Reading Reflection: 2017

In December of 2016, I set myself a series of reading challenges for this year. I decided to tackle a whole bunch of goals, and I actually completed all of them! This post is a look back on everything I accomplished in my reading life in 2017.

My Goodreads reading goal was to read a total of 76 books for the year. I accomplished that and then some, reading a total of 81 books in 2017. You can see all the books I read this year here.

This challenge required participants to read 12 classic novels fitting different prompts throughout the year. I completed all of the categories about a month early! My wrap up post is here.

The Classics Club is a five-year challenge in which participants create a list of classic novels they want to read during that time period. This was my first year working on my list, and my goal was to read at least 20 of the books on my list. I ended up reading 20, so I am on track. You can view my complete Classic Club list here.

This challenge consisted of 40 reading prompts, plus a dozen bonus categories to keep you busy if you finished early. The prompts were widely varied and meant to encourage participants to read a whole bunch of novels that they wouldn't ordinarily pick up on their own.

I finished all of the prompts, including the bonus ones, and I have to say that the mission of this challenge was definitely accomplished. The complete list of what I read is here.

I read so many wonderful books throughout the course of this challenge that it's difficult to say if I had a true favorite. The Bell Jar, A Room with a View, and Germinal became new classic favorites of mine. On the more modern side, this challenge introduced me to The Girls, History of Wolves, Another Brooklyn, American Gods, Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell, and Maus, all of which I loved. 

Aside from just reading different kinds of books, this challenge also introduced me to audio books, which I had actually never tried before this year. While reading novels the old fashioned way is still my favorite way to experience a story, I've started to use audio books while I exercise now, which has been useful for when I get sick of listening to music.

Overall, this challenge was definitely a success and I'm glad I took it on. There is already another set of prompts for 2018's Popsugar Challenge posted, but I think I'm going to pass for next year. I have my own ideas for what I want to read in 2018, which I will write about later.

The 2017 Mount TBR Challenge required participants to read books that they already owned prior to 2017. As I have a major book-buying problem, this one was right up my alley. I signed up to read 60 novels I had sitting on my shelves, and I met that goal. Here's is a list of everything I read.

Many of the novels I read for his challenge doubled as my Popsugar books, so I don't have a lot to add as far as favorites goes. The point of this challenge was to read things I already owned, and I definitely did that. Embarrassingly enough, what I read here is only a fraction of all the books I own, so I still have some work to do in this area.


This ended up being a great year for reading and blogging, and I feel very proud of completing all of the challenges I took on. I've already got some ideas running through my head for what I want to tackle next year. As always, reading continues to be my favorite hobby and my best escape from dealing with the stresses of the real world. I'm looking forward to continuing on blogging, learning, and growing next year.