My 2021 Reading & Blogging Goals: Year-End Wrap-Up

 

It’s that time of year when I like to reflect on the goals I set for myself at the beginning of the year and see how I did.  Some of my goals this year were repeats of goals from prior year, while others were new this year.  A few were also ways of challenging myself without officially participating in any challenges aside from the Goodreads challenge. So…how did I do?

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1) My number one goal was to read more of the books on my own shelves. I set a goal for myself of 60 books I already owned and at the end of 2020, I posted a MASTER LIST of pre-2021 books I own that I was hoping to put a dent in this year.  Being the mood reader that I am, I only ended up reading 29 books from that list.  That master list part of my goal was somewhat of a fail, but overall I crushed the goal because I actually did end up reading 78 pre-2021 books I already owned.

 

2) My second goal was to only participate in blog tours where I had already requested review books.  I hardly participated in blog tours at all this year and the ones I did were definitely for books where I actually had ARCs, so this goal was a success.

 

3) Goal #3 was to address my long-time struggle to finish book series. My goal was to finish more series and to finally start some series that have been sitting on my shelf for a while.  Below is my original list and I’ve crossed out all the series I actually completed.  Not too shabby, if I do say so myself.

Series I Want to Finish or Get Caught Up On: 

  • The Nevernight Chronicle (1 book left)
  • An Ember in the Ashes (2 books left)
  • Arc of a Scythe (1 book left)
  • Red Winter (2 books left)
  • The Wrath and the Dawn (1 book left)
  • Legacy of Orisha (ongoing series, but I’m one book behind)
  • Cursebreakers (1 book left)
  • The Mortal Instruments (3 books left)

Series I Want to Start:

  • Daughter of Smoke and Bone
  • City of Brass
  • Legend

 

4) Goal #4 was to continue to work on my Bookstagram account — to work on posting more consistently, taking better photos, and on interacting more on the platform.  I started out doing pretty well with this but then fell apart after my son got sick and work got even more short-staffed than we’ve always been.  Bookstagram was just one too many things to keep track of.  I also lost a lot of followers when I stopped posting consistently, so I didn’t grow my account at all. Overall, a fail.

 

5) Goal #5 was to re-read more.  Below is the list I posted and how I did.  I had set a personal goal of 1 re-read a month so although I did actually re-read a few this year, the goal was still a fail.

  • The Night Circus – actually started to re-read and lost interest, so DNF’ed 🙁
  • To Kill a Mockingbird
  • Rebecca
  • Children of Blood and Bone
  • Red Winter
  • The Chronicles of Narnia (7 books) – As of 12/29, I’ve re-read only the first book.
  • The Wrath and the Dawn

 

6) Goal #6 was to try to keep my Netgalley percentage at 85% or above all year.  I kicked butt on this goal and actually stayed at 90% or above pretty much the entire year.  As of 12/29, I’m at 91%.

 

7) Goal #7 was to read more Nonfiction.  I usually only read 1 or 2 nonfiction books a year, so I had set a personal goal of 1 nonfiction book per month.  Below is my list and I marked through all of the books I managed to read.  I clearly didn’t reach my goal of one a month, but I did read several more than I usually do and one of those was Hamilton which is 818 pages long so I’m somewhat happy with my progress here.

  • A Promised Land by Barack Obama
  • The Audacity of Hope by Barack Obama
  • My Own Words by Ruth Bader Ginsburg
  • The Truths We Hold: An American Journey by Kamala Harris
  • Hidden Figures by Margot Lee Shetterly
  • Hamilton by Ron Chernow (I started this in 2020 but haven’t finished it yet).
  • What Unites Us by Dan Rather
  • 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
  • A Woman of No Importance: The Untold Story of the American Spy Who Helped Win WWII by Sonia Purnell
  • All Boys Aren’t Blue by George M. Johnson
  • Untamed by Glennon Doyle

 

8) Goal #8 was to get more organized. LOLOLOL.  Yeah, that didn’t happen. Better luck next year.

 

9) Goal #9 was to have some guest posting on my blog and this one was definitely a success since my bff Sharon has been posting her Thriller Thursday posts all year. I’m hoping she’ll stay on board in 2022 and continue sharing her thoughts on those mysteries and psychological thrillers.

