Looking back at 2018 // Did I achieve my reading goals for the year?

At the beginning of 2018, I set myself ten reading goals for 2018. Since we’re heading to the end of the year, I wanted to review my goals and see if I’d achieved them. For each goal, I’ll quote my original aim at the beginning of the year, and weight up whether I think I’ve done what I set out to do.

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Goal 1

Read 80 books

Last year I set my Goodreads goal at 75 books and I just, on the very final day of 2017, managed to meet it. This year, because I like a challenge, I’ve set myself a challenge of 80 books. Wish me luck (I’m going to need it).

Did I achieve this goal: Yes

Although I was behind on my Goodreads challenge for months and months, I actually managed to achieved this goal. As of 24th December, hit 80 books for this year. It was a nice feeling to be able to tick off my goal with a week to go, because in 2017, I didn’t achieve it until the last day of the year.

Goal 2

Read more diversely and support #weneeddiversebooks

The We Need Diverse Movement is a brilliant movement that aims to get Own Voices books and books by marginalised authors in the hands of children and young people. The organisation is doing wonderful things and this year I want to do more to spread the word and support them. I also want to continue reading books written by marginalised authors, with the aim of reading at least one per month.

Did I achieve this goal: Yes

This year, 33/81 books I’ve read been by BAME and marginalised authors, and I’ve tried tried to shout about new releases by black authors and AOC as much as possible. But there’s still more to do and next year I want to be even more vocal in my support.

Goal 3 

Review more books

Last year, I ended up in something of a reviewing slump and reviewed less half of the books I read. I love writing reviews, so I was pretty disappointed by this. Often, I’ll get comments from fellow bloggers and friends saying they’re interested to hear my thoughts on a book and I love these type of comments, so this year I don’t want to disappoint. This year I want to get more thoughts and review out there.

Did I achieve this goal: Sort of 

I’ve definitely reviewed more books during 2018 than 2017, and participated in blog tour reviews too, but I still didn’t review as many as I would have liked, and I didn’t review some of the favourites (Vicious, Vengeful, Children of Blood and Bone, Heartstopper, and so on).

Goal 4

Read more LGBTQIA+ fiction

Continuing my goal from last year, I want to try and read even more books about LGBTQIA+ characters and by LGBTQIA+ authors. I often find books with all-straight characters unrealistic and slightly boring because they don’t reflect real friendships and real life, so I want to more read books with characters of all different orientations. Ideally, I’d like to make this one book per month, the same as my goal for diverse reads.

Did I achieve this goal: Yes

I devoted all of June to reading LGBTQIAP+ books and loved it so much that I didn’t want to pick up any straight books in July (even though I eventually did). During June, I read Running With Lions, Out of the Blue, Autoboyography, and 26 out of the 81 books I’ve read this year (so far) have queer characters or themes.

Goal 5

Continue (and possibly finish) manga series that I’ve had on hold for a few years

There are quite a few manga series that I started 5+ years ago and absolutely adored. I still do adore them, but I started reading more fiction again and ended up not finishing many of them. So my fifth reading goal for this year is to finish some of the manga series that I started years ago. At the moment I’m reading Blue Exorcist, but I also plan to try and finish Bleach and Fullmetal Alchemist.

Did I achieve this goal: No

I finished No. 6 this year, but that’s a new series that I started during 2018. I continued reading Blue Exorcist, but didn’t finish it, and haven’t continued with any of the other series that I’ve got ongoing, such as Bleach and Fullmetal Alchemist. That’s going to have to be a goal I carry over into next year.

Goal 6 

Meet up with more of my book blogging pals

Last year, I went to YALC and met up with blogging friends who I’d only previously spoken to online and it was wonderful. I know that I’ve made some friends for life and I love them to bits. This year, I want to meet up with my book pals more and go to more events with them. There’s nothing like chatting books with people who are just as bookish as you are, so this year I’m hoping to go to the West Midlands bloggers meet up in February, YAShot in April, and YALC in the summer. I’m also going to Alwyn Hamilton’s Waterstone’s event in Birmingham later this month, so let me know if you’re also going!

Did I achieve this goal: Yes

I met up with lots of blogging friends this year and made new friends along the way, too. I went to YALC, attended three blogging events organised by publishers, and went along to plenty of Midlands book blogger meet ups, one of which I organised/hosted! I feel like this year has really been enriched by all my blogging and bookish friends, so I definitely want to continue this goal into 2019.

Goal 7 

Read and review more ARCs and new releases

At YALC in 2017, I managed to pick up some amazing ARCs, but didn’t get round to reading/reviewing them all. This year, I want to make more of a concerted effort to read them in advance, so I can post my reviews the day they’re released. I like to try and keep my blog current, and this is one of the ways in which I want to do this.

Did I achieve this goal: Yes

Well, the reading part I certainly did. I requested more ARCs this year and was lucky enough to be sent quite a lot of those I asked for. Most of the books I actually managed to review were also ARCs, so I didn’t do too badly on that front, but I still didn’t read as many as I’d have liked.

Goal 8

Continue supporting independent and local book stores

I’m a big fan of independent and second-hand book shops because they have so much personality and individualism, so I always try to shop with them when I can. There are two indies nearby me, and I’m often in and out browsing their titles, and this year I want to continue my support by buying with them instead of online when I can.

Did I achieve this goal: Yes

I bought far more of my books from Waterstones rather than Amazon this year, and purchased second-hand books from charity shops and local bookshops when I had the chance, so I feel like I made pretty good attempts at this goal.

Goal 9

Read more translated fiction

This was one of my goals for last year, and while I didn’t make it one of my five main goals for this year, it’s still something I’d like to continue doing, to broaden the range of literature I read.

Did I achieve this goal: Mostly

I read four translated books this year and 16 volumes of manga that were translated into English. Looking back, I thought I had actually read more than four fiction books, but since I didn’t make this one of my top five goals, I’d like to say I mostly achieved it. Something to work on next year though.

Goal 10

Take part in more readathons

My final goal is to take part in more readathons this year! I often see people taking part and logging their progress on twitter, but I always seem to miss the start date by a day or two. So this year, I’m going to watch out for more fun readathons and make sure to take part in a few. If you’ve got any suggestions for good ones, let me know!

Did I achieve this goal: Yes

I feel like I did reasonably well with this goal because I took part in one readathon, Tome Topple, and organised two: Easter Readathon and YALCathon. I’ve not hosted any readathons before this year, but I had so much organising Easter Readathon and hosting sprints, that I was keen to do another after YALC. I really enjoy the community spirit of readatons, so I’ll definitely be taking part in more next year.

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Overall, I managed to achieve 8/10 of my goals, and ‘sort of’ achieved one of them. The only one I fully failed on is goal five to continue/finish some of the manga series I’ve had on hold for a year (or more). I think I failed this goal because I got into web comics this year, and ended up reading more of them than I did manga. Hopefully next year, I’ll be able to finish some of the series I’ve been postponing for a long time.

Did you set yourself reading or life goals for 2018? Have you achieved them? Will you be setting yourself any goals for 2019?