Tag Archive for: reading goals

Top Ten Tuesday – My Reading and Blogging Goals for 2024

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Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.  Top Ten Tuesday has been one of my favorite memes ever since I started blogging, so huge thanks to Jana for taking over the hosting duties!

This week’s TTT topic is Bookish Goals for 2024.  I think most of these are repeats of goals I had for 2023, either because I failed at them last year or because I did well and really want to continue to work on that same goal in the coming year.

 

via GIPHY

My Reading and Blogging Goals for 2024

 

1)  My number one goal this year is pretty much a forever goal at this point and that’s to read more of the books I own.  ARCs will always have my heart so I’m not even going to say I’m cutting down on how many I read because we know that’s not true, but I’m determined to keep putting a dent in the unread books I own either by finally reading them or else purging them if I’m no longer interested in reading them.  I’m setting a personal goal for myself of reading and/or unhauling 70 books I already own, starting with the 24 in 2024 list I posted on Bookstagram last week.  I’ve already read 3 of those books, DNF’ed 1 other, and unhauled 6 others I was no longer interested in reading so hopefully that bodes well for a good year.

 

2)  This is also a repeat goal for the past 3 years.  I really want to continue to only participate in blog tours where I have already requested a review book.  I’ve done really well with that the past two years, mainly sticking with Berkley Romance tours, but it’s always so tempting when someone reaches out with a tour opportunity.

 

3)  This is also an ongoing goal since my struggle to finish series continues.  I did actually complete several from my list last year, but there are always more. For this year, I have 6 series on my shelf that I want to finish and 7 sitting on my shelf that I want to start.

Series I Want to Finish or Get Caught Up On: 

  • Bridgerton (5 books left)
  • Outlander (4 books left)
  • The Bergman Brothers (4 books left)
  • Chestnut Springs (3 books left)
  • Dreamland Billionaires (1 book left)
  • Legendborn (1 book left to get caught up)

Series I Want to Start:

  • Windy City
  • The Off Campus Series
  • Heartstopper
  • Slammed
  • Twisted
  • The Edens
  • Hoops

 

4)  This is also a repeat goal from the past two years.  I really want to continue to grow my Bookstagram account.  When I started having so many tech issues and glitches on my blog in 2023, I really started pushing hard to grow my bookstagram account and post almost everyday since I knew I needed a reliable way to still get my reviews, etc. out there if my blog went down.  I also discovered I really like taking bookish photos and having a word limit that I can’t go beyond since I can be long-winded in my reviews. In my mind, I have an unofficial goal of reaching 20,000 followers this year, but all of the tech issues seem to be on that platform this year so we’ll see how it goes.   If you have a bookstagram account and are not already following me, you can give me a follow at https://instagram.com/thebookishlibra

 

5)  Re-reading more.  This is also a repeat goal and one I mostly failed at in 2023, aside from re-reading Fourth Wing and Crescent City 1 to get back into the swing of things before their next books came out.  I have a few old favorites that I’d like to try to read this year, but we’ll see how it goes.

  • To Kill a Mockingbird
  • Pride and Prejudice
  • ACOTAR series
  • The Handmaid’s Tale
  • The Invisible Life of Addie Larue
  • Throne of Glass
  • Jane Eyre
  • The Winternight Trilogy

 

6) I am aiming to keep my Netgalley percentage at 90% or above in 2024.  I did very well with this goal in 2023, finishing the year at 93%.  I know I can’t keep it that high, but if I could maintain 90, I’d consider that a success.

 

7)  I say this every year, but in 2024, I want to read more Nonfiction.  Last year I failed miserably and only read one nonfiction book, but this is the list of books I’d like to read.

  • What Unites Us by Dan Rather
  • Oath of Honor by Liz Cheney
  • We Should All Be Feminists by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
  • Code Girls: The Untold Story of the American Women Code Breakers Who Helped Win WWII by Liza Mundy
  • D-Day Girls: The Spies Who Armed the Resistance, Sabotaged the Nazis, and Helped Win WWII by Sarah Rose
  • Spare by Prince Harry
  • Untamed by Glennon Doyle
  • Where the Light Enters, Building a Family, Discovering Myself by Jill Biden

 

8)  This is also a forever goal, haha.  In 2024, I really want to work on being better organized, particularly when it comes to blogging ahead and with scheduling my instagram posts.  I’m usually frantically writing posts the night before I want to post them and I would love to be able to get most, if not all, of my posts for the week done the weekend before.

 

9)  Blogging More Consistently.  I used to be pretty good at this, but 2023 proved super challenging with all of those tech issues. I got so frustrated and would just abandon my blog for days at a time. I wondered for a while there if it was time to dump the blog, but I still love it so much and the fact that I was mad that I couldn’t blog and interact with this community I’ve grown to love, told me I just needed to resolve the issues once and for all.  With the exception of this week, which started off a little crazy (as you can tell since I’m posting my TTT post on Wednesday, haha), I’ve been trying to blog a little more consistently to make sure things are working properly. They seem to be so fingers crossed that I’ll be back on track for my weekly 3-4 blog posts.

