2022 Bookish Resolutions’ Evaluation

Let’s get straight to the point. After having failed to achieve almost all of my goals for the blog and reading in general in 2021, the same happened this year. My resolutions weren’t even particularly challenging, but life just got in the way and I’ve only been reading for short periods of time each day. Will this affect the way I think about declarations of intentions in any way?

At the beginning of the year, I was convinced that I would be able to read 35 books. I was planning to read only short books during the summer after all. That didn’t happen, though. In fact, I’ve only read in their entirety 22 books for pure enjoyment so far and, although I may still finish another one tomorrow, I won’t get even close to my reading goal. At best I will have read fewer 12 books than I was expecting to. A number higher than in any other year.

My second resolution was to take part in more reading challenges and initiatives. I did participate in the four I was hoping to (Daphne du Maurier Reading Week, Reading Ireland Month, Women in Translation Month and 20 Books of Summer), having had varying degrees of success.

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2022 Mid-year Resolutions’ Evaluation

Back in January, I listed the five bookish resolutions that I have for this year. The second half of June is the perfect time to evaluate whether I’m on track to fulfil those goals or not. Spoiler alert: I’ve already failed one of them!

Let’s start with one resolution regarding which there’s still hope, though. I want to read 35 books until the end of the year. So far, I’ve only read 10 books, which would be worrying if I didn’t plan to read far more books in the second half of the year, thanks to the reading challenge 20 Books of Summer.

Taking part in more reading challenges or initiatives is another of my goals. Not only am I participating in 20 Books of Summer at the moment (I’ve only finished one book so far, mainly because almost two years and a half later COVID got me and I felt poorly), but I also took part in Reading Ireland Month, during which I read One by One in the Darknessby Deirdre Madden and DNFed Normal People by Sally Rooney, and Daphne du Maurier Reading Week, having started reading at the time The Flight of the Falcon, a novel I ended up only finishing some days later.
The time hasn’t yet come for me to try to fulfil my third resolution, though.

Bookish Resolutions for 2022

I do like writing a list! That is the reason why I still continue to come up with bookish resolutions / goals / aims (whatever you want to call them) every year, although I don’t always achieve them. I have five bookish resolutions for 2022. It will be great if I manage to fulfil every single one of them until the end of the year, but if I don’t, I won’t beat myself up because of it.

Regarding numbers, I want to read 35 books. Although this is a higher number than I managed to read in 2021, it is in line with previous years. The main reason why I decided to increase the number of books I want to read is connected with my next resolution, though.

I want to take part in more reading challenges or initiatives. I have four in mind, subject to them being organised, obviously. For the last three years or more, I have been taking part in Daphne du Maurier Reading Week in May and plan to do so again in 2022. But I also hope to participate for the first time in Reading Ireland Month in March, Women in Translation Month in August, and 20 Books of Summer. For this last challenge my aim is to read some of the shortest books that have been on my wish list for a long time. So, being able to read more books than last year seems realistic at this point.

2021 Bookish Resolutions’ Evaluation

Every year, since I started blogging, I’ve shared with you my bookish resolutions. Most of the times, I’ve been relatively successful in fulfilling them. I can tell you in advance that in 2021, however, that was not the case, something I hadn’t anticipated midway through the year.

My first goal was to read at least 25 books, fewer than the previous year, since I was hoping to read some huge books. I did read two massive books and started the one I’m still reading. But I also decided to DNF three of those that I was expecting to tackle. Spending weeks reading books that I then didn’t complete was one of the reasons why I didn’t manage to achieve my reading goal. Not only did I just read 22 books, the smallest number in the last five years, but I also read a much smaller number of pages than in 2020. I must have spent less time reading than usual without even realising.

On a more positive note, I succeeded in reading at least eight books by Lusophone authors, that is authors who write books in Portuguese. I read them without having the resolution in mind to be honest, since I had completely forgotten about this one in particular. Maybe for that reason the majority of the books that I read were not the ones I was planning to. Seven of the books I read were new to me and another was a reread.

2021 Mid-year Resolutions’ Evaluation

Can you believe that we are almost mid-way through the year? Time seems to be flying by. At the beginning of the year, I set myself some goals / resolutions regarding my reading and the content that I create for the blog. Am I bound to fulfil them? I think that I’ve been making good progress in order to be successful at the end of the year, at least concerning the majority of the resolutions.

In 2021, I set the goal of reading at least 25 books. This is a lower number than in previous years, because I’m planning to read a couple of huge books (longer than 800 pages). I’ve read twelve books so far and am mid-way through another one! Goodreads tells me that I’m one book ahead of schedule, so achieving this goal seems more than plausible. Of the massive books that I was hoping to read this year, I’ve already DNFed two of them for different reasons and at different points. I gave up on War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy after reading just a couple of chapters, while I read almost half of The Crimson Petal and the White by Michel Faber before abandoning it.

Other of my resolutions for this year is to read at least eight books by Lusophone authors. I’ve read four so far, which means that I still have plenty of time to achieve my goal. I just may not read precisely the ones that I was thinking about when I wrote the post on my resolutions some months ago.

