Bout of Books 14 | Goal & TBR

Bout of Books is tomorrow and I'm just realizing how much it's sneaking up on me (it's tomorrow, tomorrow. What's happening? I have no idea anymore). Anyway - I've been in a serious reading... slump? I guess it's a slump. I've still been reading, technically, but not as much as I'd like to be. So I've been trying to participate in whatever read-a-thon I can to try and get my head back in the reading (and blogging) zone.

So my goals for this week are pretty simple.

• Read as much as I can - don't push myself too hard, not this time around, but also I respond well to goals/pushing. (average of 200 pages a day minimum)
• Finish some book books, not just trades/graphic novels
• Visit blogs! Comment! (I've been so out of just everything that I haven't gone and visited peoples blogs since before I moved, let alone commented and interacted and I miss it so much, I want to see what everyones up to, what they're reading) (not giving myself a goal, just going to push myself)
• Go to both twitter chats! I love the twitter chats, they're fantastic, and normally make me want to read, so hopefully it'll all go well.

I think the biggest thing that'll be making me read the next week instead of anything else is that I somehow hurt my wrist yesterday or the day before, and it randomly just starts to hurt too hard to type/write/really anything. But I can read. 

For my TBR, obvious this is very loose and more like just my pile of things to pick from. Only one of them is something I've started (which I was hoping to finish before the read-a-thon but a family friend had a cook out yesterday and I actually got to sleep in because workmen don't work on Sunday (there's construction still happening in my building. yay)).

So the books first:

• Cold Kiss by Amy Garvey (currently-reading)
• Glass Heart by Amy Garvey (sequel obviously, would be cool to also get done and have finished another series this year)
• Smoke and Mirrors by Neil Gaiman (short story collection, want to read and then move onto Trigger Warnings. I've been missing Gaiman).
• Shadowshaper by Daniel José Older (new release and looks super interesting, and the cover is gorgeous, and is also pretty short & YA)
• Mr. Mercedes by Stephen King (put this on my BookTubeAThon TBR and didn't get to it, but maybe I can this week? It's long but it's King)
• Werecat: The Trilogy by Andrew J Peters (I bought this at a con, and it's a whole trilogy in like 250 pages, perfect for a readathon)
• The Saint by Tiffany Reisz (I've been wanting to continue on with this series since I finished the last one, I love these characters)

And then the graphic novels/trades and such. First off, I'm going to be reading single issues throughout the week but I'm not going to count them as a full thing unless I read like 1-5 and then I'll just count it as their trade counterpart. (Does that make sense to everyone? Won't count as one thing completed, but will count the pages and list 'em)

• March, Book Two by John Lewis (read book one in July and really want to get to this)
• Phonogram: Rue Britannia by Kiernon Gillen, Jamie McKelvie (currently coming out are the single issues to part three, though they're all self contained stories. I still can't start at three, and I love these two).
• Runaways: The Complete Collection, Volume 1 by Brian K. Vaughn, Adrian Alphona, Takeshi Miyazawa (I've always wanted to read this and I'm glad they released it in the longer trades. it looks so good, though)
• Black Widow: Vol 1 & Vol 2 by Nathan Edmonson, Phil Noto (I've been dying to read these, dying, and it's complete now, vol 3 all out in single issues but not collected yet).

And for single issues? No idea, I have so many to read - probably some Secret Wars stuff and then just whatever came out the last two weeks since I should get my pull list in on Friday. 

Those are all things that I want to read soon, I hope to get through a good chunk of both lists but we'll see how it goes, I guess. 

Normally I do a separate post for everyday, it feels less cluttered to me but then I feel very guilty if I haven't read anything, so this read-a-thon we're going to go as low stress as possible and just do all the updates in one post (and then have a post next Monday, after the read-a-thon, that'll have everything I read and page count and just my general thoughts about the week).

If you're participating in Bout of Books this coming week let me know so I can check out your blog, and best of luck. 

2015 Reading Resolutions

I did very well reading wise in 2014, so I'm not going to be changing up this year resolutions too much. Though - I didn't do good on some of my resolutions (reading more books then I bought didn't happen, because I discovered BookOutlet). I'm going to, or do, have a full post (link) about a wrap up on 2014, related to reading resolutions.

And we're just going to go straight into the resolutions. I have quite a few (I've always been a resolutions kind of person, and they really do work for me. I tend to be aware of my own limits and try not to lie to myself. For example: I'm not resolving to go to the gym this year because the YMCA near me is full of old guys and business men and it's mildly creepy. However - eating better, working out more frequently are on the list).

Now - book resolutions.

• Read 100 books - now I read way more then this amount in 2014, more then double, but I don't want to put too much stress and pressure on myself. And I want to have time to read some longer books and some classics and non-fiction, all of which would take me longer then a normal book and I don't want to worry about it, don't want to push myself to hurry through books.

