The Best Reader + TIME

2011 Reading Challenges: The Conclusion

2011 was really my first time attempting any sort of concrete reading challenge and I think I faired pretty well for myself. If you're interested in exactly what books I read to complete each challenge, merely click on the photo to be taken to the appropriate page.

Let's start with the disappointment first. I challenged myself to read 100 books last year; this, unfortunately, didn't happen. I read 53 books in 2011 which is actually about 10 books less than 2010. But, to my credit, a few life changing events occurred such as getting married, moving into a house, teaching summer school, and starting a new job in two grade levels I had never taught before.
Challenges:

The Off the Shelf Challenge was probably my biggest failure/embarrassment. I challenged myself to read 76 books from my own shelves, when in actuality I read 19. Whoops. If I wanted to make excuses for this, I would (theoretically) blame my new Nook and point to the eBook Challenge.

On January 11th, I bought a Nook and set a goal to read 12 of those unfamiliar, slightly scary, eBooks. On June 17th, I completed that goal. This year I read a total of 20 eBooks! I attribute a lot of this to NetGalley and the Galley Grab because I can honestly say I have yet to buy an eBook! So for those of you who are worried about the cost — don't be!

Along with eBooks, this year I discovered my love of audiobooks as well! Last year having never listened to an entire audiobook before, I challenged myself to read 12 audiobooks and I completed 15! I am now a firm believer in the audiobook! 2011 was really a year of reading discovery for me.

The iChallenge challenged me to read 10 "Vampy, Witchy, Fae-sih, Were-ish" throughout the year and I read 12. More than 10% of what I read this year dealt with vampires, witches, faery, or werewolves. I guess I love me some paranormal YA! Had Angels been added to this list my number would be 15!

For the Dystopian Challenge I chose to read 15 books and I'm really surprised I didn't read more. My final count was 14.

Another Challenge I was so close to was the Debut Author Challenge for 2011. The idea was to read at least 12 and I read 11.

And finally, the Challenge I set for myself in 2010: the YA List. In 2010 I read three of the books on this list and at the end of 2011 this number is 13. While I didn't complete the entire goal of reading all 25 books, I'm going to call this one a wash as I don't really want to attempt it again in 2012.

Overall, I'm really impressed with my progress this year, especially in regards to the eBook and the Audiobook Challenges. Like I mentioned, 2011 was really a year of reading discovery for me. Prior to 2011 I read books that were bound and nothing else and now I have three different mediums to read in. I'm so excited to see what 2012 brings!

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2011 Reading Challenges: The Conclusion + TIME