 

10) I am doing the Goodreads Challenge and have set my goal at 175 books again this year.  I read 210 books in 2023 and could probably replicate that this year since we have cancelled our cable TV.  I stream a few shows here and there, but for the most part, I spend almost all of my downtime reading.  But to keep it from being too stressful, although still challenging, I’m aiming for 175.

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Do we share any bookish goals this year?

Top Ten Tuesday – Reading/Blogging Goals I Still Want to Accomplish Before the End of the Year

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Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.  Top Ten Tuesday has been one of my favorite memes ever since I started blogging, so huge thanks to Jana for taking over the hosting duties!

This week’s TTT topic is Reading Goals I Still Want to Accomplish Before the End of the Year.  I’m adding in blogging goals since I focused on both in my initial post about goals for 2023.  I have to admit that most of my goals have been a huge fail this year.  When Jetpack started trying to charge money to be able to auto-share across platforms – something that had been a free feature ever since I started my blog, I got discouraged. Then I got even more discouraged when good old Elon made it so you can’t use Jetpack to share to twitter, X, or whatever he’s calling it these days.  On top of that, I’ve been having so many database corruption issues. I’m hoping those are resolved now that I stopped trying to fix it myself and paid my ISP to figure it out.  In the meantime, I’ve been focusing more and more on my Bookstagram account.  I still love my blog and the blogging community though so here’s where I stand on my 2023 goals and which ones I think are still doable.

 

via GIPHY

Revisiting My Reading and Blogging Goals for 2023

 

1)  My number one goal this year is a repeat goal from the past three years and that is to read more of the books I own.  My goal for this was 70 and I’ve read 52 so not too bad.

2)  This is also a repeat goal from 2022 and 2021.  I really want to continue to only participate in blog tours where I have already requested a review book.  I’ve only done a handful of blog tours this year and those were almost all for Berkley Romance, specifically some of my most anticipated reads of the year so I’m happy with my progress here.

3)  This is also an ongoing goal since my struggle to finish series continues.  I’ve not done very well on this one at all.

Series I Want to Finish or Get Caught Up On: 

  • Lifelike by Jay Kristoff (2 books left) – I did finish this series.
  • The Aurora Cycle (2 books left) – Still have 1 book left as of this post.
  • The Inheritance Games (2 books left) – I did finish this series.
  • City of Brass (2 books left) – Haven’t touched this one.
  • Crescent City (Re-read book 1, then read book 2) – I’m all caught up on this one.
  • Bridgerton (5 books left) – I’ve only read one Bridgerton book this year but do hope to read more before the end of the year.

Series I Want to Start:

  • The Consortium Rebellion – Fail
  • Six Crimson Cranes – Read both books.
  • The Celestial Kingdom – Fail
  • The Great Library – Fail – I’m no longer interested in reading this one.
  • The Invisible Library – Fail – I’m no longer interested in reading this one.
  • The Bloodsworn Saga – Fail

4)  This is also a repeat goal from the past two years.  I really want to continue to grow my Bookstagram account.  This is probably the goal I’ve done the best with all year, having reached 10K followers last week.  If you have a bookstagram account and are not already following me, you can give me a follow at https://instagram.com/thebookishlibra

5)  Re-reading more.  This is also a repeat goal and one I failed at in 2022. And I’m failing again in 2023, lol.  I re-read the first three on this list and haven’t touched the others.

  • House of Earth and Blood
  • Aurora Rising
  • Ninth House
  • The Handmaid’s Tale
  • The Invisible Life of Addie Larue
  • The Chronicles of Narnia (5 books) – I did manage to re-read the second book in the series in 2022.
  • Pride and Prejudice
  • Jane Eyre

6) I am aiming to keep my Netgalley percentage at 85% or above in 2023.  I’m doing well with this goal too and am actually at 93%, although with 53 arcs waiting to be read and reviewed, I’m clearly failing the whole requesting less ARCs goal. I obviously just love new releases too much to ever succeed at that one, haha.

 

7)  I say this every year, but in 2023, I want to read more Nonfiction.  Another huge fail for me. I’ve not read any of these, although I do hope to at least read Michelle Obama’s new one before the end of the year.

  • What Unites Us by Dan Rather
  • The Light We Carry by Michelle Obama
  • We Should All Be Feminists by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
  • Code Girls: The Untold Story of the American Women Code Breakers Who Helped Win WWII by Liza Mundy
  • D-Day Girls: The Spies Who Armed the Resistance, Sabotaged the Nazis, and Helped Win WWII by Sarah Rose
  • Spare by Prince Harry
  • Untamed by Glennon Doyle
  • Where the Light Enters, Building a Family, Discovering Myself by Jill Biden

8)  This is a forever goal, haha.  In 2023, I really want to work on being better organized, particularly when it comes to blogging ahead.  Nope, still a fail.

9)  Revisit Shakespeare.  Fail unless revisiting him through retellings counts, lol.

