There are 52 reading days left in the year. My current count is 211 books, which means I have 52 days to read 89 books. For those of you who are interested in the mathematical breakdown, this means I’ll have to read 1.68 books per day for the rest of the year to meet my goal. Looks like I’m going to be settling in with a stack of picture books and graphic novels. By the way, those totally count, and you can bite me if you disagree.
I missed my goal by two last year and I’ll be darned if I let a late-evening nap on December 31st make me fail again.
I missed my goal by two last year and I’ll be darned if I let a late-evening nap on December 31st make me fail again. To be fair to myself, I do work nearly 50 hours a week at my day job so my free time is limited. Add that onto the fact that this blog (which I love dearly and wouldn’t give up for any amount of money) quickly went from a side project to a second full-time job, and I’m constantly going sixty per.
The other day I was taking lunch in my office at work and one of my employees came to ask me a question and caught me dead asleep.
But you know what? It’s true what they say: Dreams don’t work unless you do. I would like to be more intentional about carving out time for R&R though because I am never not tired. The other day I was taking lunch in my office at work and one of my employees came to ask me a question and caught me dead asleep. I’m talking mouth open, blacked out. But ironically, my hand was still in perfect position on top of my computer mouse. If that’s not #hustleculture in a nutshell then I don’t know what is. He immediately videoed it and SnapChatted it to another employee so I’m sure I’m enjoying a presence as a meme somewhere on the Internet right now.
Speaking of coworkers, another of mine just hit 100,000 pages for the year toward their reading goal and color me impressed. Between the two of us we probably read more than a hundred average humans combined each year.
At any rate, I can’t see myself stopping the tradition anytime soon, especially since I’ve got a TBR mountain that would make an Olympian (god, not athlete) feel inferior.
I have lots of other librarian and bookseller friends who set reading goals each year, but there’s a growing contingent of them who are dispensing with the tradition, citing it as stressful and sucking the fun out of reading. And they’re not wrong. If I were to put very much stock into whether I make my goal or not, it’d probably depress me on the years I didn’t make it. I don’t let it get to me as much as I used to, except for last year when I missed it by TWO FREAKING BOOKS. Huh…maybe they’re onto something. Oh well. At any rate, I can’t see myself stopping the tradition anytime soon, especially since I’ve got a TBR mountain that would make an Olympian (god, not athlete) feel inferior.
Did you set a reading goal this year? Do you ever? Why or why not? Let me know in the comments or shoot me an email. Only if you want to, of course.
Thanks as always for being a faithful reader of The Voracious Bibliophile. If you like what you see, please like, comment, follow, and subscribe to my email list to get notified of new posts as soon as they drop. You can also email me at fred.slusher@thevoraciousbibliophile.com or catch me on Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, and Pinterest @voraciousbiblog. Keep reading the world, one page (or pixel) at a time.
The Voracious Bibliophile 
I really enjoy reading your blog. I especially liked today’s post. It’s amazing the things we continue to do either out of necessity or a sense of obligation. I hope you reach your goal for the year. Next year think about not seeing the bar so high for yourself. You’ll still be setting a goal and maybe you won’t be as stressed. If you’re anything like me you don’t do anything well under pressure. 🙂
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Thanks for reading and I’m glad you enjoy my blog! I have considered lowering my goal, especially as my offline life gets busier and busier. In some situations, I thrive under pressure, and in others, not so much.
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Fair play to you, that’s some number of books. Do you ever feel you are sacrificing reading for pleasure just to hit the goal? The reason I ask is that that’s what happened to me – a couple of years ago, I realised that I was selecting short books before the end of the year, just to hit my goal. It seemed silly, so since then I’ve opted for pages instead. I just try to beat the figure from the year before, usually about 50 titles a year, or 17000 words. If I don’t hit it, it’ll be because I had a busy year, moving apartments and reading fell by the wayside a bit. But good luck, I hope you make it. Does reading the back of the cereal box count?
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Thanks for reading, Adrian! Honestly, I like your suggestion for number of pages instead of number of books. I have found myself hesitant to start bigger books in the last few weeks of the year because I know I won’t finish them in time. I checked out your blog, and I saw that you also use NetGalley! Giving you a follow. And to answer your question at the end, it would totally count if Goodreads would accept the barcode 😂😂😂.
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Haha good man Fred, thanks for the follow, have also subscribed to yours. Although I wasn’t able to do that via my Mac/safari, had to go via my phone, WordPress kept saying my gmail wasn’t legit. Not sure if that’s a mailing problem. Aye, I also use Netgalley, I was picking everything at the beginning. Stopped doing that, only three now, pick a new one when I’ve read one, with a publication date of 2025.
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That’s what I really need to do. I’m so backed up on NetGalley. I got click-happy thinking, “There’s no way they’ll approve all of these, so what’s the harm?” If only that were true. That’s odd regarding your email. I have only ever used WordPress on my phone, so next time I’m near a desktop I’ll have to check it out.
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