When it comes to my reading challenges, November is probably the month I dread most. Why? Because it forces me to look back at the reading challenges I set myself at the start of 2018 and see how bad / good I did at them. As I’m writing this, I have no clue yet as to the state of my progress so… Let’s say I’m pretty curious to find out how I’ve done so far!
With only November and December left to try and tick off as many goals as possible, it’s important to set a game plan so we can at least try and tick off some goals, if not all of them. Wishful thinking, I know! But at least it’s a month of giving it an extra shot! If you want to check out the original post for my Remember November-challenge, simply click here!
For those of you who don’t know about my 2018 goals, you can check out this post or go to the top of this page and check out all the tabs beneath “Reading Challenge 2018” where I split my goals up into different challenges.
So, let’s see what I’ve yet to read / tick off, shall we?!
BOYFRIEND CHALLENGE
I feel like I should mention this first, simply because it’ll influence the way I pick the books to read. My boyfriend challenged me to read 75 of the books I owned before 2018 and.. well.. I’m nowhere near that number yet. I have yet to read 29 BOOKS MORE before I reach that goal. I’ve no clue if that’s even possible so.. we’ll see? There’ll be a more detailed post on this later on, so keep an eye out!
GENERAL GOAL
Books to read: 150 – current state: 148
Pages to read: 55.000 – current state: 52.076
This seems doable, doesn’t it?! I won’t focus on these two goals because I’m simply going to see where I end up at the end of the year.
PHYSICAL TBR
The goal was to get my owned TBR down to 100 but.. I’m not even going to talk about that. I started at 145 and am nearing 200? Or something? Right now? So, yeah. Let’s ignore the existence of this goal altogether.
SERIES CHALLENGE
Reread Harry Potter 1 – 2 – 3 – 4 – 5 – 6 – 7
Reread The Raven Cycle
Read A Song of Ice and Fire
I only wanted to reread The Raven Cycle the moment I really felt like rereading it and that hasn’t happened so far. Maybe it will, maybe it won’t but I’m not forcing myself to pick them up. As for the GoT-series? Let’s just say I’ll be happy if I manage to read one of those books before the year is over at this point..
GENRE CHALLENGE
Classics: 3/4
Humor & Comedy: 1/3
Graphic Novels / Manga: 1/5
I’ve only mentioned the genres I haven’t ticked off yet. Fact is I don’t even own any unread graphic novels / manga anymore so.. I’m going to leave that one be. As for the other ones, I want to read the following books to try and tick those off:
BOOKS AND MUNCHES BINGO
FINISHED
As I was prepping this post, I had yet one book to read being for the prompt “book with a fruit or vegetable in the title” but I just finished Dinosaurs & Cherry Stems today so, yay!
ALPHABET CHALLENGE
Q – V – X – Y – Z
This is on author’s last name, so.. Quite difficult! I decided not to buy books to complete this challenge, so I’ll just have to be happy with the end result. Unless one of you has the BEST recommendation for an author that’d fit one of my missing letters, that is.
Anyway. These are the books I own and can use to tick off some more letters:
Q – NONE
V – The Art of Baking Blind, Vaughan Sarah
X – NONE
Y – NONE
Z – The Book Thief, Zusak Markus
And that’s it! So.. to put everything together, I’ve yet to read these books:
This seems.. doable? If I add those page numbers to my current amount of pages read, that would get me to… 54.108! And as December has to be added as well, I’m well on my way of smashing that goal too – yay!
How are you going on your 2018 reading goals? Are you on schedule?
Did you give up on some challenges?
Going to join me with Remember November and try ticking them off anyway?
Books & Munches 
Okay, first of all, I am SO EXCITED for this challenge. I decided not to make a huge TBR, so this month’s is pretty small, but it has a bunch of titles for the challenge, and then I’ve also made a list of all the other optional titles I could use for it as I go through the month. I think there’s also a readathon in December devoted to finishing up old TBRs, so I might save that list for the readathon, too!
I like that you had so many goals this year. I want to do more goals in 2019, too, because my 2018 goals were mostly pretty minor/”general” and I want to focus on more specific ones! I have faith in you finishing Gust’s challenge. 😉 Shortathon will help with that, right?!
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Awesome! I saw your TBR post and it does look smaller than yours usually do but that definitely isn’t a bad thing. Leaves more room for mood-reading too, haha.
Oh, I might need to check that one out! I think I mostly have pre-2018 reads on unfinished TBR’s so that might help as well. [Going to write this down so I don’t forget to check upcoming readathons.]
Haha, I’m going to do less goals next year because.. well.. It’s not like I have ANY clue what my life will be like next year and all that.. The skies know if I’ll actually get to read even two books a month once the little wiggle is born. :’)
Shortathon will help a bit but.. most of my shortest reads are ones I got during 2018 so.. 😦
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Yeah, I actually basically FORCED myself to make a smaller TBR, heh. I liked adding in the “OPTIONAL reads” section at the bottom, because it lets me still mention books I’m considering in case anyone wants to buddy read them, but it also makes me feel so much less overwhelmed?
If it makes you feel any better, I actually read MORE once Isaac was born than I had while I was pregnant! Ebooks were a lifesaver for me because I would sit on the couch propped up with him on my chest and pillows everywhere and then I would read ebooks while he slept! It was perfect. ❤ You'll find a balance in one way or another!
