Reading Plans for 2012

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Challenges, Readalongs, TBR

I am deliberately not making any Reading Resolutions this year other than to tackle my TBR in all ways – through reading and culling. Participating in the TBR Double Dare as already discussed here should get me well on the way.

in 2011, I had aimed to join in with DGR’s ‘Team Troika’ readalong of War & Peace, but never got started. Also, despite good intentions, I got derailed halfway through the Dark Tower readalong hosted at Shelf Love (a series I definitely will finish though … sometime).

So not a good record – yet I find myself itching to follow and readlong closely with all these irrestistible things:

• January is Australian Literature Month over at Reading Matters. I’m planning to read Oscar and Lucindaby Peter Carey, but to do it readalong style with Lizzy if we can manage it.
• This year’s DGR classic readalong is Middlemarch
  by George Eliot. Again, if I can just get started ….
• Later in January, from the 23rd, Stu at Winston’s Dad is hosting a Henry Green Week. An author I’d never heard of, but upon researching, one I’d be keen to read. I’ve acquired Loving, Living, Party Going, which has three of his short novels together in one volume, so I’ll have plenty of choice.
• Although I don’t intend to formally follow Simon’s plans at Stuck in a Book to read one book from each year of the 20th century, it is a fascinating premise, and I plan to chart my progress out of pure listy-lovingness.  I am trying to read more books from the years before I was born, so following Simon’s progress in this challenge should help with that aim.
• Then there’s my monthly face to face Book Group which has its own tab at the top of the page. Our January read will be Ridersby Jilly Cooper – I’ve never read one of her books, so I’m looking forward to this.

Phew!  That’s enough for starters.  Let’s see how I get on.  What about you?

Me & My TBR

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TBR

I have a love-hate relationship with my TBR piles.

I love having my own personal library to choose from.  But for every volume I pick off my own shelves, I read a shiny newly published title, and maybe add another onto the shelf.

That’s why I’ve signed up for the TBR Double Dare hosted by C B James.

I took part in the first one this year – and lasted the full three months.  I read only from my TBR, and acquired fewer books too, so it was a success, although I didn’t read as many books as I’d have liked – I got derailed by life in the first part of the year. After the TBR dare finished though, I managed to read over 30 books published in 2011 during the rest of the year!

Although I couldn’t/wouldn’t impose a book buying ban on myself, I do intend to try to acquire less this year and to continue to read more from my TBR after the end of March.  I’ll probably be moving and will need to reduce the TBR as much as I can. I keep a lot less books once I’ve read them these days.

It’s not too late to sign up.  I’m in good company – blog-friends Teresa of Shelf Love and Lizzy of Lizzy’s Literary Life are doing the TBR Double Dare too.

… and all this makes me realise – I don’t hate my TBR – I love it!

Which books to keep, which books to cull???

I don’t like to over burden you with personal stuff, but life does have a habit of catching up with you, and I’d like your advice on a thorny subject.  Also, apologies in advance for a rather long and very rambling post …

I come from a family of hoarders and collectors.  My late, lovely Mum was a big one and my Dad likes a well-stocked bookcase too.  In our generation, these traits are well to the fore – My brother collects Mini paraphernalia and cricket/soccer books in particular; me – I just collect/hoard books, books and more books these days (having got over my Star Trek collecting phase in the last millennium thankfully).

Now I mean no disrespect to anyone who suffers from any form of OCD, but this collecting/hoarding mania does have some commonalities with the more serious condition.  My TBR piles have got totally out of hand – I have nearly twenty years worth of books to read if I keep up at my present rate, so you can see my problem.  I see books and have to have them, just in case I never encounter them again and miss reading something brilliant.  I got out of the habit of using the library many years ago once I was able to afford to buy enough books to read.  I have a couple of favourite charity shops that can be relied upon to have a good choice of books too – cheaper on the wallet, but still puts on the shelf inches, resulting in teetering piles in the spare room that long ago o’erflowed the bookcases, and are now migrating into other rooms.  I always wanted a personal library, but with the exception of my main reference collection, it’s getting more and more difficult to locate books when I want them.

