The 2015 Annual Reading Challenge Discussion Thread

[issybird]

I've got one more book to go before polishing off my 2015 goals. In perusing the list of eligible books, however, I find I'm not in the mood. I'm going to let it go until the week after Christmas which I've got off, but it's risky, especially as I'll have company. But I'd rather clear the decks first of a few titles which have been languishing partially read. I'm also enjoying this month's book club selection and it's a long 'un.

[HomeInMyShoes]

Only 22 more days left everyone. As Issybird said, it's time to clear out that clutter before next year.

I want to get around to December's literary club selection, but I won't sweat that. I'll get to it. It might be the first book of 2016, but I'll get to it.

Trying to finish up two titles before a bit of a reading break before the new year and it is time to start requesting a couple of the hard to find titles from the library for next year to give them some time to find them.

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by issybird

I'm also enjoying this month's book club selection and it's a long 'un.

I'm going to start that when I've finished my current book.

[DrNefario]

I keep buying stuff, and I'm qualified for a free Kindle book if the promo code ever appears (I'm probably going to have to contact amazon uk about it), so I think I'm going to have to deploy some emergency short stories to finish ahead on my TBR. It will be a bit of a pyrrhic victory, but my actual target to was to gain no more than 1.5 times what I read, which I have easily managed.

[HomeInMyShoes]

Woohoo! 20,000 pages.

[sakura-panda]

I only have nine books left to match my goal, so if I continue reading the shorter, regular sized books on my list (the ones that only take a couple of days), I might be able to reach it this year.

I have until Christmas to try; I'm off of work between the holidays which is a good time to settle down with the longer, more involved novels that I put off when I'm only filling a few minutes here or there.

[Tarana]

Working really hard to finish up some random reading so that I can start on some holiday based reading/listening. I really didn't get to much beyond listening to A Christmas Carol audiobooks last couple of years, so ready to plow in for 2 weeks.

[HomeInMyShoes]

Well, I'm usually pretty absent from the boards over he last couple of weeks of the year, so assuming I finish the last two books I've got on the go right now here is the yearly damage report:

general statistics
72 Books Read
20,464 pages read
53 different authors
37 new authors
20 countries
7 new countries
$0.00 spent on books
64 library books read
53 paper books read
19 electronic books read

most read countries
17 - United States
16 - United Kingdom
14 - Canada
7 - Japan
2 - Austria, Iceland

new countries
Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Cameroon, Denmark, Iran, North Korea, Togo

most read authors
6 - Terry Pratchett
4 - Catherynne M Valente, Jasper Fforde
3 - Margaret Atwood
2 - Haruki Murakami, Richard Wagamese, Sjon, Lisa Moore, Tom Holt, Wolf Haas

[orlok]

I don't bother to keep a tally of pages or average number of pages read, but I just saw the Goodreads summary feature, See Your 2015 in Books, which is nice (no idea how accurate it is). My stats are:

- 87 books read (will probably end up as 89 or 90 by year end)
- 23,326 pages read
- Average book page length 320 (longest 519, and there were a few short stories in the list)
- My average rating 3.6 out of 5 (a few I couldn't finish or didn't like much)

[DrNefario]

Back to evens today - 126 books in, 126 books out - and I only had to deploy two standalone short stories to cheat the numbers a bit. I am hoping to finish at least two more books before the year is out, which will give me a bit of breathing room to receive books for Christmas. Plus there is one book I really want to buy soon. But overall it's looking good for my TBR.

[orlok]

Originally Posted by DrNefario

Plus there is one book I really want to buy soon.

C'mon gis a clue

[DrNefario]

It's the third book in Lev Grossman's Magicians trilogy, The Magicians' Land (I'm not sure where that apostrophe goes, to be honest, it could be one magician). I've read the first two this year and I'd probably say they were my top reads of the year. The price is only just acceptable (£4.99), but it has been a good bit higher, and I'm concerned it might go back up. Also I would definitely read it soon, unlike some of my other purchases.

[Dazrin]

I really doubt I will finish my current book before the end of the year so here are my assumed year-end stats. If this is the way I end the year, this will be my second highest year as far as pages read and tied for second lowest number of total books.

Page Goal: Finished 11/3/15. Final tally 28,315 pages read, 79 books/short stories completed.

Overall Summary Stats:

• Read 37 Books from 32 new authors
• Read 48 library books (61%)
• Read 24 books that either won or were shortlisted for a literary award
• Read books published in 45 different years (highest from 2015 with 7)
• Most read author: Terry Pratchett with 9
• Average length of books: 358 (vs 330 normally)

I have updated my goal post with more detail.

[Tarana]

I'm doing pretty good. I should be finishing "Ghost" by Peter Straub today and hope to knock off 2 more started books by the end of the year. That puts me over my goal!

[CRussel]

I am going to come close to my stretch goal of 150 books for the year, but I'm not going to make it. I'm at 141, and I might manage to read one more, maybe two, but that will be it, I'm sure, with the load of work I've got lined up for this week. And I've slipped on my secondary goal of tracking purchases and books read a bit as well, as the level of overload this month has been high. But overall, I'm reasonably pleased, even with the tracking. It's more sporadic than it should be, but it IS happening.