Bookish Resolutions for 2021

2021 has only just started, but it already provided scenes and occurrences worthy of a nightmare. One way to make everything seem better is to focus on books and the joy they bring. During this year, I want to fulfil some reading goals as always. I don’t want to put too much pressure on myself, though, so my bookish resolutions for 2021 are deliberately not particularly challenging.

I intend to read at least 25 books. This is a significantly lower number than in previous years, mainly because I’m planning to read some huge books (longer than 800 pages) and I’ll obviously take much longer to finish them in comparison with medium-sized ones. If I read more pages than last year, I’ll be more than happy.

My second resolution is to read at least eight books by Lusophone authors. Lately, I’ve been mainly reading books originally written in English or translated into English, not only because they are cheaper than books published in Portugal, but also because of all your amazing recommendations. In 2020, I only read four books written by Lusophone authors, which is disconcerting, since Portuguese is my mother tongue. There are three books, for example, that I wanted to read last year but didn’t manage to and that I definitely want to pick up this year – A Maçã no Escuro (The Apple in the Dark) by Clarice Lispector, O Irmão Alemão (My German Brother) by Chico Buarque and O Quase Fim do Mundo by Pepetela.

2020 Bookish Resolutions’ Evaluation

When 2020 was still a promising year, that is to say in its first weeks, I set myself a few goals regarding my reading and the content I wanted to publish on this blog. The time has now come to evaluate whether I fulfilled them or not.

I wanted to read at least 35 books, having even the aspiration to read more pages than the year before. I failed to achieve my reading goal, though. Not only did I just finish 30 books, I also read fewer pages than in 2019. I blame the pandemic for this. Throughout the majority of the year, I struggled to read for long periods of time, even when I was enjoying the books.

Another of my reading resolutions was to finish three of the book series that I was reading. And I did! I completed The Memoirs of Lady Trent by Marie Brennan, As Areias do Imperador (Sands of the Emperor) by Mia Couto, and The Neapolitan Novels by Elena Ferrante. They are incredibly distinct in terms of genres and writing styles, but I relished reading all of them.

2020 Mid-Year Resolutions’ Evaluation

Before revisiting the blog post that I wrote about my bookish resolutions for this year, I was certain that I wasn’t on the way to achieving the majority of them. That is not the case, thankfully. But I’ve still read fewer books than I was expecting to so far.

One of my resolutions for this year is to read at least 35 books. I was hoping to surpass that number or at least read more pages than last year. I’ve only read 12 books so far, though, which means that I’m significantly behind schedule. I should have read 16 or 17 books by now. There are still full six months left in 2020, and I’m hoping to spend more time reading than I have so far from now on.

I was also eager to finish three of the book series that I was reading. I’ve already completed two – The Memoirs of Lady Trent by Marie Brennan and As Areias do Imperador (Sands of the Emperor) by Mia Couto.  I’m currently reading Royal Assassin, the second book in the Farseer Trilogy by Robin Hobb, but I’m not sure if I’ll pick up the last one until the end of the year (it’s massive!). Maybe I’ll read the last two books in The Neapolitan Novels by Elena Ferrante instead.

Bookish Resolutions for 2020

My resolutions or goals for 2020 concerning reading and the content that I create for this blog are mostly a continuation of or an improvement on what I’ve been doing for a while. I deliberately decided not to challenge myself too much and made sure to avoid setting goals that I could lose interest in. Only one of my resolutions is wholly new and may have a small impact on my book buying habits.

Regarding the number of books that I want to read, I’m keeping my goal at 35. However, I’m hoping to either surpass that number or read more pages than last year by selecting the books that I want to read more carefully. One of the reasons why I finished fewer books in 2019 than in 2018 was that I spent too much time forcing myself to read books that I ended up deciding not to finish, because I was either not enjoying them or they were not what I had expected.

I also want to finish three of the book series that I’m currently reading. Two of them will certainly be The Memoirs of Lady Trent by Marie Brennan and As Areias do Imperador (Sands of the Emperor) by Mia Couto, since I only have one book left to read from each. The other will probably either be The Farseer Trilogy by Robin Hobb or The Neapolitan Novels by Elena Ferrante.

2019 Bookish Resolutions’ Evaluation

At the beginning of 2019, I set some goals for the year ahead regarding my reading, this blog and the social media that I use (not exclusively) for bookish purposes. The time has now come to evaluate whether I have met them or not.

I read in their entirety 35 books, the exact number that I had set as my minimum for the year. Although I read four fewer books than in the previous year, I read around 1300 more pages, according to Goodreads. And this is without counting with the eight books that I didn’t finish for various reasons.

Another of my resolutions was to reread at least one of my old favourite books. I reread O Ano da Morte de Ricardo Reis (The Year of the Death of Ricardo Reis) by José Saramago and loved it as much as the first time. Despite it not being an old favourite, I also reread Hamlet by William Shakespeare at the end of December, after buying a new edition. I am still not a huge ‘rereader’, but I don’t feel like I’m ‘wasting my time’ anymore, even though there are still a large number of books that I’m eager to read for the first time.