2019 Reading Wrap-up, 2020 Reading Goals
Jan. 7th, 2020 09:31 pmWelcome to my fourth year of setting and tracking reading goals. I am still not sure how I feel about reading goals, to be honest. So far the only ones I'm finding motivational are the goals relating to reading more diversely.
In 2019, according to Goodreads which is admittedly always a little bit suspect (I always forget at least a book or two), I read 30 books (plus two which I will probably mark as DNF), well short of my goal of 50, mostly because I read very little in the second half of the year. If I wanted to blame this on something, the most likely culprit would be the Arrowverse project -- I set myself a lot of TV to watch in a comparatively short amount of time, and so my other media consumption had to give. As as been a theme of my life lately, I need to consider how to balance things better.
Other reading goals for 2019:
For every new book I obtain, I will read at least one book that I already own. It's hard to count this, because I don't know exactly how many new books I bought (I've got at least a few that I haven't read yet), but from a rough analysis of my Goodreads list, I only finished 6 books from my TBR, plus the two DNFs. So that's either 20% or 25%, which either way is not really even close.
Read 6 new-to-me authors of color and 50% books by authors of color. I read seven new-to-me authors of color, which was great! My percentage started off strong but then fell off in the second half of the year, with a total of 12 books by authors of color (40%). (Not counting a couple of works with multiple authors/editors, where some authors were people of color and some were white.) It's better than my historical average, but still short of the stretch goal I was going for.
For 2020, I want to balance the hoped-for with the possible, and so I'm knocking my Goodreads reading goal back down to 40 books. The tougher goal I'm going to keep is 50% authors of color. As far as working on the TBR goes, I have a -- well, not a "goal" exactly, more like a plan. The main household project that T and I have set for ourselves in 2020 is a Konmari-style culling of our upstairs living area, because we need to replace the floors, and that job basically requires packing up everything as if we were going to move. So I will take this opportunity to do a ruthless(ish) look at my bookshelves, especially my physical TBR, and getting rid of the books I'm never going to read: some DNFs, some very old purchases that, if I haven't read by now, I'm never gonna, some impulse buys, some gifts and free table acquisitions, etc. etc. That should help me prioritize what I have left and figure out how to tackle them. It would be great if I could read at least 10 books off that shelf.
That's a really simplified set of goals, but that's the plan for this year -- simplifying my goals, while I figure out what my life is going to be like as a full-time employee again. Discovering the new balance: that's what it's all about.
In 2019, according to Goodreads which is admittedly always a little bit suspect (I always forget at least a book or two), I read 30 books (plus two which I will probably mark as DNF), well short of my goal of 50, mostly because I read very little in the second half of the year. If I wanted to blame this on something, the most likely culprit would be the Arrowverse project -- I set myself a lot of TV to watch in a comparatively short amount of time, and so my other media consumption had to give. As as been a theme of my life lately, I need to consider how to balance things better.
Other reading goals for 2019:
For every new book I obtain, I will read at least one book that I already own. It's hard to count this, because I don't know exactly how many new books I bought (I've got at least a few that I haven't read yet), but from a rough analysis of my Goodreads list, I only finished 6 books from my TBR, plus the two DNFs. So that's either 20% or 25%, which either way is not really even close.
Read 6 new-to-me authors of color and 50% books by authors of color. I read seven new-to-me authors of color, which was great! My percentage started off strong but then fell off in the second half of the year, with a total of 12 books by authors of color (40%). (Not counting a couple of works with multiple authors/editors, where some authors were people of color and some were white.) It's better than my historical average, but still short of the stretch goal I was going for.
For 2020, I want to balance the hoped-for with the possible, and so I'm knocking my Goodreads reading goal back down to 40 books. The tougher goal I'm going to keep is 50% authors of color. As far as working on the TBR goes, I have a -- well, not a "goal" exactly, more like a plan. The main household project that T and I have set for ourselves in 2020 is a Konmari-style culling of our upstairs living area, because we need to replace the floors, and that job basically requires packing up everything as if we were going to move. So I will take this opportunity to do a ruthless(ish) look at my bookshelves, especially my physical TBR, and getting rid of the books I'm never going to read: some DNFs, some very old purchases that, if I haven't read by now, I'm never gonna, some impulse buys, some gifts and free table acquisitions, etc. etc. That should help me prioritize what I have left and figure out how to tackle them. It would be great if I could read at least 10 books off that shelf.
That's a really simplified set of goals, but that's the plan for this year -- simplifying my goals, while I figure out what my life is going to be like as a full-time employee again. Discovering the new balance: that's what it's all about.
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