Taking Stock – Reading 2008

With 4.5 months left in 2008, I thought it would be a good idea to re-evaluate my reading goals and take stock of where I am and where I want to go. I’m already thinking ahead to 2009 and have made one major decision regarding my reading: not to join so many challenges and be more focused on some of my long-term, perpetual challenges.

As of today here are the reading challenges I’ve completed:

1. Winter Reading 2008 (2/29/2008)
2. Unread Authors (2/22/2008)
3. The Pub 2008 (3/14/2008)
4. Book Awards 2007 (5/24/2008)
5. Remembering Nattie (5/31/2008)
6. Book Binge 2008 (5/31/2008)
7. Themed Reading 2008 (5/31/2008)
8. 48 Hour Reading Challenge (6/8/2008)
9. Man Booker Challenge (6/17/2008)
10. 24 Hour Read-A-Thon (6/29/2008)
11. Chunkster Challenge (7/29/2008)
12. ARC Challenge (7/29/2008)

Here is my progress on my time-limited challenges (follow the links for more information on each challenge):

• Book Awards II (ends June 1, 2009) – Completed 0/10
• Russian Reading (ends December 31, 2008) – Completed 1/4
• 2008 Decades (ends December 31, 2008) – Completed 7/8 decades, but they are not consecutive
• Celebrate the Author (ends December 31, 2008) – Completed 7/12
• In Their Shoes (ends December 31, 2008) – Completed 3/4
• Novel Challenges Yahoo Group Mini Challenges (ends December 31, 2008) – Completed 10/12
• Short Story Reading (ends December 31, 2008) – Completed 6/6 individual stories, 1/3 collections
• African Reading (ends December 31, 2008) – Completed 2/6
• 2008 TBR (ends December 31, 2008) – Completed 3/12
• My Year of Reading Dangerously (ends December 31, 2008) – Completed 7/12
• Every Month is a Holiday (ends December 31, 2008) – Completed 8/12
• Notable Books (ends December 31, 2008) – Completed 3/8
• 888 (ends December 31, 2008) – Completed 29/56
• Suspense-Thriller (ends December 31, 2009) – Completed 5/12
• 100+ (ends December 31, 2008) – Completed 64/100
• Soup’s On (ends March 31, 2009) – Completed 2/6
• 1% Well Read (ends February 28, 2009) – Completed 5/10
• 10 out of 100 (ends October 31, 2008) – Completed 5/10
• Chick Lit (ends September 1, 2008) – Completed 2/3
• Well-Rounded (ends December 31, 2008) – Completed 5/6
• Summer Reading (ends August 31, 2008) – Completed 7/9
• What an Animal (ends June 30, 2009) – Completed 0/6
• Unread Authors (ends January 31, 2009) – Completed 0/6

It is obvious I won’t complete all of these – but, I have a new attitude about reading challenges these days. I join them to expand my horizons and push myself to read in areas I might otherwise ignore; and I also use them to clear books from my huge, towering TBR mountain. I will accomplish both those goals even if all the numbers don’t add up.

I am also working to read from some perpetual lists of award winners. Here’s how I’m doing with those (again follow links to learn more about each challenge):

• Pulitzer Project (goal: read all the Pulitzer Prize winners) – Completed 15 (2 in 2008)
• The Complete Booker (goal: read all the Booker winners) – Completed 9 (4 in 2008)
• Reading the Nobels (goal: read at least one book from each Nobel Laureate) – Completed 8 (3 in 2008)
• The Orange Prize Project (goal: read all the winners and nominees) – Completed 17 (5 in 2008)
• Costa Book Award Project (goal: read all the Costa winners from Novels and First Novels) – Completed 2 (1 in 2008)
• The National Book Award Project (goal: read from the nominees and winners) – Completed 19 (0 in 2008)

I’m also working on two other perpetual challenges:

Science in Fiction Project – Completed 5 (3 in 2008)

Reading the World – which is a long-term (life long) project I started in 2007 to read books around the world. So far my progress in this project is as follows:

• Africa – Completed 6/52
• South America – Completed 2/12
• North America – Completed 2/23
• Europe – Completed 13/47
• Australia/Oceania – Completed 2/14
• Asia – Completed 7/46

So what does all this mean for me today? Well, I will likely finish at least 11 of my challenges which end on December 31, 2008 which means I will nearly double the number of challenges I completed in 2007. I will continue to chip away at my perpetual challenges. And I will certainly read 100 books this year.  Some of my time-limited challenges bleed into 2009, otherwise I will resist the temptation to sign up for more time limited challenges and instead focus my reading in 2009 on the Award Challenges and Reading the World.

What about you? Do you have goals for the remainder of 2008? Are you thinking of changing things up in 2009? Whatever you are doing, I hope you are having fun like I am! Happy reading!