.  Read books that are waiting on my Kindle:

Finish in progress:  Elantris, Strangeville, The Sister,  A Tree Grows in Brooklyn

Try a Chapter:  The Bedlam Detectie, Bridget Jone's Diary, The Wolf in the Attic,The Glass Books of the Dream Eaters, The Paper Magician, The Search for Anne Perry, The Butterfly Sister

Decide if I am going to DNF:  Out of the Shoebox, Gifts of the Blood, Anna Karenina, Bellefleur

Other goals - 

DNF more books if I don't like them, there are too many wonderful books waiting to waste time.

Be more honest with my Star ratings on Goodreads and not feel guilty about saying I didn't like a book.

Happy Reading!

My 2017 Reading Year

If you are wondering why you should join Good Reads, the Reading Challenge and Reading Year wrap up is a really good reason.  They provide some interesting statistics about the books you have read and seeing all the covers together is really beautiful.  

I set my 2017 goal at 50 (same as 2016 which I exceeded by 7) but ended up lowering to 45.  Instagram is entirely to blame for the reduction in reading time.  

I listened to both the shortest and the longest books on audio CD

I enjoyed Winter which was the conclusion to the Lunar Chronicles Series.

I did not enjoy Let It Snow which was too similar to Dashing Through the Snow by the same author which I had listened to earlier in the month. 

Most and least popular refers to how many people have read those books not necessarily how well they enjoyed them.  Trampling in the Land of Woe has an average 4.5 Star rating.

My average rating should actually be lower.  The Good Reads rating system defines 1 Star as "I did not like it", 2 Star as "It was ok", 3 Star as "I liked it", 4 Star as "I really really liked it" and 5 star as "It was amazing".  I tend to overrate books because at my work 1 Star and 2 Stars are considered negative on reviews.  A lot of books I rated 3 should really have been 2.  In the later half of the year, I made an effort to think of it in terms of how much I enjoyed the book regardless of how well it is written (or not).

Happy to say both of these are accurate ratings!

Highlights:  

Finished 3 series (Lunar Chronicles, Raven Cycle, Miss Peregrine's Peculiar Children, Six of Crows duology)

Read 3 Graphic Novels (Wires and Nerve, Through the Woods, Anya's Ghost)

Favorite books of the year:  All 3 graphic novels,  The Girl Who Played With Fire, Crooked Kingdom, The Coldest Girl in Coldtown, Ender's Game

Least favorite books of the year:  The Perfect Poison, A Natural History of Dragons, Let it Snow, The Longest Ride

Update - I just realized I did't add The Martian to my Read shelf on GoodReads.  I listened to the audio CD in the summer.  The narrator was superb; he had just the right tone and inflection.  I almost quit listening 3/4 of the way through because there were so many heart stopping events that I couldn't take any more!   Adding this book did not change any major stats other than page count.