My 2022 Reading Prompts

When I first started blogging back in 2014, I was really into reading challenges involving various prompts to encourage you to read outside of your comfort zone. I really enjoyed these kinds of challenges as I wasn't sure what I loved in books and used these challenges to find books I wouldn't typically gravitate towards. They were also a lot of fun to do, so I had considered doing a similar challenge for 2022. However, I found that I got easily burnt out on these kinds of challenges if they had too many prompts so struggled to find one that suited me. 

As I couldn't find a challenge I liked, I decided to create my own challenge for myself and compiled a list of 12 prompts, one for each month of the year in theory. Each of these prompts is to encourage me to either read outside of my comfort zone or pick up the books that I already own. I thought I would share these prompts, mostly to hold myself accountable.

1. Read A Classic - This is pretty self-explanatory. I have not really read any classics, except the couple I skim read for school, and I want to change that. These books are classics for a reason and I have never picked one up voluntarily. 

2. Read A Historical Romance - I read my first historical romance in 2021 when I started the Bridgertons series by Julia Quinn after loving the TV show. I have read the first five books in that series but I would like to read a historical romance outside of that series in 2022.

3. Read A Book In A Series I Have Already Started - I am so useless when it comes to finishing series so this was a prompt I knew needed to be on the list. I have so many unfinished series so I just need to read a book in one of those to tick this off.

4. Start A New (non-contemporary) Series - Despite already having so many unfinished series, I want to start a new series, ideally one that I have been meaning to get to for a while. I have started a lot of contemporary series recently but own a lot of first books in fantasy/paranormal series that I would like to get to.

5. Read A Book That Is Out Of My Comfort Zone - This is also self-explanatory. I want to push myself to pick up books I wouldn't typically gravitate towards. I might end up being surprised and find a new genre or type of book I really love.

6. Read A Book I Have Owned Since Before 2015 - I have a few books on my shelves that have been there since 2015 or earlier and I am trying to prioritise them in 2022. 

7. Read A Paranormal Romance - This is a sub-genre I haven't really explored since my Twilight days. I would like to give it a go this year and see if it is something I would enjoy now.

8. Read A Book Being Adapted In 2022 - I haven't actually looked into this one much so I'm hoping it won't be too difficult. I used to loved reading books in preparation for watching their adaptation but have gotten out of that habit in recent years. I thought it would be fun to read something being adapted this year before watching it's adaptation.

9. Read An Intimidating Book - I have quite a few books on my bookshelves that have been there for years because I find them intimidating for whatever reason. This prompt is here to force me to finally pick one of those books up.

10. Read A Low Rated Book On My TBR - This just seemed like a fun one to throw in here. I always find it interesting when I read a book a lot of people either love or hate and seeing where my thoughts lie. 

11. Read An Underhyped Book - I tend to read a lot of books that other people in the book community are reading because that is where I get my recommendations from. I don't want to just be reading super popular books that everyone else is talking about so for this prompt I want to read a book that has less than 200 ratings on Goodreads.

12. Read A Book By A Popular Author - In contrast to the last prompt, I want to read a book I haven't read by a popular author. There are a lot of popular authors that I haven't read a lot from and want to see what all the fuss is about.

Those are my twelve prompts for my little reading challenge I have made for myself. If you have any recommendations of books to read for any of these prompts, especially the classic or the paranormal romance, please let me know. 

Are you doing any prompt based reading challenges in 2022?

Sophie :)

2022 Goals

 I love this part of a new year! The fresh start and the chance to make new goals for yourself in the upcoming year. I always find making reading goals at the beginning of the year really gives me the motivation to get reading and gets me excited to find my new favourite books. I'm trying not to be too ambitious with my goals this year but I always get a bit over excited and get carried away.

Goodreads Reading Challenge

I have always set my Goodreads goal as 50 books but after surpassing that the past two years I have decided to push myself this year. I had my goal set at 100 books for some of last year but reduced it when it became clear that wouldn't happen. As I managed to read a total of 80 books during a pretty mental year for me, I thought I would try and challenge myself again this year and set my 2022 Goodreads Challenge goal at 100 books.

Buzzword Challenge

This was one of my favourite things I did last year so I am excited to do it again this year. This challenge comes from Kayla from booksandlala's Buzzword Readathon. She has compiled a list of buzzwords for each month of the year which can be used as either a year long reading challenge or as prompts for a week long readthon each month of the year. I completed it as a challenge last year and will be attempting to do the same in 2022.