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You keep forcing yourself to do that and eventually it’ll be natural and normal to make smaller TBR’s! [I know you’ll have a gigantic one soon anyway though but hey. You can try! :P] The optional reads one I LOVE. Definitely gives you some wiggle room and.. well.. “cheat room” in a way. Which is totally allowed because we cannot be without mood reading all the darn time. :’)
That’s gooood to know! Now I just have to make sure my Kindle dies so I can buy one that’s easier to read one-handed with and all that. *whistles*
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I’m going to be participating. I did a post about my challenges I needed to still complete but by the time this month ends I will only have The Alphabet Soup Challenge to complete.
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Hah, that’s still a challenge to tick off! And having only that one left is even better since that means you’re on top of your 2018 reading game. 🙂
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Thank you!! Hopefully I will be able to complete this one.
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You can do this! I’m positive you can at least make a dent in a couple of these!
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Haha, let’s hope so! I haven’t properly started just yet but I’m planning on jumping in as soon as I finish my current read. 😀
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First of all, I could never read 75 titles that I already own. I read so many ARC’s so that is probably the hardest challenge I see on this list.
As for your author challenge, I found some titles that would fit. I’ll put stars next to the ones that I think look really cool
Q – By a Charm and a Curse by Jaime Questell**, Open Minds by Susan Kaye Quinn
V- The Stars Never Rise by Rachel Vincent ** (any title by her looks cool actually), Survive the Night by Danielle Vega** also The Merciless looks good by her.
The Beast is an Animal by Peternell Van Arsdale
Y- Samantha Young has a few contemporary titles that look great. I loved The Replacements by Brenna Yavanoff. If you like NA titles I would recommend Deeper by Robin York. Sky in the Deep is by Adrienne Young**
Z- I loved the All the Things I’ve Done series by Gabrielle Zevin, The Girls at 17 Swann Street by Yara Zgheib*** Eliza and Her Monsters is by Francesca Zappia
Hope that’s helpful.
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Haha, I totally thought it’d be manageable at the start of the year but.. right now I just don’t know. I can only try my best to make it. Don’t think I will though. :’)
Ooh, thank you so much! By a Charm and a Curse definitely sounds interesting. I love anything fantasy with circuses and the like so that one’s right up my alley! Sky in the Deep is actually on my wish list.. so.. maybe I should just cave and get myself a copy, haha. 😛
I added a bunch of your rec’s to my wish list – thanks! 😀
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Did you read Caraval? It sounds like you would love it.
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Yesss! Loved Legendary way more though. 😀
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Also – how long are the books you are reading?? I have read 251 books this year but “only” 42,807 pages, so I would definitely fail your page number challenge even though I read 100 more books. This is so weird 😀
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That is exactly why I keep track of page numbers! You can read more books, but have read less pages and vice versa so you never really get a decent view on how much you read!
Most books I read are around 350 pages but I also read some huge tomes. IT being 1400 pages, Kingdom of Ash with 992. Those definitely help a lot to up that number. :’)
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Oh yeah, that makes sense. I read a lot of books, but if they are over 300 pages then it takes some self-convincing to pick them up 😀
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Haha, not everyone likes big books. 😛 I do like shorter ones but.. somehow the fantasy books that interest me are always 300+ pages.
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I guess in fantasy you need more worldbuilding 😀
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Definitely true!
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When you first posted about Remember November, I looked at what I still have left for my challenges, then kicked myself in the butt and I already finished two of them since then. So I might actually have almost nothing left for November? Oops? But at least this way I can definitely finish off whatever is left.
Hahahaaaa. My owned TBR was around 250 at the beginning of 2018 and currently it’s… around 350. My goal for 2019 is to get it back under 200. Why do we do this to ourselves?
Dinosaurs and Cherry Stems is a cute title 😀 and congrats on finishing your bingo!!
Right now I’m hunting for challenges to do in 2019. I already have one (I’m doing Around the Year in 52 Books again) but I want at least two, and possibly more if I find ones that interest me.
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Hahaha, that’s AWESOME! You don’t even have to be oops about that either, because it’s definitely something to be proud of!
Oh my lord. I’m relating to that. I wanted to get my owned TBR down and.. it’s gone way up. I don’t even think my numbers are correct anymore because I’ve noticed some mistakes in books I haven’t even mentioned on my list and stuff like that.. Might have to redo the entire thing once I unpack my books at the new house. *sigh*
Haha, thank you!!
I’m waiting for the Popsugar Reading Challenge 2019 to pop up so I can take a look at those prompts.
I’m also thinking about making some kind of “masterlist” with all 2019 challenges I can find.. Maybe.. We’ll see how much time I have to actually execute that idea. 😛
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I recently added a bunch of books on Goodreads that I had on my computer but never added there, so my owned TBR went up without actually acquiring books. So yeah, keeping track is suprisingly hard
what time does the Popsugar Challenge usually go up?
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Ooh, yup! That makes it even harder! I don’t really count ebooks / earcs to my owned tbr and I’m already struggling with it. :’)
Last year it went up on November 2nd, I think?
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If I didn’t count ebooks then mine would “only” be around 50 I think 😀 that would be much easier
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But alas, we have to count them all! [The sole reasons I don’t count ebooks is because I.. rarely buy any..]
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