Category Archives: monthly goals

September Wrap-Up & Looking ahead to October

Posted in monthly goals, Monthly recap by

My reading this month was literally less than half of last month’s- you can tell my uni course has well and truly started!  In October things will ratchet up another notch so outside of studying I haven’t really got too much planned yet.  In September I hit my original Goodreads goal of 100 books, so I’ve slightly increased it to 104 – it’s not much, but I think as term goes on, I’ll probably be reading less and less, so I don’t want to set it too high!  I’ll be continuing with the Fall Bookish Bingo, joining in with Dewey’s 24 hour readathon, and blogging as much as I can around all of that!

Reading


Artemis | A Short History of Nearly Everything | City of Ghosts | Brief Cases | The Island | Sadie

Books read: 6 (12 less than August)
Pages read: 2408 (2578 less than August)
Average pages per day: 80
Average book length: 401
Favourite: A Short History of Nearly Everything

Blogging

Challenge Updates

  • Beat the Backlist (49/48) (+3)
  • Finishing the Series (7/15) (+/- 0)
  • Goodreads (100/100) – Goal achieved! Increased to 104.
  • NetGalley % change: +/- 1% (72%)

September Goals

  • -6lbs: EPIC FAIL.
  • 4 blog posts: Exceeded! 6 posts managed.
  • At least 1 cinema trip & 1 date evening: We managed a cinema trip to see Crazy Rich Asians. We didn’t manage a specific date night, but we did have a few evenings at home with a takeaway and some tv, and also quite a few social things with friends so I’m happy enough with that.

October TBR


My Life and Laughing (294) | Audible (started)
Time’s Convert (436) | Audible
Waking Gods (336) | Library (started)

Target pages = 1066

October Goals

  • Weight loss – back into the 11s
  • 4 blog posts, including 2 reviews
  • Take part in Dewey’s 24 hour readathon
  • At least 1 cinema trip & 1 date evening

How was your September?

Looking Ahead: September 2018

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What’s on in September?

This month I’m starting my teacher training course, which promises to be intense, challenging and exhausting but hopefully also inspiring, satisfying and rewarding. I’ve kept my TBR pile small and focused quite heavily on audiobooks as I’m not sure how much time I’ll get to read around placements and assignments – everyone keeps telling me I should basically give up on the idea of books/hobbies/any kind of social life until the end of the year but I’m determined not to! I got ahead on my Goodreads goal over the summer but haven’t raised it, which means if I can get 6 books finished before the end of the year I’ll hit my goal of 100. Anything beyond that would be a bonus!

September’s TBR list

Artemis (305) | Audible (started)
A short history of nearly everything (687) | Audible
The Island (304) | E-Arc
Waking Gods (336) | Library

Target pages = 1632

September Goals

  • -6lbs: Now that we’re back from our holiday, we’re back at WW for the first time in a long time and giving the Flex plan a try. Fingers crossed!
  • 4 blog posts – Honestly, I’ve no idea how plausible this is, all depends on the uni work – maybe I can post more, maybe even 4 is too many (although I hope not)
  • At least 1 cinema trip & 1 date evening – I want to try and make sure I force myself to take some down-time and relax, as everyone says work-life balance is crucial but also one of the hardest things for the teacher training course

What do you have planned for September?

Q1 Reading

Posted in 2018 challenges, monthly goals, Progress by

I read and loved Ellie’s post on her book stats for the first quarter of 2018, and couldn’t resist looking at some of my own! I haven’t tracked the books that have come in like she has, but I’ve enjoyed looking at the series statuses and lengths of what I’ve read so far.