Read The Books I Own

This is not a new goal for me. I think I have made this a goal every single year I have had this blog and I still fail miserably every year. Once again, I really want to try and prioritise the books I already own, either physically or as an ebook. I have around 150 unread physical books and around 110 unread ebooks, some of which I have owned since 2012. I need to get these numbers down this year, both by reading them and by getting rid of the ones I am no longer interested in.

Reread Books

I didn't reread a single book in 2021! That is crazy to me as rereading is one of my favourite things. I love diving back in to a story I have already fallen in love with and being with characters I enjoy all over again. I want to try and reread more again in 2022. I would like to do at least one reread a month but I'm never great at sticking to that so just more would be enough for me.

Read More Non Fiction

This is similar to my last goal, I love nonfiction but don't read enough of it. I only read 8 nonfiction books in 2021, which is nothing considering I read 80 books. Again, I would love to read at least one a month but I know that doesn't really work for me so I would like to just read more than I did last year.

Read More Diversely

I am so ashamed that I am having to make this a 'goal' again this year, as I feel it should be something I just do. I did not do a good enough job of reading more from authors who are not white in 2021 and I need to do better this year. 

Review Every Book

This one is a goal that I am already doubting my ability to do. I would really love to review every single book I read this year, even if it is just a couple of sentences on Goodreads. I don't necessarily want to review every book on the blog, I think I'll probably just do that with favourites or new releases, but I would like to review every book on Goodreads and most of them on Instagram as well. I'm terrible at keeping on top of reviews so this will be a struggle but I'm hoping I can do it.

Those are my main reading goals for 2022. I do have some other goals relating to blogging and the book community in general, as well as some personal goals, but I think reading goals are the most interesting. I really am hoping to be able to stay blogging this year, with no big long breaks, but I know life can be crazy and unpredictable.

What are your goals for 2022?

Sophie :)

2021 Goals Review

 It's that time again when we look back at my goals for the past year I realise all of the ways I failed and all of the goals I forgot about. I set quite a few goals for my reading life in 2021 and I know for sure I didn't do so great with some of them. I liked to look back at the goals I set in the previous year before deciding on my goals for the current year as a way of seeing what I still need to work on.

Goodreads Reading Challenge

This is always my first goal every year as I find having a number goal to reach pushes me to keep reading throughout the year. I have set my goal as 50 books for the past 6 years so started of 2021 with that goal again. However, pretty early on I decided to be ambitious and change it to 100 books. This was going well until I got super slumpy and decided to lower it to 75, which is still more than I read in 2020. I did managed to read this goal as I read 80 books in 2021. I'm a little disappointed I didn't manage 100 but I am glad I managed to read more than the year before.

Buzzword Challenge

This was a new one for 2021 and was created by Kayla from BooksAndLala, stemming from her Buzzword Readathon. She compiled a list of buzzwords, one for each month of the year, and the idea was to either complete a readathon each month reading books with the buzzword in the title or, as I did, use it as a challenge to read one book containing the buzzword in the title each month. While this was a bit of a struggle some months, I'm pretty proud that I actually did manage to complete this challenge. 

Year Of Smut Challenge

This is a romance reading challenge that I wanted to do at the beginning of the year but quickly gave up on. I found I was putting pressure on myself to read books to fit a prompt rather than what I wanted to read. I have found that these challenges, at least when they are year long, don't really work for me.

Read From My Physical TBR

This is some thing I make as a goal every year. I have far too many unread books on my shelves, some of which have been there since 2014, and I always make it a goal to focus on reading those books. In 2021 I challenged myself to read at least one book a month from my physical TBR. Noone is surprised that this didn't happen. I only read 11 books from my physical TBR in 2021, which is really not great. 

Read More Diversely

I wanted to make a conscious effort in 2021 to read more books by authors who are not white, as this is something I have not done in the past and felt that it was a very important change. I started off the year doing well with this goal but I'm really ashamed to say I did very poorly the rest of the year. This isn't good enough and I need to do better.

Try New Things

This is one that I just completely forgot about. I wanted to read at least one book from a genre or subgenre that I had never read before each month in order to push myself out of my comfort zone. I tried historical romance for the first time but that was really it. 

Participate In Readathons

I wanted to participate in a readathon every 1-2 months in 2021 in order to become more of a part of the book community online. I have discovered that readathons are not really great for me. I tend to feel a lot of pressure to read and then end up not reading as a result. I think I only took part in two readathons in the year and didn't involve myself in the community in any way during those.

