Happy Tuesday everyone! As it is Tuesday, it is time for a Top Ten Tuesday update. Top Ten Tuesday is an original blog meme created by The Broke and the Bookish and is currently being hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl.

This week’s given topic:  Reading Goals I Still Want to Accomplish Before the End of the Year

toptentuesday
1. Reading at least two books from each of the six continents

At the start of the year, I made a list of my reading resolutions. One of my resolutions was to read at least two books from each of the six continents. I have, so far, covered Europe, Asia, Africa, North America, and South America. I have yet to read at least one work by a writer from the Oceania region. Hopefully, I get to accomplish this before the year ends.

2. Read all books from my 2023 Beat the Backlist challenge

Ever since 2018, I participated in the Beat the Backlist challenge. I have quite a lot of backlist; oh well, I am the backlist type of reader. It comes as no surprise that a majority of the books I read this year are backlists. This also means that I have already completed my target of 60 backlist books. As part of this challenge, I also listed 20 backlist books that I aim to read this year. It is in this part that I am lagging behind. Of the 20 books on the list, I have to read nine more books.

3. Read all 23 books in my 2023 Top 23 Reading List

Just like the beat-the-backlist challenge, an integral part of my annual reading journey is my Top 20 (or more) reading list wherein I list at least 20 books I aim to read during the year. So far, I have read 13 books from this list. The rest of the ten books will be distributed across the rest of the year. Thankfully, some of these books are also part of my Beat the Backlist challenge.

4. Read 20 books from the 1,001 Books You Must Read Before You Die list.

I have to say, must-read lists have led me down literary alleys I never expected to find myself in. Among these reading lists is the 1,001 Books You Must Read Before You Die List. While it is my goal to read as many books from the list as I can, I always try to achieve balance by reading other books. Still, I want to tick off books from the aforementioned list, hence, my goal to read at least 20 books from the list this year. So far, I have read 12 books listed as among the 1,001 Books You Must Read Before You Die. I still have time to achieve this goal.

5. Read twenty new books.

While I am trying to read as many backlist books as I can, I also want to read as many new books as I can. It was recently that I tried to make reading more new books a part of my annual reading journey. Unfortunately, I am not sure I will be able to hit my target of twenty new books. I am lowering my target to ten but even with this lower target, I am not confident.

6. Read at least two nonfiction books.

I have always been an avid reader of works of fiction. This made me kind of averse to nonfiction books although I did read one or two. But with the broadening of my reading horizon, I have resolved to read as many works of nonfiction as I can. So far this year, I haven’t read even just one. Maybe one memoir before the year ends would redress this?

7. Publish 80 book reviews.

2023 has been a prolific reading year; I am one book shy of hitting 100 books. Unfortunately, I cannot say the same where writing is concerned. I have quite a backlog of book reviews. This year is definitely not going to be as prolific as the previous one but I am still hoping I get to find the motivation to complete at least 80 book reviews this year. I have already published 55.

8. Read more works of translation

Toward the end of 2022, I realized how severely imbalanced my reading demographic is. More than 80% of all the books I have read were originally published in English. This just goes to show how much my reading list lacks diversity. As such, I promised myself to read more translated works this year. So far, so good as half of the books I read this year were published in a language other than English; Japanese is leading the way, followed by Spanish. I am hoping that I will sustain this momentum until the end of the year.