Books read so far: 33
Total pages: 11027
Pages per day: 123
Average pages per book: 334

Format:

  • 8 Paperback (24%),
  • 10 eBook (30%),
  • 15 audio (45%)

Series:

  • First in a series – 8 (33.3%)
  • Second – 6 (25%)
  • Third – 3 (12.5%)
  • Fourth or higher – 7 (29.2%)

Genres (note, books are categorised as multiple genres in some cases so don’t add up to 100%):

  • Fantasy – 12 (36.4%)
  • Sci fi – 6 (18.2%)
  • Mystery – 6 (18.2%)
  • Manga – 5 (15.2%)
  • Romance – 4 (12.1%)
  • Contemporary – 4 (12.1)
  • Horror – 3 (9.1%)
  • Non-fiction – 2 (6.1%)
  • Crime – 1 (3.0%)

Length:

  • 0-150 pages – 0
  • 151-300 pages – 9 (28.1%)
  • 301-500 pages – 20 (62.5%)
  • 501-800 pages – 3 (9.4%)

Publication date:

  • Pre-2018 – 29 (87.9%)
  • 2018 – 4 (12.1%)

Target audience:

  • MG – 4 (12.1%)
  • YA – 6 (18.2%)
  • Not-specified (eg Manga) – 6 (18.2%)
  • Adult – 17 (51.5%)

Length:

  • 0-150 pages – 0
  • 151-300 pages – 9 (28.1%)
  • 301-500 pages – 20 (62.5%)
  • 501-800 pages – 3 (9.4%)

Reading Goals (5)

  1. Read 100 books – 33/100 – ON TRACK
  2. Finish/catch up with 15 series
    I haven’t worked out the exact number of these yet, but two-thirds of the books I’ve read in series are book 2 or later, so I think this is going pretty well.
  3. Read at least 12 manga volumes or graphic novels – 5/12 – ON TRACK
  4. Get My NetGalley ratio up to (and then keep it above) 80% – 73% as of end of March
  5. Read at least 48 backlist books – 29/48 – ON TRACK

Looking Ahead: April 2018

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What’s on in April?

This month I am: going away for a few days, going to see Nashville in concert, doing lots of wedding planning (<6 months now!), taking some serious steps towards the career change I mentioned in my 2018 goals and taking part in Camp NaNoWriMo!

April’s TBR list

 

Beneath The Sugar Sky (174) | Scribd
Authority (341) | Scribd (started)
City of Brass (544) | ARC
Our Dark Duet (510) | Scribd
The Well of Ascension (781) | From my shelves

Target pages = 2350

This is below my total target pages for the month, but because we’re a bit all over the place this month, I know it’s likely that I’ll finish a book somewhere away from home and not have something pre-planned lined up. Plus, I’m a definite mood reader, so if I plan out my reading in too much detail, I get frustrated by not being able to add in whatever I fancy at that precise moment 😉

April Goals

  • -8.5 lbs: an ambitious goal, but this would take me into the next stone bracket so I’m going to try! Less than 6 months until our wedding now so I’m feeling pretty focussed.
  • 8 blog posts
  • Camp NaNoWriMo – 20k words. I have no plan for this, and I don’t mind if it’s all one story, a bunch of short stories, fanfiction, anything. I just want to get into a bit of a writing habit!

What do you have planned for April?

Looking Ahead: October 2017

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What’s on in October?

I’m taking part in NaNoWriMo again next month (yes, even despite failing last year, because I’m an optimist!), and things at work really pick up between now and Christmas, so this month will mostly be filled with NaNo Prep and working. I’m hoping to complete both the Writing.com NaNo Prep calendar and Fiction University’s Idea to Novel in 31 days, because I went in to last November with a very rough idea and just ran out of steam. I still like the idea though, so I’m hoping doing some more prep this year will work better for me!

Last month’s TBR list

I didn’t set one…

October’s TBR list

 

One Dark Throne (448) | Review copy
Ink (761) | Owned
History is all you left me (320) | Borrowed
Nevermoor (640) | Borrowed
Lady Midnight (698) | Audiobook
The Well of Ascension (781) | From my shelves

Target pages = 3269

Last month’s Goals

  • I didn’t set any!

October Goals

  • Run streak. You might remember that at the beginning of the year I was running pretty consistently. I’ve stopped running altogether and am back at square 1 (read: feel like I’m dying after a 30 second jog), so I’m going to try something I’ve never done before: a run streak. The aim is to move for 1 mile a day, every day, for the month of October. To start with at least that mile will be walk/run intervals, but I’m hoping if I can stick to it that by the end of the month I can run for a lot longer than 30 seconds!
  • 8 blog posts
  • At least 4 blog posts scheduled for November
  • NaNoWriMo prep calendars!

What do you have planned for October?