ŷ������

As the new year approaches, I thought it might be nice to have a thread to talk about our goals and reading highlights from 2016 as well as our reading resolutions and books to start off the 2017 in a positive fashion.

2016:

- read more Canadian (57%) - success!
- read 110 books - hoping to finish off the year with 115 and surpass my goal (helpful to be on vacation!)
- started CanadianContent in March which slowly grew and expanded more quickly in June. I have to say that this has been such a lot of fun and that I have expanded my reading and met some great readers because of this group!
- wanted to meet Joseph Boyden and was so excited to meet him this past summer (thrilled to have a picture with this trickster doing rabbit ears behind my head!
- was privileged to meet Candy Palmater and talk about my blog and LFL on her CBC radio show
- started the year with The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing (which I will vote the worst book of the year) in an effort to get organized for the new year.

This year:
- I will continue to read as much Canadian as I can
- get back into reading some of the leadership books (I have a pile of signed ones from the Art of Leadership Conference with topics of coaching, goal setting, teamwork) and add to my leadership library that I share at the office.
- As for author events, I am hopeful that Richard Wagamese will come to Ontario at some point as I would love to hear him speak and meet him in person. He offers writing workshops and if these ever come close, I will definitely be signing up!!
- I have not set a # of books goal yet but would like to increase my audio content, making use of my commuting time and of course, read every chance that I get!

Did you meet your 2016 reading goals and what do you have planned for the new year??

In 2016 my goal was to just read a book having not read anything in so long. Thankfully that's a low bar so that was easily completed. Sticking to reading was a bit harder.

In 2017 I'm hoping to:
- complete CanLit Bingo 2017
- Rework Queer Lit Bingo and actually complete it
- Finish r/fantasy Bingo 2016
- Start r/fantasy Bingo 2017 and finish 2/3 of it
- Start a book club with Mom
- Start book club with friends
- Read one nonfiction book per month (no memoirs)
- Read one classic every two months
- Read six books in French
- Post reviews minimum 3x/week
- Participate in more ReadAThons
- Read more translated fiction
- Aim to have books by US authors less than 50% of books (It was like 54% in 2016)
- Aim to increase number of books written by POC, Indigenous authors, queer, trans authors

In 2016, I set my goal very low to only read 20 books. I had not read a book in years, I was so focused on other things and life just happened, but I vowed to take up reading again. I exceeded my goal, in which I am incredibly proud.

I'm upping the ante for 2017 and doubling that to 40 books. I also want to read more Canadian authors, LGBT atuthors, and more poetry. The vast majority of books I read now are by poc/woc, so I'm going to stick with that, too!

2016 goals achieved:
Completed bingo card and kept it all Canadian
Read a series or linked books: The Best Laid Plans and The High Road
Read all of the Canada Reads finalists

2017 goals:
Complete bingo card (but no all-Canadian mandate this time)
Read a series or linked books
Increase my nonfiction reading to 20%
Read a chunky classic novel that will take several months to complete on Serial Reader
Attend the Mississippi Book Festival again (and do a better job of reading in advance for it)

Here's to goals achieved! Great job everyone.

2016:

1. Read 75 books in total

Status: Success
Comments: Counting the audiobook I plan to finish driving to work tomorrow and Friday, I should finish the year with 105 books.

2. Complete Bookworm Bitches 2016 Bookworm Catch Up Challenge

Status: Complete
Comments: /topic/show/...

3. Read all monthly Bookworm Bitches selections for 2016

Status: Failed miserably

4. 2016 Bingo Challenge

Status: Complete
Comments: I wanted to keep it 100% Canadian, but it didn't work out. Next year!

5. Read 5 classic novels, 5 nonfiction, and 10 books by Canadian authors.

Status: Complete
Comments: I actually read 23 Canadian. Such an improvement from 2015.

6. Read more diverse authors.

Status: Failed miserably
Comments: I thought I was doing well until I tallied my stats in this category. The books I read were authored by 90.5% white writers and only 9.5% comprised of black, Asian, and indigenous writers.

2017
1. Read 100 books in total
2. Complete Bookworm Bitches 2017 Bookworm Catch Up Challenge
3. Complete 2017 Bingo Challenge and restrict to Canadian titles
4. Read 30 Canadian books, 5 classics, and 5 nonfiction
5. Read 25% non-white authors

2017 Reading Resolutions/Goals:...

Read 70 Books (read 112 in 2016 so far - 2016 Goal was 60)

1. Complete Can-Lit Bingo Challenge (don't limit myself to all Canadian)

2. Complete Book Riot's Read Harder Challenge

3. Read all the books for Canada Reads (these I will purchase if available in ebook).

4. Limit myself to purchasing Gift cards once a quarter for myself to buy books ($200/year)

5. Strive - expect for BDA and Can-Lit book club purchases to only read books from my own collection (over 900+)

6. Read more authors of colour

7. Read more woman authors

8. Do the Rincey Reads (BookRiot.com contributor) Big Book Read in August 2017 - The Brothers Karamazov

My goal is usually to read 104 books per year (2 per week). This year I surpassed it by reading 121 books so far and will most likely finish 2 more before the year is out. I'm still not reading as many books in French as I would like to.

