Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ

http://www.goodreads.com/user_challen...

Ta da!

Now I gotta figure out what to do for the rest of the year - ha ha!

congrats. I should hit my 55 goal. Next year I'm going for 50, but picking some longer titles, as I purposely read some shorter works this year to get there

I moved the topic to the Members' Lounge, rather than the void it was floating in.

I always find these "x books a year" challenges a bit odd. It's not really about numbers, is it? Anyway, I don't mind. Anything that gets people reading is good.

I've never set a reading goal, but good for you!

My yearly reads usually fall between 70-80 books. This year I'm up to 36. Guess having a baby will do that... :)

Nice going! I'm on 96 and have a packed month of reading so expect to exceed my 100.

Stefan, I was the same at the beginning. I didn't want to find myself changing my reading habits to hit a target, but for me it's been a nice goal to have without feeling pressured and has, I think, helped pull me out of a bit of reading slump. Although maybe that's just being on GR generally...

I had a goAl of 100 with 12 educational and 5 literary works. Might make the educational goal, started Le Mort d'Arthur in March or something (1st of 2 volumes on kindle) and think I will finish it by year end for a literary total of 1. Also reading The Ulimate Science Ficion Collection volume 1 which is 22 books and if I counted as 22 rather than 1 I would probably meet the 100 book goal.
It isn't really about numbers but I like knowing my number and thinking a bit about what I read....
I will make a goal of reading Matterhorn, The Submission and the second volume of the Mallory, 12 educational and 100 total for 2012.

Congrats on the baby, Shel. I imagine you're too tired & busy to focus on a book. We had 3. I always wondered how we found the time & privacy after the first, though.
;-)

I don't set reading goals at all. I'm up to 122, but haven't filled in reviews on a couple, yet.

I set a goal of 100 books just for fun. It's nice to have all the book covers in one place to scroll through, and the other night when a friend asked me to tell them my top book for the year, it was great to be able to scroll through them all to pick my top reads and #1 for the year.
I'm over 90 books, but I doubt that I'll be hitting 100 - I just started a 850+ page book this weekend that will probably eat up most of my reading time for the rest of the month. With so much to do before the holidays, and my oldest DD's 8th birthday on the 30th, my reading time is very curtailed this month anyways.

I set a personal, unrecorded goal of 50 books, about 1 a week. I'm only at 36, so I doubt I'll make it. And I don't have Shel's very valid excuse of a new baby, and I'm retired besides!! So I don't know what the deal is... I want to read more, but other things seem to take up my time. I'll set the same goal for 2012 and see how I do.

Well, I'd set the goal at 300. Now I think I'm at something like 400 books for the year. Please do know that at least half if not more of those books are picture books. Being a librarian means going through a heck of a lot of them. Being a mom with two kids means more. I'll have to do an actual count on the longer works.

Okay, just did a count. Cutting out the picture books, board books, and younger nonfiction books will put the overall count at 162 longer works of fiction for the year. Not bad, I think. Having those 40 minute subway rides to and from work helps.

100+ books is a lot to read in a year. I only joined goodreads in July of this year, so I've only been keeping track since then and I'm at 25 books, extrapolating to the full year would put me at approximately 50 books, which makes sense as even before joining I figured I read about a book a week. I don't think I could fit in 2 books a week, what with a full time job and two kids.

Congrats to all who are happy with their reading rate whatever it may be. What always surprises me is people who say, "I used to read." I can't imagine not having reading as an important part of my life even if I sometimes have enough other stuff going on that I don't read much....

Nikita wrote: "100+ books is a lot to read in a year. I only joined goodreads in July of this year, so I've only been keeping track since then and I'm at 25 books, extrapolating to the full year would put me at ..."

I'm admittedly a fast reader, which has served me well both as an editor and now as a librarian. I almost always have to have a book in my bag so that if I'm on a line at a store, on the subway, or anything else that requires me to wait but not actually engage my intellect I can go back to reading. I suspect once my kids get older, it'll be more difficult to find reading time but I'm a compulsive reader, so I doubt I'd ever give it up.

Good for you!

Stefan wrote: "I always find these "x books a year" challenges a bit odd. It's not really about numbers, is it?..."

I enjoy the "x books a year" challenges, but not specifically because I find import in some arbitrary number. I base my challenge level on what I read the previous year, and I try to hit the next "breakpoint" (generally a multiple of 5, to make it simple) the next year, so as to push myself to read more. Last year I read around 65 books, so this year I set a "70 books in a year" challenge for myself. I'm at 68 right now, so unless something really unusual happens, I'll pass 70 by the end of the year. So next year, I'll probably set the bar at "75 books in a year." (I'm a very challenge-oriented person and am quite competitive - more so against myself than against others. I like to set tasks for myself just to see if I can conquer them, and reading is just another way to channel that.)

