50 books a year

I haven’t posted in a while, mostly due to a lot of things I won’t be getting into here (the holidays are one of them, though). I’ve been slowly getting back into reading, although it’s rather slow going. Reason for this is that ever since college, a lot of other interests/activities took up my time, and I was around people who did not really read. Now, that’s even more difficult, given the fact that I work full-time, work on freelance projects, work on my hobbies-turned-responsibilities. And then I have to read. And, read what?

I have a couple of books on my currently-reading and to-read reading list, which I’m hoping to finish. I had the thought that it was probably high time to do something concrete about this, and what better time than now, just before new year? I’ve decided that I’m going to read 50 books next year — at least 30 of them new books. I will read 50 books. That’s roughly one book a week. I can finish one book a day (unless it’s very long and doesn’t grab me early enough) so this should be “easy”, even with full-time work. I initially thought of 100 a year, but I didn’t want to be too ambitious (especially because of work!), as this isn’t like movies which you can finish in two-three hours.

I already have a few which I know will be on that list. I’m still working with Sylvia Plath’s The Bell Jar, and like I mentioned in my journal, I have Orhan Pamuk’s My Name is Red as well. I’ve put some other books back on my to-buy list, like Jean Rhys’ Wide Sargasso Sea and Mineko Iwasaki’s Geisha: A Life. I have a few books I was to revisit, like Noli me Tangere and Florante at Laura which were both required reading in high school, but ones I feel I should like reading in a non-academic setting. So, I already have a few books slotted for the 50, and I made a progress meter as well:

[pfmeter id=2 target=50 progress=1]

Still zero, obviously. ;) I’m excited! Anyone care to join me? (I’ll probably put a page up somewhere with my running list soon.)