But my real goal for 2017 is to read more short stories. The Short Story Advent Calendar gave me the idea that I can easily read one short story per day without taking away from my regular reading so that's what I will do (and put reading Classics thru the Serial Reader app on the back burner).

Mine is to read more non-fiction, work on bingo, and to just keep plugging along with my love of Canadian literature.

I am going to try and tackle some of my big books, that I already own. I get caught up in in numerous challenges, group reads etc, and then never end up reading the books I have already bought.

I read 144 books in 2016, which is far more than I have ever read in previous years, but on average they are in the 250 pages range. I would like to read less books, and dig into some really juicy long ones.

I've given this some thought and I have a conk still of tangible and intangible reading goals for 2017.

Right now in my 2016 Reading Challenge I'm at 73 of a planned 85 books. The reasons I didn't reach my goal don't matter because they largely couldn't be controlled. But I'm remaining optimistic and setting a goal of 90 books in 2017.

I also want to read at least 10 additional books on the 100 Books that Make You Proud to be Canadian list; and I would like to explore more European authors. More intangibly, I would like to feel zero guilt when turning to comforting reads, blockbuster reads or books chosen purely for distraction. I'm not sure where the guilt comes from - perhaps the cumulative effect of being a member of a family of accomplished readers when revealed book choices illicit the the response, "You're reading what!?" (Usually not in a good way.) So that's coming to an end.

I also want to use my Serial Reader app to read classics that I have started and never finished, as well as Children's classics that I have always wanted to read, but have never prioritized.

Naturally, my love of Canadian Literature will continue. I can't WAIT to find new Canadian gems to help me mark Canada's 150th birthday - celebrating Canadian authors is my personal act of patriotism this year. Santa even provided a "Read the North" t-shirt and tote bag to get me started. :)

2016:
I set a goal for 95 books and surpassed it, hitting 105 finished books. I have three that are ongoing. should I tag them as 2016 or 2017 if i don't finish them?
I participated in the 2016 Bingo Challenge and completed my card by the early fall. It was a lot of fun in both the planning and in the reading and I'm looking forward to doing it in 2017
Participated in a few of the monthly group reads which was fun. I'd love to join a book club but without having a car, it makes things difficult so having the online one covers that.
Increased my CanLit reading by quite a bit. I will never hit 100% because there are just so many great books from all over!
Started borrowing from our library's digital collection, something I'd always planned on doing

2017
Will participate in the Bingo Challenge
Will make a goal for at least 90 books
Will take more advantage of the library though I don't expect it will save me all that much money!
Will try to read a few of the Canada Reads books. I have some picked out that I think I'll like. I doubt I'll get through them all but I'd like to read some from the long list and if any of those are finalists, even better!
Will look forward to lots of great discussion here!

I think my reading goals for this year are going to be fairly simple: 1) I would like to tackle the Canada Reads longlist, but there are several I am not interested in and I'm going to allow myself to be ok with not reading these.
2) I am going to dedicate more reading time to Canadian authors
3) I am going to tackle books on my shelf that have been collecting dust for years and are screaming at me to open
4) I am going to get through a huge stack of books that I was gifted in return for reviews as I have gotten very behind
5) I am going to read for pleasure

I love resolution #5 @Wanda! That's the ultimate goal.

@Allison, perhaps in hindsight that should rank as #1 not #5 lol

Well you did better than me. I didn't even list it all!

My two 2016 goals were:

1) Read mostly Canadian.
I read 40% Canadian, so didn't make this goal exactly. However, this was my biggest year of audio, and most of those were American, so this really skewed my stats. In paper books, I read mostly Canadian.

2) Complete 2016 BINGO with mostly Canadian authors.
Success!

3) Read all of the Canada Reads shortlist books before the debates.
Success! My fave success of the year -- it really made the debates my literary highlight of the year!

For 2017, this is what I'm thinking:

1) Complete 2017 BINGO with mostly Canadian authors.

2) Read all of the Canada Reads shortlist books before the debates.

3) Do an author run of 3-4 books by one author in a row. (I'm thinking Elena Ferrante, Louise Penny, Elizabeth Hay or some others.)

4) Participate in 4-5 monthly book reads with this group.

5) Participate in 3-4 monthly book challenges with this group.

6) Read 15-20% authors from outside North America.

@Allison - I like the idea of a series of books in a row by the same author!!

We have all talked about reading resolutions but here is an interesting article from CBC with resolutions for writing from some Canadian authors:

Reading a series of books by one author is a good idea when you've found one you really like! I've done that in the past and I have a stack of paperback books by Lesley Crewe that my cousin lent me so I'm good to go on that front! I can also use one of hers for Bingo since she's from Nova Scotia as am I and some of her books are also set in NS.

I was recently starting to get back into reading after finding some great books and enjoying them. So I decided to set a resolution of reading 24 books in 2017, 2 per month. It is nowhere near what I would have been reading a few years ago but these days I spend some of my free time writing as well as reading. Also, the past couple of years of being a teacher have been kind of stressful and have contributed to lessening my reading. Anyway, I'm excited to get back into the swing of reading now. I hope I can complete my goal this year. Two down, 22 more to go! lol

It's been a couple of days since I read anything because I had to stop a book due to a badly inserted love story and it just sucked the momentum I had been building. Off to go try another book!

Thanks for sharing Noor - I am sure this group will inspire some of your reading choices!