It's that time again! My 2018 reading goals will be going up soon, but first I need to take a look back at my 2017 goals. Here's what I wanted to do, and how I did.
1. Read fewer than 50 books from my to-read list.
Success! I only read 43 from my to-read list. I actually started to wonder how many of my books really came off my to-read list in previous years, as it might not be as many as I thought. I decided to keep tracking the books I read off my main to-read list again this year, as my list can sometimes feel like a bottomless pit and it's good to see the progress I've made.
2. Read some books over a thousand pages.
I read Don Quixote, Bleak House, and Infinite Jest, and I'm partway through The Stand. I also read some books on the longer end that weren't over the 1000-page mark, including Vanity Fair, The Three Musketeers, and The Brothers Karamazov.
3. Catch up on some classics.
I got through a ton of these, including The Picture of Dorian Gray, Crime and Punishment, Sophie's Choice, The Sun Also Rises, and Stranger in a Strange Land, plus the extra-long ones listed above.
4. Read something my sister recommends.
This year my sister picked You by Caroline Kepnes, which was a weird book that I can't say I really liked, but I appreciate that she got me out of my comfort zone a bit. I'd take another recommendation from her this year!
5. Make use of my personal reading area.
I did a pretty good job of this in the first half of the year, but I've gotten away from it. Mainly that's because I've been trying to get to sleep earlier, which means as soon as my son's asleep I get ready for bed, so that's cut out most of my evening reading time. My reading area is also right next to the bedroom door, so even if it's my husband's turn to do bedtime I can't read because I can hear them talking. Weekend naptime is my other downtime to read and I was taking a class on Saturday afternoons the last few months. We'll see if I can get back to reading in my special reading chair more regularly this year.
6. Read books on my new Kindle Voyage.
I've definitely used my Kindle a lot more this year since getting the Voyage for Christmas in 2016. We took a week-long trip to Mexico in May and it was glorious to have all the books I could want in one slim case. I still read on my phone more than on my Kindle since I don't bring my Kindle with me everywhere, but I like reading on the Kindle when I can.
7. Read book club picks more than a week in advance.
I did really well with this in 2017! I didn't always get them read a full week in advance, but having that goal meant that I didn't have any more situations where I was scrambling to finish the book the morning of. The downside is that sometimes my memory's fuzzy if it's been a few weeks since I finished it, but I've usually written enough key points in my Goodreads review that it doesn't matter.
8. Host a book club meeting in the first half of the year.
Success! I hosted in March. There's enough of us in the club that I shouldn't have to host again until late summer or fall of this year.
9. Comment on other book blogs more often.
I did really well with this in the first half of the year, and then in June Delicious Bookmarks stopped working, which is where I saved all the links for the pages I commented on so I could go back to look for replies later. I'd already switched all my other bookmarks to Diigo but kept my comment tracking in Delicious, and I don't want to have two separate Diigo accounts so I need to find a different site. I just haven't put in the work to find a replacement yet. Any suggestions?
10. Promote the Best of the Bunch linkup more.
This is the one thing I didn't do a great job with this year. One thing I did do was start enforcing that people who submit a post have to have a link on that post to the Best of the Bunch linkup, so no one gets free publicity for their blog without also publicizing the linkup to their own readers, but so far this has just resulted in people not linking up rather than adding a link on their own post. If you have any ideas of how to get more people to join in, let me know!
How did you do with your book-related resolutions in 2017?
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