10) I am doing the Goodreads Challenge and have set my goal at 175 books.  I’ve read 156 so far so I think I’ll exceed this goal pretty easily considering I still have 3 months to go.

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How are you doing with your reading/blogging goals this year?

2017 Reading and Blogging Goals

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Happy New Year, everyone! It’s that time of year when most of us are reflecting on our lives and making resolutions for what we hope to do differently in the upcoming year.  In addition to a few personal resolutions I’ve made (working on my organizational skills, eating healthier, and exercising more), I’ve also come up with the following list of reading/blogging goals that I hope to accomplish in 2017.

READ AT LEAST 60 BOOKS IN 2017.  

I’ll be tracking this goal through my Goodreads challenge.  I used to only manage to read about 40 books per year before I started blogging, but starting my blog this past year actually pushed me to read nearly 70 books in 2016. I’m hoping therefore that 60 will be a manageable number as I continue my blogging adventures in 2017.

WRITE AT LEAST 52 BOOK REVIEWS FOR MY BLOG.  

If my first goal goes as planned, this goal should be manageable since I’m basically aiming for an average of one review per week.

PUT A DENT IN MY ENORMOUS TBR PILE.   

In order to facilitate this goal, I’ll be taking part in the Beat The Backlist challenge, which is hosted by NovelKnight.  Here’s the list of books I hope to knock off my TBR by participating in this challenge.

  1.  A Storm of Swords by George R. R. Martin
  2. A Gathering of Shadows by V.E. Schwab
  3. The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater
  4. Practical Magic by Alice Hoffman
  5. Scarlet by Marissa Meyer
  6. An Ember in the Ashes by Sabaa Tahir
  7. We Were Liars by E. Lockhart
  8. Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo
  9. Landline by Rainbow Rowell
  10. The Red Tent by Anita Diamant
  11. A Shadow Bright and Burning by Jessica Cluess
  12. Holding Up the Universe by Jennifer Niven
  13. We Should All Be Feminists by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
  14. My Brilliant Friend by Elena Ferrante
  15. Lily and the Octopus by Steven Rowley
  16. A Court of Mist and Fury by Sarah J. Maas
  17. Today Will Be Different by Maria Semple
  18. Labyrinth Lost by Zoraida Córdova
  19. When We Collided by Emery Lord
  20. Illuminae by Amie Kaufman
  21. Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng
  22. A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman
  23. Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail by Cheryl Strayed
  24. In a Dark, Dark Wood by Ruth Ware
  25. The Orphan Master’s Son by Adam Johnson

WRITE MORE DISCUSSION POSTS AND ORIGINAL CONTENT.  

This is something I haven’t been very successful at thus far in my blogging journey.  I post regularly and participate in a few weekly features hosted by fellow bloggers, but I fall into these ruts where it feels like everything I want to talk about in discussion posts has already been discussed by dozens of other bloggers and so I talk myself out of posting anything.  So yeah, I need to get better about just going for it and putting my thoughts out there.

KEEP MY BLOGGING EXPERIENCE FUN.  

In this goal, what I’m seeking is to maintain a balance between reading what I want to read when the mood hits me versus the ARCs I need to read for review purposes.  Why this goal? Well, late last fall, I requested quite a few books from Netgalley assuming that I’d probably only get approved for a couple of them.  Needless to say I was rather shocked when I got approved for almost all of them and then realized that at least three of them had a publication date of January 10th.  With the holidays upon me, I got pretty stressed out about the prospect of having to quickly read that many books and put together that many reviews in such a short time.  It felt like I was back in college again, cramming for finals.  (I’m actually still trying to finish the last book right now since the book is due out on Tuesday.) Plus, in addition to the pressure of the deadline, I also didn’t have time to read anything that I wanted to read so December wasn’t that fun of a blogging month for me.

That stress is most definitely not something that I care to repeat so my goal for 2017 is to pay more attention to publication dates and choose my ARC requests more wisely so that I don’t unnecessarily stress myself out and, most importantly, so that I leave myself time for pleasure/mood reading.

INTERACT MORE WITH THE BOOKISH COMMUNITY.  

The past few months I’ve tried to make it a goal to visit other book blogs and comment whenever I have time.  I know how happy it makes me when I log into my own blog and see I have comments to respond to, so I just really want to continue to do my part to be supportive of the community and make other bloggers feel that same sense of joy.

I also want to improve my twitter presence.  I follow a number of bloggers but because I can be such an awkward potato at times, I rarely ever talk to them.  I did participate in a few twitter chats in 2016, which were a lot of fun, so I hope to do a few more in 2017 and to just be better about interacting overall.  Even being an awkward potato, I still managed to cross over the 500 follower mark on twitter, so for 2017, I’m hoping to make it to 1,000 followers.

* * * * *

Well, that’s what I have so far anyway.  I think (hope!) they’re challenging yet reasonable goals.  Do we share any of the same reading or blogging goals for 2017?  If not, what are your goals for this year?