Last Updated on January 6, 2023 by ThoughtsStained
I’m back this Friday participating in another Let’s Talk Bookish post! This weekly bookish discussion series was created by Rukky @ Eternity Books and co-hosted with Dani @ The Literary Lion. However, in April of 2022, Aria @ Book Nook Bits took over! For this week, our topic is: 2023 Reading Goals and Challenges.
You know me and how I get lofty ideas for what I want to accomplish as the new year comes around. Do we think I can meet all of my reading goals?
Let’s discuss!
Overarching Reading Goals
So, let’s start off ambitious. The past few years, I’ve averaged roughly 30 books read in a year. To me, that’s a very small number. Especially when I used to read 100+ books a year. (Oh, middle-school me didn’t know what luck she had in some areas of her life.) And, one of the challenges below is to get to 80% of books owned read.
Knowing that, my goal is to read 60 books this year. Or a book and a half a week. As someone who has been in a reading slump for almost three months, this is going to be…interesting. ๐
Challenges I’m Signing Up For
To help motivate me to read more, I’m signing up for a few yearly challenges! Take a look at them below and see if any of these strike your fancy, too. Perhaps you might want to take the plunge and join me?
Read Your Owned Books Challenge
Hosted by Kal @ Reader Voracious
Honestly, I am so, so stoked Kal put this reading challenge together. Especially since I spent a good chuck of my hiatus updating my spreadsheet (also made by Kal ๐ฅฐ) to accurately reflect my home “library”. Now, I have an accurate count of how many books I own, what I’ve read and what I have left. The goal of this challenge? Read your owned books. There are also smaller goals, badges to earn and a Discord to join!
For transparency sake, my numbers starting in 2023 are:
- Owned books: 290
- Read: 180
- Percentage read: 61%
Imma need some help. ๐
Backlist Reads Challenge
Hosted By Ari and Alexi @ Bookish Valhalla
So, this has the same goal as the first one: read your damn books. (Can you sense a theme this year?) Yet I also like it because it narrows in, focusing on: adult, SFF and must be backlist titles. Plus, they also have themes and badges!
Same stats as above. We’ll see how well I do avoiding 2023 releases. Though we all know Orbit is coming for me, so…
Great Series Reading Challenge
Created by Caitlin @ Realms of My Mind
So, this isn’t truly a challenge, per say, like the others are. However, Caitlin is one of my favorite bloggers. And she’s been doing a personal challenge to finish reading the series she’s started. And good gods, friends, do I need to work on this. Last year, out of the 32 books I read? Only two of them were sequels. TWO.
I’m writing up a more detailed post about this next week, so stay tuned for that. I have a feeling it’s going to be a doozy. ๐ Thank you so much to Caitlin for letting me join in!
Discussion Challenge
Hosted By Nicole @ Feed Your Addiction and Shannon @ It Starts at Midnight
I’ve partaken in this challenge for the past few years, as I love it! Discussion posts are my favorite to write, hands down. So, getting to link up and read others posts is my absolute favorite. Especially since I’ve also started participating in Let’s Talk Bookish in the past few years, it’s only natural to join this challenge!
This year, I’m aiming for 3 discussion posts a month or the Terrifically Talkative tier!
In Sum
So, as you can see, I have some ambitious reading goals this year. (Especially if you add these in with my other intentions for the year.) But, I really miss reading. I’ve been slumping for a multitude of reasons, but I know this for a certainty. I’m happier when I’m regularly reading. And I’d like to reclaim a little of that happiness, you know?
What about you? Any reading goals or challenges you’re hoping to tackle this year? Did you sign up for any of the above? Any others you think I should be aware of? Let me know in the comments below.
May the book gods allow us plenty of 5 gem reads!
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Aww Nicole, your number of unread books compared to mine is so cute ๐ I’m not sharing but it’s a lot and will take me 5 years to catch up if I STOPPED buying books. I need some help…๐
This makes me feel so much better, because I thought I had SO MANY (I mean, I still might, but…*shrugs*).
And yeah, we’re not going to look at what happens if I continue to buy books…
No definitely not a good idea ๐
Great posts, Nicole! I’ve also signed up to join Kal’s backlist reading challenge. I’m not going so far as to do 80% of my owned books because I haven’t finished cataloguing my books yet (that’s also one of my goals this year, lol) but I know that I have *a lot* (read: way too many) digital books that are still unread! So I’m hoping to read at least one owned book a week/month and cutting down on those ARCs cos I’m basically the queen ARCrastinator. ๐ซฃ I hope that 2023 is the year that you can shake your reading slump! Good luck with these challengesโI know you’ll slay! โจ
I spent most of the month of December cataloging books, so it’s definitely a task, to say the least! But I believe in you and know you can absolutely do it! I’m with you on the ARCrastinator, for SURE.
Rooting for you, Dini!!!
Some great goals, and I know you’ll do well with them!
Thank you so much, Davida!
I hope you hit your reading goal Nicole! And have fun with the Great Series Read! It’s really exciting to just chip away at some series one at a time and have the satisfaction of actually finishing lol. (Can you tell I’m the kind of person who likes lists and crossing things off them?)
As someone else who also adores crossing things off a list, I think it’s going to be great motivator!