Teresa over at Shelf Love is trying to change her habits and inspired by her post, I think a good bit of spring-cleaning and cognitive-book-therapy is required at Gaskell Towers too.

I made a tiny start this January by joining in with the TBR Dare. Apart from sneaking in the two Penguin Mini Modern Classics I was sent to review, I’ve kept to only reading books already in the piles since Jan 1 which is good, but I’ve only finished thirteen books so far this year; thus it hasn’t made a huge impact yet, and review copies do keep arriving. I have made a few acquisitions, but substantially less than usual which is good. The TBR Dare is scheduled to run until the end of March, and I should make that deadline.

I’ll tackle incoming books another time. Today, I’d like to discuss how to decide which books to keep and which books I should cull.

Back in Feb 2009 and this blog was young, I made myself a list of Rules For Keeping Books – at the time I was quite proud of them.  Here they are again…

I may keep a book once read if it meets one or more of these criteria:

• I rated it 9 or 10 points out of 10;
• It’s part of a series I am reading and intend to keep in its entirety;
• It’s a collectable edition, e.g. hardback firsts, Folio, illustrated, other special editions;
• It’s won a major prize, e.g. Booker, Pullitzer, Orange, Costa, Goncourt etc;
• It’s an important book in the history of literature;
• It’s by an author I collect (see list);
• It’s a book I want to keep for my daughter;
• It belongs to a particular ‘reading trail’ or area of special interest, e.g. Russian novels, fairy tales, children’s novels;
• It’s signed by the author;
• It’s non-fiction and useful for reference;
• It’s a top-class hardback biography.

There’s one fatal flaw with the above – there are all too few books that fall outside these criteria.  Also it’s missing one major point ‘It’s a book I may want to re-read’.  However, now I have my Kindle, and it’s mostly classics that I re-read so that’s not an issue any more.

So what can I do to reduce the keepers?

• First and foremost, I should only keep fantastic fiction. If I didn’t enjoy it, I shouldn’t keep it for any reason other than it’s a collectable/signed edition or it’s a book my daughter will want/need to read at some time.
• Do I need to keep an entire series together? Matching sets, be they true series or publishing strands, are attractive, so maybe – but they need to average on the excellent with some fantastic reads in them.   Non-matching series – don’t think I have the same need to keep them together.
• Reading trails – not long term keepers I think, short term yes for referring back.
• Non-fiction depends on the reference potential.
• What about authors I collect … There was a time when I was a real completist with my music – in the days of several formats of cd singles with bonus tracks etc – I had to get all the options – but just listened once or twice to those bonus tracks and shelved the cds – never got round to compiling the bonus track compilations I planned.  I sold most of those, along with all my Trekkie stuff, and bought more books instead.  This is leading to the fact that I think I don’t need to be completist about keeping everything written by a particular author either, so I can dump the duffers after reading.

At this point, I think I shall stop rambling and save ‘culling the TBR’ for another day. Instead I will turn it over to you, because I’d really like to know…

How do you decide which books to keep?

Reading Resolutions for 2011

For the past couple of years I’ve made some reading resolutions for the next year, had a go at keeping to them and I’ve done OK against them, but only really sort of!  I’ve started off fairly well, but allowed myself to be diverted each time a shiny new book pops through the letterbox.  So my plans to read more books published before I was born, or read an entire series of particular books and so on gradually fizzle out like most resolutions.   I don’t have enough self-discipline to keep to multiple challenges – even ones of my own making, and as for other book bloggers’ challenges – well they’re not for me either.

So this year I am only making one:

“I resolve to tackle my TBR pile.”