Other than my Goodreads challenge and the Buzzword challenge, I didn't really do great with my goals in 2021. I struggled a bit with my motivation to read at quite a few times over the year so I think a lot of my failure in my goals is to do with me just picking up anything that would make me want to read. I will definitely be looking at these goals and incorporating some of them into my goals for this year.

How did you do with your 2021 reading goals?

Sophie :)

2021 Reading Goals

One of my favourite things about a new year is setting new goals for myself, both personal goals and reading goals. I try not to put too much pressure on myself with these goals, and will change them throughout the year if I feel like trying to accomplish my goals is causing me to lose the enjoyment of reading. I have quite a few to share with you. Some of these I will keep in mind throughout the year and work on them without thinking about it, others I will completely forget about and we can find out together at the end of the year if I have accomplished them. 

Goodreads Reading Challenge

As always, this is my first goal for the year. I have, once again, set my Goodreads challenge goal at 50 books. I managed to easily read 50 books in 2020 but who knows what this year is going to bring. I do have a bit of an 'out there' goal of 100, we'll see if I manage to push myself.

Buzzword Challenge

One of my favourite booktubers, Kayla from BooksAndLala, created the Buzzword readathon a while ago but has changed it up for 2021. She has compiled a list of buzzwords, one for each month, and these can either be for a week long readathon at the beginning of each month, or as a year long reading challenge of reading one book per month for that month's buzzword. I did a terrible job of explaining that but you can find out more about it here or here. I am going to be trying to read a book a month for each monthly buzzword.

Year Of Smut Challenge

One of my favourite bookstagrammers, RateTheRomance, created a reading challenge for romance and I am so excited about it. There are two bingo boards, the regular boards and the Badass Bibliophile edition. I am starting off with the regular boards, but if I complete that I will challenge myself to be a Badass Bibliophile.

Read From My Physical TBR

This is a goal I have in some form every year. I don't reach for the books I own, I think because they don't reflect my reading tastes as much anymore, but I do still want to give them a go. I've tried setting a myself the challenge of getting my physical TBR down to a certain number by the end of the year, which didn't work. I've tried only allowing myself to buy new books once I had read 5 I already owned, which failed. So, this year I just want to try and read one book each month that I have owned before the beginning of 2021. I also want to try and do the same with the ebooks I already own but that is less of a priority.

Read More Diversely

This is something that I have been saying I want to do for so long now but never really made any conscious effort to change my reading. Looking back on my reading over previous years, I'm ashamed of how few books I have been reading from non-white authors. I want to read at least one book a month by an author that is not white. Obviously I want to be reading more than that, but that is the very least I want to be doing. I am also going to be tracking the diversity of all kinds within the books I'm reading on my reading spreadsheets to make me more aware of what I am reading and how diverse my reads actually are.

Try New Things

One of my favourite goals I have for myself in 2021 is to read one book in a genre/subgenre that is new to me, or a book that is completely outside of my comfort zone, each month. I didn't think adult romance was for me until I gave it a go and now it is my most read genre. I want to discover things I love that I haven't given a chance before.

Participate In Readathons

Readathons are so much fun and a great way to participate in the book community. I have had a blog for six years now and have yet to really be active in the book community in any way. Mostly because, even in an online environment, I am painfully shy. I want to participate in at least one readathon every 1-2 months and try to make myself get involved.

I'm not making any blogging goals this year because I'm not really sure what direction I want to take with my blog in 2021. Part of me would love to make this the year I really put the effort in and try to grow my blog. However, I don't want to put too much pressure on myself this year. Life is hard right now and I need to be nice to myself. So everything is a bit up in the air with blogging, but I will work things out.

What reading goals have you made for 2021? 

Sophie :)

2020 Goals Review

With everything else going on in the world, 2020 was the year my reading and blogging goals took a major back seat. I prioritised reading what I wanted to read and what I was in the mood for over trying to stick to the goals I set at the beginning of the year. In fact, I don't even remember what goals I did set. So I thought it would be interesting to take a look back and see how I did with my goals without actually trying.

Goodreads Reading Challenge

I have set my Goodreads goal at 50 for the last few years and did so again in 2020. I managed to surpass that and read 71 books. This was one that I was aware of throughout the year but never really had to work to surpass it as reading was something that brought me a lot of joy and comfort in such a mad year.

Finish Some Series

I didn't set any number for this goal, probably because I knew I wouldn't do very well with it. I did finish a series that I have been reading for many years, which felt like a big achievement, but otherwise I didn't prioritise series. I continued with a couple of series and read a complete trilogy, but only finished one series in 2020 that I had previously started.

