Wednesday, January 1, 2014

2013 Reading Goals: A follow up

Did you remember that I wrote a post about my 2013 reading goals back in the beginning of the year? Of course you don't remember. I didn't even remember I wrote that. I'm on top of things like that.

New Year, Same C&H
Let's see how I did, shall we?

1. Read more ladies - In 2012 31% of the books I read had a female author. This year...49%. I haven't been making a conscious effort to read more women, but look how nicely that worked out.

2. Read more non-white people - Last year 93% of the books I read were by white people. This year...93%. Dammit. Apparently that is my sweet spot. I need to work on this.

3. Read more non-US authors - Last year 69% of the authors were from the US. This year...73%. Whoops. Also the only other nationality I read was British. So. I failed here.

4. Go to more author signings - Didn't do this at all. Which is sad, but I can't say I came across any author signings that really got me excited. The local bookstore in town has lots of "author" signings and while I love the store itself, I put author in quotes for a reason, since most of these authors are actually reality stars that "wrote" books. I'm sure they have these people come because they draw bigger crowds but PLEASE throw an actual author in every once in a while.

5. Get my review of The Parable of the Sower just written already - Hey, I did this. I mean, it was sort of clear that was going to happen. Still proud.

6. Finish the Harry Potter readalong - Did this too, and it was AMAZING. I was actually going through some of the old HP posts when I found this goal one.

7. Do a better job answering review requests - Worse. I have gotten much much worse at this.

8. Read The Corrections - BAM! Completed. Take that, Franzy-pants.

9. Listen to more audiobooks - I did this, but not so much with the whole running dealy. But I did a lot of the HP readalong via audiobooks and I've listened to the World War Z audiobook at least twice this year. Because yes, it's that good. I've also started listening to Welcome To Night Vale and if you guys haven't started listening to this as well, you're doing it wrong. I haven't started the running part at all, BUT we did get a stationary bike that I have been awesome at *pats self on back*. So I completed both parts of this goal, just separately.

10. Do a better job reading the newspaper - Eh, I need to work on this one some more. I get the NYTimes on my iPad and iPhone in addition to getting it delivered every weekend, and yet I still usually focus on the magazine, real estate, and book reviews. I've gotten better at at least browsing through the other headlines.

So let's see. Overall I've done a worse job at reading more non-US people, going to more author signings, and answering review requests; stayed the same when it came to reading non-white people, listening to audiobooks, and reading the newspaper; got better at reading more ladies; managed to finish my Parable review, completed the HP readalong, AND read The Corrections, thanks to another readalong. Even though I failed or stayed the same at more than 1/2 of them, I'm not too upset. Probably because I'm (clearly) terrible at resolutions so I didn't really expect things to improve dramatically.

Should I bother coming up with more resolutions/goals for 2014? Sure, why not?

1. Keep reading female authors: I'm pretty happy with my stats from last year and I'll be happy to keep that up.

2. Read more non-white people: ...yeah

3. Read more non-US people: Again...yeah

4. Post more often: I'd like to aim for about 3 posts a week. I haven't bee doing a great job with that the last...well for a good amount of 2013. So let's get better at that.

4b. Not let so much time go by between reading and reviewing: Part of posting more would be not letting so much time (like a month+) go between reading and reviewing. Because while it's not a bad thing to let some time go between when I read and when I post to let the ideas stew, there's also the issue that I forget everything that happened in the book. Which makes for a pretty crappy review.

5. Meet up with more book bloggers: I got a chance to meet up with Alice, Rayna, Emily, Amanda, and Kayleigh M. this year, which was awesome. More of that would be excellent.

Do you have any bookish resolutions/goals for 2014?