Reading more from my TBR pile has always been at the top of my resolutions list, but this year I hope to go further in this regard …

• I’ve signed up for The TBR Dare for the full three months, which I hope will help me to make a good start on it.
• I am starting to stockcheck and catalogue my TBR pile fully – I knew it was into four figures, but I’ve not been so good at keeping track of it for a while.
• I will be a lot more critical about what gets added to it.
• I will also try to cull it to help reclaim some floorspace.

That’s it for me!

Do you make any Reading Resolutions – have you been able to stick to them?

A HAPPY NEW YEAR of reading in 2011 to you all!

Reading Resolutions 2010 – How did I do?

Back in January, as always, I made some reading resolutions.  There were just four of them, so how did I do this year?

1. As always, try and reduce the TBR mountains – goes without saying really. That also means acquiring less books – but I’m not going to impose any out and out purchasing restrictions. Instead I shall try to think more about all the good reads waiting that I already have. FAILED

Out of over 100 books read in 2010, a large number, 37 to be exact were published in 2010, and a further 27 were published in 2009 and so hadn’t been in the TBR long if at all – mostly paperbacks of hardbacks released in 2009 I’d wager.  Looking through my list, I could only count around 20 that were definitely acquired further back in time (and that’s counting the Lord of the Rings as three books).  I have plans to address that this year!

2. Read the Canongate Myths series – This was one from 2009 that I failed to achieve at all, but if I make an effort to read one volume a month, it’ll be fun, and I love re-tellings of this kind. PASSED PARTLY

I started well and managed four out of the dozen or so titles in this series so far. I rather got sidetracked onto the Mabinogion later in the year – which are also retellings of myths, so think I can just about say I passed.

3. Again try to read more books published before I was born. (Between you and me that means pre-1960). I’m thinking of finally getting to grips with Wodehouse for starters, and more Thomas Hardy. PASSED

In 2009 I read just five books published pre-1960, so it couldn’t be hard to do better.  In 2010 I read 13 (again counting LOTR as three though).  That is a respectable pass as far as I’m concerned even though I still haven’t got around to Wodehouse or more Hardy!

4. Re-read a few books that I really enjoyed the first time around. Last year I revisited just one book fully and it was an excellent experience, so I should definitely do it again more often. PASSED

I joined in the LOTR readalong and loved it all over again.  Also I re-read Ella Minnow Pea and The Spy Who Came in From the Cold for book group, both books standing up well to being re-read – Spy turning out to be my Book of the Year.  I was planning to take part in DGR’s War & Peace readalong, but didn’t get started in time.  I think that’s about the right level of re-reading given my un-read TBR so that’s a pass.

I’m still musing on updating my resolutions for 2011. I’m not a great one for challenges and the like, so shall keep things simple – but that’s another post …

How did you go against your Reading Resolutions if you made them?

The TBR Dare – are you brave enough to take it?

In a possibly mad moment of bravery, I’ve signed up for the TBR Dare over at Ready When You Are CB.

Deliberately posed as a dare rather than a challenge, participants are asked to commit to reading only from their TBR piles for a certain length of time or a number of books. The dare will finish on April 1, and if you’re interested click through to the sign up page above.

My TBR pile has been so out of control for so long, I don’t know how many books are in it, except that they go into four figures – my own personal library, so I’ve signed up for the full three months (with a pass for book club reads).

Simon S of Savidge Reads has not bought a book all year, and Simon T of Stuck in a book has managed his Project 24, so it’s not impossible to buy less books … will I be able to do it for just three months? As they say – Watch this space!!!

Bloggers and Book Groups – Keeping the Backlist Alive

This past fortnight I’ve been soooo busy with fireworks, quiznights, and tonight more fireworks, I’ve got behind on blogging about books and my stock of ephemera too even. Normal service will resume next week I hope! So meanwhile, I’d like to have a voxpop type discussion with you…

We all love ‘new’ books – titles hot off the press, piled high in bookshops on the 3 for 2 table, featured in the ever-decreasing review sections of papers etc, Richard & Judy picks, nominated for major prizes, what happens to a book when it moves out of company with the new. If it’s lucky, it’ll have two chances – in hardback, then paperback – but then it’s onto the dreaded backlist.