Reduce My Physical TBR

This is another goal I really didn't think about at all. I didn't buy as many books in 2020, in fact I didn't buy many at all, so I didn't add to my physical TBR too much. However, I also didn't read too many of the books I already own. I've noticed that my tastes are changing so a lot of the books I own physically are not the books I want to pick up now. I am still reading them but I'm not getting through them as quickly as I would like.

Blog More Consistently

Obviously I made this goal before the whole global pandemic situation. I don't think I did too badly with my blogging in 2020 considering how crazy the year was. I had a few months of pretty consistent posting and other that weren't as successful. I'm not stressing about this goal too much.

Photograph Every Book I Read

For years I have wanted to post a picture of every book I read in a year on Instagram and never managed to do it. Somehow, 2020 was the year for it! I was a bit all over the place with how consistent I was, and I'm still working my way through sharing the last of my 2020 reads to my Instagram, but I was a lot more successful with this goal than I have been in any other year. 

I'm actually surprised by how successful I was in 2020 with my goals. I am not really bothered about the things I didn't do so well with as last year was so strange. Hopefully this year will have a bit more of normality and I can put a bit more effort into my reading goals.

Did you make any reading goals for 2020? How did you do?

Sophie :)

Mid-Year Goals Check-In

We are now half way through 2020, which is crazy, so it's time to look back on the first half of the year and check-in with the goals I set for myself at the beginning of the year. I was unsure about even making goals for 2020, so I haven't really been focusing on them. I didn't make as many goals for myself in 2020 as I have in past years, though I'm not sure that will make it any less likely that I will completely fail at all of them. 

Goodreads Reading Challenge

I always set my Goodreads goal for 50 books, some years I read way under that but other years I manage to read more. I am currently 11 books ahead of schedule, having read 34 books so far in 2020. I haven't had the 'stay at home' advantage that a lot of other people have had in the past few months, as I have still been working as normal, so I'm pretty happy with that number. I think I have a pretty good chance of reaching 50 this year.

Finish Some Series

I wanted to get through some of the many series I have started but not finished in 2020. So far, I don't think I've finished a single series. I have made some progress on a couple of series, and started a few new ones, but my progress on this goal seems to have slowed a lot recently. 

Reduce My Physical TBR

This is the goal every year that I fail miserably. Of the 34 books I have read so far this year, only 7 of them were books I have physically owned prior to this year. I haven't bought a lot of books this year so my physical TBR isn't growing massively, but it isn't shrinking either.

Blog More Consistently

This is another goal I have every year, but I think this year is the best I have done with this one in a while. I did have a bit of a lull for a few months, but I have been managing to post around twice a week most weeks since the end of April. I'm really hoping I can keep this up throughout the year.

Photograph Every Book I Read

I wanted to share every book I read in 2020 on my bookstagram that I made but kept neglecting after feeling I'm just not creative enough to take nice pictures. I stopped caring about my pictures looking as good as everyone else's. as my goal was just to have a visual documentation of my reading year, and I have been keeping it up. I'm not very up to date with it but I am trying.

I've not been doing as bad as I expected! I need to finish some series and read some of the books I own, but other than that I'm not doing too bad. 

I mentioned in my Summer TBR post that the current situation in the world made me look more closely at the kind of books I have been reading. I was really quite disgusted at myself when I discovered that I have read almost entirely from white authors so far in 2020, and this is something I want to change. I'm making it a goal for the rest of the year, but also just forever, to read more books from Black and POC authors. I would also like to be a bit more aware of the books I'm picking up and conscious of author identity as I want to be reading books from people of all backgrounds and identities and promoting their stories here on my blog. I really hope I can do better in the remainder of the year, and in the future in general. I'm going to try harder to do better.

Sophie :)

Find out how you can help the Black Lives Matter movement here.

2020 Reading Goals

I wasn't sure if I was going to post my reading and blogging goals this year, mostly because I wasn't sure if I wanted to make any goals for 2020. I found in previous years that the pressure of having too many goals became a bit overwhelming and led to me reading less. However, I decided to make a few reading goals for myself, and of course a couple of the usual blogging goals, but not as many as in previous years.

Goodreads Reading Challenge

As always, I am setting my Goodreads goal to 50 books in 2020. I didn't hit my goal in 2019 but I am hoping that life won't be quite as crazy this year. I think 50 is a pretty good number but it would be nice to surpass this goal again like I did in 2018.