(I started joining challenge groups to counteract the trend I'd seen within myself of reading fewer and fewer books over time. I use the goal as a reminder to put reading equal to or above other hobbies and diversions.)

I have quite a competitive nature so perhaps that has spurred me on. I'd noticed that I spent more and more time on Facebook and not reading. I left FB and started reading more last December. I also found that going to bed at 10pm meant that I couldn't read if I was going to get up at 6.30am so another nail in my reading's coffin (I've been going to bed early to fit more in).

Last year I only made 20 books. I set my challenge at 50 but in May I upped it to 70 as I was getting so close. I'm now on 67 books. I've also enjoyed reading again, much nicer than watching TV til 10pm or going on FB!

Yeah, the kid takes up a lot of time, but I'm ok with it :)

Can I count it in my total if I've read Moo, Baa, La La La fifty times? ;)

That's one of about 30 children's books that, by now, I know entirely by heart. It's stunning, the amount of repetition a kid can endure when it comes to reading material. I love rereading books, but really, you want to hear THAT SAME THOMAS STORY AGAIN? (That being said, Sandra Boynton's books are very funny. I read so many kid's books for a while with my son that I was halfway considering setting up a blog to review them, but I barely have time to keep up with the SFF so that plan fell by the wayside...)

And as for my count... 70 so far this year - not counting children's books!

Marty wrote: "Congrats to all who are happy with their reading rate whatever it may be. What always surprises me is people who say, "I used to read." I can't imagine not having reading as an important part of my life ..."

Absolutely! I literally cannot understand people who don't read books.

A couple of years ago I was doing some training with work, and every morning we'd start with some daft team building exercise. One day we each had to come up with a question for a questionnaire that we were all to fill in, the trainer read out and we'd have to guess who each set of answers belonged to - to see if we were getting to know each other. I suggested "What is your favourite book?" - to which the trainer said, "Can we change that and make it What is your favourite book or magazine, in case not everyone is a reader?"

Sure enough, about half the group of sixteen (mostly the women, as it happens) chose things like Hello! or OK magazine...

I know I'm reading less, partly due to Facebook and TV. In the past there were only a couple shows I'd watch, but this year my husband & I are following 5 shows (which is a lot for us) and watching football, the only sport we follow closely. And I'm OK with that, it's the other time-wasters that I know I need to cut back on! I, too, cannot imagine life with books (and music).

I am shamed. My challenge was 4 books. Yes, you can count them on 1 hand. But I did make it! Already. :-) Of course, like many of you, that doesn't count the 50 times I've read Richard Scarry's Bedtime Stories or any of the other children's books, not to mention the short stories (which are about all I can manage these days) and random poetry, so I guess I won't beat myself up about it (too much).

Online activities (mostly Blog, liveJournal, twitter, FB and the like) also take up a lot of time... Bäh!

I read 10 books this year. I'm so jealous of those of you who obviously read so much faster than i do :(

I'd like to read more but I read slow and don't seem to have a ton of time.

Just a comment on reading speed...

One of my goals in the past couple years has actually been to read more slowly. I tend to get caught up in wanting to know what happens next, and when I do that, I read very quickly, almost skimming. And then I miss the details, and sometimes even more important things than the details!

So, while I want to average a book a week (for a goal of about 50 books), I also want to savor the stories more. As my memory has gotten worse (chemobrain and middle age), it's even more important that I really read and don't just skim.

I think it's a combination of how fast one reads and how much time one has available for reading.

Definitely, Kathi! I tend to read rather slowly, but that has never bothered me ( until I recently acquired Mommy-brain) because my retention was always good. Now I simply have no time and finishing a short story in 2 or 3 sittings feels like an accomplishment. :-)

I've never thought of myself as a quick reader, but I do read a lot. I watch very little TV these days, although I do spend a fair bit of time online. But the thing that's really upped my reading volume in the last couple of years is audiobooks, listening to them while travelling, exercising, doing mundane tasks that don't require much attention.

Stefan wrote: "I moved the topic to the Members' Lounge, rather than the void it was floating in.

I always find these "x books a year" challenges a bit odd. It's not really about numbers, is it? Anyway, I don't..."