You hear many authors groan that once their books lose their shiny new book du jour status and go on to the publisher’s backlist, then it’s a slippery slope towards being deleted off the backlist for straggling sales, diminishing royalties – hence they’re only as good as their latest book.

One small section of my TBR!

Bookshops have limited shelfspace for backlisted titles and have to choose their stock carefully to keep sales going, and this is where I believe that bloggers and book groups really are playing their part. By not always reading the latest new best thing, and delving back into our TBR piles occasionally to read books that are a few years old or more, or even buying backlisted titles new, we are doing our bit to help.

Often book groups choose backlisted titles – usually preferring (ours does anyway) to opt for books once in paperback to keep the monthly expense down. Admittedly, we tend to stick to the backlists of better-known authors, but occasionally will pick something less well known or off the wall.

Many bloggers like to combine reading and writing about the latest titles, with exploring their TBR piles – and this can all help raise interest in living authors’ backlists. As a blogger with a TBR mountain range that’s now totally out of control, since it got my late Mum’s books added to it, exploring it will remain a key reading resolution for me for years to come!

The key thing for me is finding real gems in authors’ outputs that can be shared – there are so many good books out there from recent decades that are getting forgotten about.

Over to you – what do you think about backlists?

Reading resolutions for 2010

In a small attempt to focus my reading for the year, I’m going to make some Reading Resolutions again. Last year I was partially successful and it made for some fun when it came to check the stats, so here we go again! …

I resolve to:

1. As always, try and reduce the TBR mountains – goes without saying really. That also means acquiring less books – but I’m not going to impose any out and out purchasing restrictions. Instead I shall try to think more about all the good reads waiting that I already have.

2. Read the Canongate Myths series – This was one from last year that I failed to achieve at all, but if I make an effort to read one volume a month, it’ll be fun, and I love re-tellings of this kind.

3. Again try to read more books published before I was born. (Between you and me that means pre-1960). I’m thinking of finally getting to grips with Wodehouse for starters, and more Thomas Hardy.

4. Re-read a few books that I really enjoyed the first time around. Last year I revisited just one book fully and it was an excellent experience, so I should definitely do it again more often.

In my neverending hope of keeping the resolutions achieveable and simple, I think that’s enough! Have you made any reading resolutions for 2010?

P.S. Don’t forget my New Year Giveaway – see the post below…

My Reading Resolutions for 2009 – how did I do #4 (the final one!)

By now you might have cottoned on, by the series of bookish but not books-read posts, that I’m suffering a severe case of end-of-term-can’t-read-itis and have thus resorted to fillers; (all this pondering the stats is helping me formulate my books of the year though). Aside from that, I am reading The Moonstone but mostly the same pages over and over before falling asleep. I may have to resort to something fun and trashy again to get me through it… However, this is the last post about my 2009 Reading Resolutions in which I resolved to ‘read more non-fiction’.

This year about 15% of my reading was non-fiction (around 10% in 2008). I’ve read a wider range of subjects too. One of those that has stuck with me was the first book I read this year The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell which looked for those key moments that made a good idea a great one. I always enjoy biographies and memoirs, and this year have read enjoyable ones by Raymond Blanc, Susan Hill and the quirky Stewart Copeland. So a vintage non-fiction year for me.

RESOLUTION #4 – PASSED!!!

My Reading Resolutions for 2009 – How did I do #3

My third reading resolution for 2009 was to ‘read more world and translated fiction’. Last year I read a dozen which were all Nordic or French except for Blindness by Saramago. This year I did a bit better…

Eighteen in translation, plus a sprinkling from parts other than the UK or USA. I spread my reading around the EU a lot more too including novels written in German, Dutch, French, Italian and Spanish. Missing this year are novels from Canada, Japan and Eastern Europe – maybe more Margaret Atwood, Murakami and Stefan Zweig for next year to redress the balance.

RESOLUTION #3 – PASSED!!!