Finish Some Series

I have quite a lot of unread series on my TBR, as well as some that I really want to get to but haven't yet started, and I want to focus on them a little more in 2020. I'm not setting any kind of number for this goal, I would just like to prioritise series a little more.

Reduce My Physical TBR

I set this goal every year and fail every year! My physical TBR is currently sitting at around 150 books, which is just crazy for me, so  I really need to try and get that number down. With using Scribd and my library more, I have been neglecting the books I own. Again, I'm not aiming to get it down to a certain number but just to prioritise my physical TBR books a bit more.

Blog More Consistently

This is another goal that I have every year. I really struggled to find time to blog in 2019, meaning my blog got completely neglected. I still haven't quite got into the groove of fitting in blogging with a full time job, it was way easier as a student, but I am hoping I can try to blog as consistently as possible. I think I will just be happy if I manage to post even a few times every month but ideally I would like to keep it up a bit more regularly.

Photograph Every Book I Read

I created a bookstagram a few years ago and it kept getting neglected as I am not a creative person at all. I would try to keep up with the kind of pictures other people were posting, but then giving up when I realised I just couldn't keep up with how beautiful and creative their pictures were. For 2020, I would like to not focus on the creative aspect of bookstagram and not compare myself to others, but instead just post a picture for every book I read in 2020. I'm hopeful I can keep this up for the year as it would be a nice visual representation at the end of the year.

Those are all of my reading and blogging goals for 2020. I don't have many and they aren't very interesting at all, but these are the few things I would like to focus on throughout the year.

What are your goals for 2020?

Sophie :)

2019 | Reading & Blogging Goals

I'm pretty late sharing my reading and blogging goals for this year, but that has a lot to do with the fact I couldn't think of many. Last year I tried to limit the goals I set myself as I had felt restricted in previous years. Giving myself fewer, less specific goals led to me reading the most I have read in years so this is something I want to continue this year. However, I do have a few little goals for myself in 2019.

Goodreads Reading Challenge

Despite reading 67 books last year, 17 more than my Goodreads goal, my goal is not changing this year. I am sticking with 50 books. This is partly because I know this year is going to be crazy for me - I graduate this year so I have to be a real adult with an adult job - and partly so there is less pressure to meet my goal.

Read More Variety

Of the 67 books I read in 2018, 42 were YA Contemporary. That is my favourite genre so it is always likely to be the biggest number but I'm not very happy with that number. I really enjoy many other genres but I just haven't been picking them up recently. I would like to make it a priority to reach for books from other genres throughout 2019.

Use The Library More

Last year I discovered my library ebook and audiobook service and it's great. I would love to make use of it a bit more in 2019, which will hopefully help me to buy less books. At the moment my library isn't great for physical books, and I am not the most reliable when it comes to returning books, so I'm sticking to this service for now. 

Get My Physical TBR Down

I am sick of setting this goal for myself every year but it just never seems to happen. My physical TBR is currently sitting at around 145, which is a little overwhelming. I'm not giving myself a number to get it down to this year, I would just like it to go down.

Request Less ARCs

Over the past couple of years I have discovered Netgalley. Last year, despite my best efforts, I went a slightly crazy with requesting and ended up getting overwhelmed at times. This year I am hoping to limit myself to no more than one ARC per month. We'll see how well that one goes.

Post Reviews On Goodreads

I often forget to post my reviews from my blog to Goodreads. I also don't tend to review a book on Goodreads if I don't write a full review on my blog. I would like both of these things to change in 2019. Ideally, I would like to review every book I read this year on Goodreads.

Post At Least Once A Week

I have given myself to goal to blog consistently every year and I always struggle to do so by the end of the year. This year I'm trying to be kinder to myself and take into account the fact that life is about to get mad. I know there are weeks that I can't post consistently, but I am hoping that I can manage at least one blog post a week.

Bookstagram

This is another one that is on the list every year. However, this year I am putting less pressure on myself. Rather than try and be as artsy and creative and all the crazy talented bookstagram people, I just want to have every book I read this year featured. There will most likely be nothing creative but I like to have a visual representation of the books I read.

Those are my goals for 2019. They are a lot less specific than in previous years, I have tried not to set any specific numbers to my goals. I have also tried to take into consideration that fact that a lot of things are going to change throughout this year and I don't know how that will affect both my reading and my blog. Hopefully I can accomplish at least some of these goals.

What goals have you set for yourself in 2019?

Sophie :)