I've been mulling my 2022 plans for literally weeks, waffling about whether or not I want to make major changes. Last year, as you know if you read my blog regularly, I made a pretty major change in that I opted to go on a full year book-buying ban but offer myself a few exceptions and also to rarely accept ARCs. So, what's in store for 2022?
Reading and Blogging Goals for 2022
1. The return of the book-buying ban. I've given myself a couple weeks in which to purchase some of my most-wanted titles. I can't get all of them, of course. The wish list grew enormously, last year, as I found that a way to keep myself from immediately buying was to just add to the wish list. But, I've chosen a few and will probably buy a couple more. My ending date for allowing purchases is January 14.
After that, I'm going to continue with last year's rules and exceptions to the buying ban. The exceptions are books by people I know personally, dirt cheap books, and maybe some F2F group selections. However, I'm going to allow myself to return to checking out books from the library so I'm hoping my F2F books will be available there to prevent having to purchase. Again, I'll allow myself a mid-year purchase, but I hope to limit myself to a single mid-year order.
2. I will read exclusively off my shelves, the exception being the occasional library check-out. I have a specific shelf that I plan to tackle, first. That's shown above. I have so many books that they're piled up on the library floor and were also piled on the floor in other rooms (the books on the library floor remain but the rest have been moved off the floor, now). The books shown are actually my bedside pile, which has been shifted to the top of a shelving unit. I'm not going to limit myself to only reading off that shelf but I'm going to try to focus on getting through those, first.
3. Read at least 100 books. That's my Goodreads goal; however, I have discovered a new love of chunksters so I'm not going to kick myself if I decide to read some bigger books and don't make my goal.
4. Continue reading from an anthology or collection of short stories at all times. Last year, that went pretty well. There were times I focused on a single read and the anthologies fell by the wayside, but I got through quite a few and want to keep that going.
5. Accept no ARCs. None. That is going to be so hard. But, the next goal should make it somewhat easier . . .
6. Only write what I feel like writing. If that means only a monthly reading update, fine. If it means 25-word reviews, fine. I've found that after 15 1/2 years, I don't really want to write a full review of absolutely everything I read, although I like having a record so I'd like to write something about each book I read, regardless of length. I am, at this point, leaning toward eventually going to a "Monthly Reads in Review" post as my only method of reviewing. But, along with that I'm considering continuing Monday Malarkey and Fiona Friday. On these details, I haven't decided so the blog will continue as it has been until I make a decision and then . . . well, I guess we'll see. Opinions on this are welcome. Would you even drop by if I only post once a month? Would Monday Malarkey and Fiona Friday keep you coming back? Is blogging passé?
7. Get rid of as many books as possible. This means going through older books as well as letting go of finished books a little sooner. I have found that I require a cooling-off period before I let books go and that's fine. But, I need to be a little more mercenary about getting rid of anything I won't read again.
That's it! OK, more goals than I expected but most of these are holdovers from last year and I did pretty well, last year. The one goal I utterly failed at was my goal to read books by Native American authors. I read a few but let that one slide, after a time. I'll keep that as an unofficial goal that I'd also like to work on but since I'm not buying, it'll mean reading what I already own.
It's so nice to start a fresh, new year!
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Sounds like some good goals! I wish I could be as dedicated to clearing off shelf space- I consider I'm doing pretty good if I read at least as many of my own books as borrowed library ones.
ReplyDeleteIt's hard! So many new and tempting books are always being released. But, my shelves have little competition with the local library. The reason I started collecting books was that my library never seemed to have what I wanted to read (although our current library is an improvement over the last). Most of what I've bought ironically came from the perpetual library sale. I might not have been able to check out the books I desired, but people were reading them and donating them to the Friends of the Library to sell!
DeleteSame here, actually. I'm mainly interested in books about animals, wildlife and plants- or older fiction. I find most of them at thrift stores and the library sale!
ReplyDeleteYep. Buying from library sales and thrift stores is a great way to both find the books you really want to read and help out the library or a charity!
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