Yes!
I’ve signed up to read 150 books this year through the Goodreads Reading Challenge.
I don’t see at as much as a challenge as a way of keeping track of what I’ve read (helped by the fact that most new books I read are on Kindle, which automatically marks a book as Read at Goodreads).
I’ve also signed up to the Mt. TBR Challenge again, in the never-ending attempt to reduce the number of unread books I own. I’ve done this challenge for the last four or five years, usually aiming for 48 books per year. I actually aimed for 60 last year, but only got 48 so that’s the level I’ve chosen this year. Now to read books I own and not buy new ones!
I set myself the challenge of reading 30 books by new-to-me authors in 2020, and I achieved 47!
My rationale for this challenge was that I want to be able to support debut authors. The problem is that if I focus too much on debut authors, I don’t have time to read new books from favourite authors. So while I will still record how many new-to-me authors I read this year, I won’t be aiming for a specific number.
Another personal challenge was to read 50 independently published books last year. I managed 45. This is another figure I’ll continue to track, but won’t set a specific goal. I want to focus on content, not how the book was published. The reality is that the books I buy tend to be independently published, because they’re cheaper (yet the author receives a similar royalty per copy sold).
I also aimed to read 12 writing books and 12 marketing books last year.
I actually read 12 writing books (win) but only 4 marketing books. My focus this year is going to be on writing, so I’m going to ignore all the unread marketing books and focus on the writing books (and the writing).
So my Reading Challenge targets for 2021 are:
- 150 books
- 48 books off my to-read pile
- 12 writing books