• Read books from my (physical) TBR / Don't buy as many books - I know putting myself on a book ban will just end up with me cracking and buying a shit ton of books in one go. I think I might try and just buy books I know I could read in the next month (if I don't, like if I'm not in the mood, that's fine. I'm not going to feel guilty about it, that's counterproductive). I'd like to do the 'read 5 books and then I can buy one' kind of thing, but then I'd be pushing myself to speed through books and that'd defeat the purpose also.

• Complete series - This wasn't, actually, a goal of mine last year, but I ended up completing a lot of series (I only completed 2, I believe, in 2013, while I completed 12 in 2014). So I'd like to try and be conscious of trying to complete some of the series I've started, especially the ones that I own all the books in the series and therefor it would be the easiest thing in the world to just finish it up. (Or if I only have the last book left. I don't think there are any series I have left like this, but that always drives me crazy).

• Weekly Wrap-Ups - I did two a few months ago and really liked the format, and so I'd like to do them in 2015. Some weeks I might end up not doing it - it's a lot of work and some weeks I might not have anything to say - but I'd like to keep up with it for the most part. It'll be a wrap-up of my week, so even if I haven't read much, or anything, there will probably be something else to talk about - a TV show I started watching, some YouTube videos, blog posts I've read. I'll still be doing monthly wrap-ups, hopefully including links to the blog posts I've done (including these), so everything is all organized and easier week to week. This is also how I plan to mini-review every book I read, writing a bit about it in the weekly wrap-up after I finish it. I think I'm going to be posting them on... Mondays? covering from Monday to Sunday, finish it up Sunday night (hopefully), and it'll go up Monday. We'll see how this goes. I'd really like to stick to this, but this is the one I'll most likely break, even though I've been thinking about it since I did those two. (The second one I did, is good idea of what I plan on doing if you're confused/curious).

• More discussions / more book reviews - I like writing posts for both, but I don't do either of them as much. With reviews, if I don't write one, I normally just don't have enough to say - meaning I liked it but didn't have enough to say, didn't like it and didn't know how to explain that, or adored it and don't want to spend the review squealing at you. Either way - I'd like to do more. Mostly discussions. I did more reviews in 2014, then I did in 2013, which is good, but I tend to write out my initials thoughts for discussion posts and then second guess myself and not post them, and I'd like to stop doing that.

• Read More... classics, non-fiction, longer books (500+ pages).
• Classics - isn't this always a goal? I own so many classics and I do really want to read them all, but I read classics slowly. I'm not going to put a number on this one, but I'd just like to read some.
• Non-fiction - I own a lot of non-fiction and I never read it at the rate I buy it, since I rarely read non-fiction. And I'm not sure why, I tend to love it and really enjoy it (I also can't get out of the habit of feeling like I should be taking notes? Which isn't a bad thing, but I'd rather just read and tab things). I need to get on this - but I'm also not putting a number amount here.
• Longer books - normally I don't have a problem reading longer books. And I don't think I read abnormally few, I just have a lot I'd like to get to - and I did feel like I was neglecting them more then I would if I hadn't kept pushing myself for a higher goal. All there of these things are linked to that. (Saying that, I just counted and I read 19 books with pages 500 and up - not counting rereads - which does not seem shabby at all to me, I've quite proud of that. Still, I'd like to make sure to read more in 2015).

• Challenges - I'm going separate posts on them, that'll be up this month, but I'm still going to just list them quickly: TBR Double Dog Dare, Banned Book Challenge, series challenges (this one, I'm not participating in a particular one, I'm just doing it on my own).

On the other hand - getting so many books knocked off my TBR, and re-read, was a lot of fun and it felt fantastic to be able to read so many books in one year. So I'm still, definitely, going to push myself, I'm just not going to put too much pressure and stress on myself. I've learned that even setting number goals can cause problems, let alone setting a specific book I want to read. 

It sounds silly and superstitious, but I'm not jinxing anything for this coming year. And this is a fair list of resolutions, which does look like a bit of pressure, but most things are things I've been considering for a little while, and I'm promising myself not to beat myself up too much if I don't hit any of them.

I've considered not counting single issues of comics, because they're really short, but I tend to count everything I read towards Goodreads. And, yes, they're short - but I feel like it evens out (for the things I can't count, or if an edition of something I reread is off on page count. Can't count like: fan fiction, things that aren't on GR in general. So I think it'll even out, and I'm loving the single issues I've been reading and wouldn't want to push them to the side).

And I think that's it, for the resolutions. "It" like there aren't a slightly large number of them.

If you have any resolutions for the coming year, I'd love to read about them! Leave a comment, with a link to your blog or just your resolutions. Reading, writing, everything. Happy New Year!