This year I read 100 books! This beats my reading last year by almost 40 books. I know why– the readalouds. I’ve always readaloud to my girls, but this year we had a lot of transition (moving 2x, once to a new state!) and so I really readaloud a lot.
Here’s the breakdown of my (almost) 100 books:
- Around 45 of these were read-alouds to my children (children’s novels, like Wizard of Oz and The Borrowers)
- Around 12 were poetry books (one of which a lengthy anthology)
- Around 40 were nonfiction (on Christian Living / Theology, Writing, and Various Topics)
I didn’t read ONE single novel for myself last year–all my fiction was for the kids. I love children’s fiction–Roald Dahl’s Danny Champion of the World is probably one of my favorite books ever, for children or any human being–but for the same reasons I read fiction to the children–for enjoyment, teaching character, working through situations–I probably should read at least a little bit of it for myself.
Last year I attempted the Challies Challenge and failed–it was geared toward theological reading (which I do a lot of) but didn’t have much room for whimsical reading on topics various and wide (like I tend to do–grab whatever catches my fancy in the new-reads section of the library).
This year I decided to come up with my own booklist. Assuming I will read 100 books next year, I’m allotting a space for:
- 40 readalouds
- 20 poetry books
I’m not going to make a list of which poetry books/ readalouds I plan to read because I like to read what catches my eye there (and also whats in our homeschool curriculum).
For the other 45, I plan to read more books on poetry craft, much more fiction, and a few select Christian Living books (cutting back on my random nonfiction / random christian nonfiction)
Booklist:
(Christian Living)
- You Who by Rachel Jankovic
- Made for More by Hannah Anderson
When God Doesn’t Fix It by Laura StoryTable for 8 by Megan FrancisHolding on to Hope by Nancy Guthrie
(Writing Craft Books)
- Nine Gates by Hirshfield
- The Cure of Poetry by Kinzie
- Your First Novel by Rittenburg
- Poetic Meter and Poetic Form by Fussell
Poetry in Person by Neubauer- The Art of Syntax by Ellen Bryant Voigt
- The Triggering Town by Richard Hugo
- The Art of the Poetic Line by James Logenbach
- The Art of Recklessness by Dean Young
Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott- Rules for the Dance by Mary Oliver
Letters to a Young Poet by Rilke- Real Sofistikashun by Tony Hoagland
Ordering the Storm by Susan Grimm- A Little Book on Form by Robert Hass
(Fiction)
Anna Karenina by Leo TolstoyThe Awakening of Miss Prim by Natalia Fennorella- True Grit by Charles Portis
- Cranford by Elizabeth Gaskell
- Hannah Coulter by Wendell Berry
- Kristin Lavransdatter by Sigrid Undset
- Bleak House by Charles Dickins
Cheaper by the Dozen by Frank Gilbreth- My Cousin Rachel by Daphne de Maurier
- Austerlitz by W. G. Sewald
- Atonement by Ian McEwan
- The Hours by Michael Cunningham
- Beloved by Toni Morrison
- The Inn at the Edge of the World by Alice Thomas Ellis
- The Edge of Sadness by Edwin O’Connor
- Delta Wedding by Eudora Welty
- A Month in the Country by J.L Carr
- Gaudy Nights by Dorothy Sayers
- Song of the Lark by Willa Cather
- The Screwtape Letters by C. S. Lewis
I don’t expect I’ll finish this list this year, but I’m going to try! I feel like this list is more purposeful for me than the Challies Challenge–these are books I Actually Want To Read but haven’t for one reason or another.
What are you reading this year?