 

10) Goal #10 was just my Goodreads Challenge and I crushed that goal as well.  I had set a goal of 150 and as of December 28th, I’ve actually finished reading 210 books. Woo Hoo!

 

I’ll be posting my 2022 goals sometime in the next couple of weeks, but I imagine there will be a lot of repeats from this list since I clearly still have some room for improvement. 🙂

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Did you have any reading or blogging goals in 2021? If so, how did you do?

21 replies
    • Suzanne
      Suzanne says:

      Honestly, I cancelled my cable TV early in the year and that made a huge difference. Whenever I would have normally turned on the TV for downtime, I grabbed a book instead.

  1. Angela
    Angela says:

    I think you did a great job on your goals, especially reading from your shelves! Wow, 78 books! I’m also not great about keeping up with series, and you did awesome with that goal!

    • Suzanne
      Suzanne says:

      Yeah, I think reading from my own shelves was by far my biggest bookish achievement of the year. Hoping I can repeat that in the upcoming year and truly put a dent in all of those unread books.

  2. Greg
    Greg says:

    Sounds like you did pretty great! I was a fail at Bookstagram this year too, though… when I first got on the platform I really liked it, but time… or something… haha has conspired to keep me from updating it. Sigh.

    Anyway… nice job on your goals and happy New Year!

  3. Tanya @ Girl Plus Books
    Tanya @ Girl Plus Books says:

    Reading from my own shelves (physical, Kindle, whatever) is always my top goal. Sounds like you really made that happen this year! And you did awesome with finishing so many series! I just started working on that since the late summer but I’ve managed to finish a few. It’s a nice feeling of accomplishment. 🙂

  4. Lark
    Lark says:

    I think you did great on your goals from last year; you might not have been perfect in all of them, but boy did you crush a lot of them, too! Congrats. 😀

  5. Literary Feline
    Literary Feline says:

    It looks like you made great progress on all of your goals, Suzanne! It’s a testament too to your organization abilities. I hope you have a productive and wonderful New Year!

  6. Anne - Books of My Heart
    Anne - Books of My Heart says:

    You’ve done amazing! It seems easy to say I’ll read 1 book per month of some sort but they really add up. I cut down on the number of challenges the last few years other than COYER and the ones I sponsor and definitely cut down on blog tours unless I’m reading it anyway. That helps with the futzy things to do. I have done really well with blog ahead tactics. When I have a chance I get the shells of regular posts like Sunday post, Thrifty Thursday, Series on Saturday and Library Love all set up a year in advance with just details to fill in on them. I also do a post setup for every ARC when I receive it so all I have to do is fill in the review. I have a spreadsheet which holds the next 3-4 months days with all the ARCs on it and when I plan to review, although they sometimes get juggled. That system has allowed me more time to just read and not be so bothered with setup details.

  7. Sharon
    Sharon says:

    “Goal #8 was to get more organized. LOLOLOL. Yeah, that didn’t happen. Better luck next year.” I believe I laughed when you first said this was a goal for 2021 LOL!

    “Goal #9 was to have some guest posting on my blog and this one was definitely a success since my bff Sharon has been posting her Thriller Thursday posts all year. I’m hoping she’ll stay on board in 2022 and continue sharing her thoughts on those mysteries and psychological thrillers.” WooHoo! We crushed this *high five* LOL And you bet I am on board for 2022, I totally enjoyed it and look forward to continuing 😀

  8. Missy
    Missy says:

    Overall I think you did fantastic with your goals! Especially finishing series you already started! That’s something I wanted to do but didn’t quite get to in 2021….but hey, 2022 is here now and I WILL finish series – I also have 2 books in the Ember in the Ashes series to read still among others. I love seeing goals, I didn’t make any for 2021 but I did for 2022 so I can’t wait to see how I do!

  9. Sam@WLABB
    Sam@WLABB says:

    First of all, you killed it this year. Gold star! I am especially impressed with all the series you finished and the number of shelf books read. I am embarrassed to say – I didn’t realize the thriller Thursday posts were not yours. HA! That’s great that your friend did it all year. I keep trying to get my co-bloggers back to blogging, but there has been little success.

  10. ShootingStarsMag
    ShootingStarsMag says:

    I keep saying to read more of the books I own and I feel like I’ve done well the last couple years. But that’s still a big goal for me in 2022. I really want to focus more on those books because I’m running out of room! haha

    -Lauren

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