As do I. It so depends on the kind of book I'm reading. Some have such beautiful prose I need to read slowly or out loud, maybe re-reading on the spot. Others are complex needing thought or even research. And some are pure escapist, like TV episodes and can be speed read. Numbers to me are irrelevant.

Also there is the amount of time available for reading. I generally read 2 or 3 hours before bed. Lately, work has taken long hours and I find myself waking up in the wee hours, lights on, book on floor, having forgotten anything I might have read. My plans for retirement are rocking chair, in view of the lake, stacks of books around, reading as much as I like with a slave seeing to all my earthly needs ;-)

Kernos wrote: "My plans for retirement are rocking chair, in view of the lake, stacks of books around, reading as much as I like with a slave seeing to all my earthly needs ;-) ."

Good luck with that! In many ways, I have more demands on my time in retirement than I did while working. Yes, a lot of that is my choice, but it's also the reality of aging parent(s) and volunteer work (which I didn't have much time for when I was working).

But it is truly lovely to have the flexibility to choose, and I DO have times when I choose to sit in my rocker, overlooking the river and woods, and read for hours and hours. Aaaahhhh....

Kathi wrote: "Kernos wrote: "My plans for retirement are rocking chair, in view of the lake, stacks of books around, reading as much as I like with a slave seeing to all my earthly needs ;-) ."

I want to retire!

I went for 24 and I'm at 23 right now so I should hit it. I just picked a pretty realistic number, but one that was high enough to keep me motivated.

Stefan wrote: "
I always find these "x books a year" challenges a bit odd. It's not really about numbers, is it?."

I am with you on that. I read for pleasure so if it takes a couple of weeks to read something or a couple days. As long as I enjoy it I am happy. With that said this year I have read 40 or 50 books.

I just finished what will probably be my last novel for the year (an excellent one by the way, a great dark space opera/military SF debut called Faith by John Love) so I can now report that I've read a total of 72 books this year, with an average page count of 389 pages per book. The balance between SF and fantasy is a bit more even compared to last year, probably because I'm now also reviewing for (they request more SF reviews, so it's not just all fantasy anymore more ). I read the vast majority of these novels in the first half of the year, and was on track to read about 100, but thanks to a painful neurological disorder I was diagnosed with in the middle of the year my reading slowed down tremendously in the second half of 2011. Still, I'm happy with what I've accomplished, especially given that I wrote full-length and at least somewhat coherent reviews for most of the books I read! Onwards to 2012.

I hope you're doing well, Stefan, and can be on the mend soon!

All my best.

It never occurred to me to count the books I read until joining Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ. And if it weren't for GR, I'm sure I still wouldn't count them, as I agree with Stefan about numbers. And numbers don't make sense, much, either, as some of the books I read are just brain candy and others are really worthwhile and nourishing.

I set a goal this year of 150 and have actually passed it, at 153 or something like that. But I am semi-retired and live alone with my two dogs, so I don't do much else. Also I cut out cable, so never watch TV, although I watch a lot of stuff online.

Last year I was almost embarrassed by the # of books I read! It was somewhere way over 200. So have cut back this year.

Sandra aka Sleo wrote: "Last year I was almost embarrassed by the # of books I read! It was somewhere way over 200. So have cut back this year.
"

Embarrassed?

Ken wrote: "Sandra aka Sleo wrote: "Last year I was almost embarrassed by the # of books I read! It was somewhere way over 200. So have cut back this year.
"

Embarrassed?"

It looked so obsessive, lol.

Sandra aka Sleo wrote: "It looked so obsessive, lol. ."

There are way worse things to be obsessed with ;)

Sandra aka Sleo wrote: "It never occurred to me to count the books I read until joining Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ. And if it weren't for GR, I'm sure I still wouldn't count them, as I agree with Stefan about numbers. And numbers don't ..."

Ditto for all the above. Even page counts are silly. A page of Charlaine Harris' candy books does not equal a page of prose by Janny Wurts, Roger Zelazny, or Mary Roach.

I read 126 books (a couple were short stories) this year & met my goal of reading what I wanted, when I could. Any book listed here, I read for pleasure & I had a lot of pleasure this year, no matter the count.

I read a LOT for work, but it's all tech docs, news stories, & such. No books at all since the publishing industry hasn't been able to keep up with technology for decades & who wants to list them anyway? While To Kill a Mockingbird is timeless, even I don't care that I read a book about DOS 3.x 20 odd years ago.
;-)

Someone I was chatting to in another group read 400+. I had to go and look at the shelf as I was amazed given they work full time and watch tv etc. Turned out most of their reads were Graphic comics. Now yes they are books but can they count in the same way that a Martin counts for example?