I felt it best to begin the New Year with a fresh post about my plans for the New Year. I'm still not sure if I'll be wrapping up 2022 for you guys considering my massive blogging absence but we'll see. A New Year means new reading challenges and plans for the year.
I always feel a little sad at the start of a New Year, usually because I've not achieved everything I'd hoped for the previous year. And also because I usually start the year broke from Christmas and with a long wait for January payday. This year I'm trying to stay positive and keep it low-pressure. I'm doing just 2 reading challenges, one I tried in 2022 (and sort of succeeded at) and the other just looked like the perfect challenge for me. We'll get onto those soon.
Plans for 2023
This year I want to make sure my blog is low-pressure and hopefully, I won't take month long breaks from it. I admit I have fallen a little out of love with blogging over the past few years. I know that the past few years have been high stress and full of change but I still don't know if that means I've grown out of being a blogger, especially when I still love reading so much.
This means my general plan for 2023 is to blog regularly. That doesn't mean I stick to a strict schedule or anything like that, but I want to try and post regularly and actually be present commenting.
I also want to keep a reading journal this year, I started one at the start of this year but I just got fed up with keeping it. I want to try and write a small paragraph about every book I read so I can actually remember what I read and my basic thoughts on the books I read, something I'm very bad at doing.
I have the tried and true goal of trying to clear my shelves of unread books. In particular, I hope to reduce my unread Kindle books to below 100. I'm currently at 260 so I admit that's a lofty goal but I'm determined to try. I won't be too sad if I don't manage to reduce it down to that but I at least want to try. My kindle shelf is probably my biggest embarassment. I don't mind having unread physical books but those Kindle shelves are very much out of sight out of mind and I don't like that.
My only other plan for 2023 is to figure out what I want to be doing. I know I don't really enjoy being on Twitter and most social media (please see me on Tumblr where I will be blogging obsessively about formula 1 from March to November).
Reading Challenges
2023 Monthly Key Word Reading Challenge
First up, we have the Monthly Key Word challenge which is hosted by Kim & Tanya of girlxoxo.com. I did participate in this last year but I kind of missed a few prompts as various reading slumps hit and I was motivated to pick a book to read using a random number generator so trying to fit that into a prompt felt like too much pressure. It was fun, though. I like only being required to read one book a month and I can pick anything as long as it fits the words. Also, I can track this on Storygraph and I love when reading challenges can be tracked on an app.
JAN – Crown, Girl, Whisper, Black, Heart, Guide, All, Ever
FEB – Please, Might, Return, Shy, Vanish, Book, Ash, Come
MAR – Crimson, Beyond, Friend, Cry, Wait, Six, Run, Woods
APR – Vicious, Ask, Wind, Found, Circle, Broken, Beneath, Drown
MAY – Dragon, Day, Chain, Another, Thousand, Begin, Stolen, And
JUN -Bridge, Everything, Blue, Why, First, Wild, Luck, Tomorrow
JUL – Final, Clock, This, Way, Poison, Summer, Future, Kiss
AUG – Dangerous, Again, Best, Chase, How, Flower, Date, Together
SEP – Sign, With, Just, Lies, Grace, Enough, Sleep, Name
OCT – Old, After, Take, Shadow, Monster, Haunt, Darkness, Of
NOV – Paris, Hidden, Sparrow, Realm, Two, Fair, Street, Say
DEC – Silver, Wish, Forgotten, Dance, Also, My, Fate, Dream
As you can see, it's going to be fun and different. There are lots of words to work with each month as well. I'll try and do regular check-ins.
Romanceopoly
This challenge is hosted by Francesca and Suzanne at Under The Covers. I actually initially thought this one was too much, Monopoly based reading challenge with so many prompts would surely be too much for me…. But then I kept going back to it. It seemed like a slightly more specific version of the random number generator I was using to pick my books the past few months and if I don't do a prompt so what. I just thought this sounded fun and considering most of the unread books I have are romance books of one shape or form this was kind of a no-brainer. I might just stick to the genre prompts rather than the specific challenges on this one but either way I'm going to have fun playing.
As you can see, this one is going to be a lot but I hope it's fun.
And those are my 2023 plans. As you can tell, I really am keeping this low-key. Two reading challenges and a commitment to blog hopefully once a month. The other stuff is whatever, I won't be too sad if I don't stick to things it's just an idea. My biggest commitments are Romanceopoly and my plan to write a reading journal. I'm undecided if that will be a handwritten or digital journal but either way, it's happening.
What plans do you have for 2023? Are there any reading challenges which have caught your eye? Or do you have specific plans for your blog for the coming year? Tell me all in the comments.
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