Reading Plans for 2022

I have never made any reading plans before. But my TBR tower has gotten out of hand. So, I have made a plan for this year to read each month one classic book, one self-help/health book, one old TBR and one bird/nature book. Hopefully from books already in my library. I read a lot of books but am a bit helter skelter about what I choose. Wish me luck!

Does anyone else organize their reading list?

A.

>1 perennialreader: I had a verion of that question in 2021 so I went on a project to understand what books I had read in my lifetime, now 87 years old. I calleded it my Reading Journey. I have now finished it, with a lot of work using LibraryThing. My conclusion was that my books read could be explained by my lifetime experiences and my heritage. I also concluded that I have, and suspect others also have a reading fingerprint which is a small group of books that succinctly summarizes my reading profile.

You can look at my library JoeB1934 and see how the books read can be drawn down to a small subset which contains my favorite books of all time.

>2 JoeB1934: Interesting. I am still working on my lifetime reading journal. My tags 1952-1999 are books that I read before keeping a record, so I am missing about 5000 or so. :)

Mostly though I want to be more organized about my future reading.

Normally, I just read things chronologically, from the oldest to the newest. However, now that I'm aging, I do pass over books because they no longer suit my fancy. Too old to read bad or uninspired books!

>2 JoeB1934: I love this idea. I'm going to try it with my books. My Reading Journey.....sounds like fun!

I have not kept records except on LT and GR. Also at my age, 83, I am reading what I like.
>1 perennialreader: Those are great plans.
>2 JoeB1934: I will check your library.
I read Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne when I was in Jr. Hi and still like the book and the movies.

All sounds a bit too organised for me! I'll re-read Lord of the Rings some time this year as I do most years, but apart from that I'll be reading whatever I can download to my Kindle free or cheap, and picking up real books from my book shelves as the fancy takes me.

I usually have an annual reading theme--author, genre, time period, things I ducked reading in college, etc. This year it's True Crime.

I read lots outside the chosen theme, but if I don't have a critical focus, I just feel like I'm killing time in a waiting room.

Maybe having made my career as an English teacher makes it different for me. If I were, say, a retired ornithologist, I expect desultory literary selections of whatever looks interesting would be just fine, and that I would be much more serious about my birdwatching instead.

>8 nohrt4me2:

Or if one were both a retired birdwatcher and a retired model railway enthusiast currently building a large model railway layout in a forty foot shipping container...

I do occasionally choose to re-read an author’s entire work (I re-read Iris Murdoch a few years ago) but mostly my reading is fairly spontaneous. A lot of my books come from charity shops so there is no way to plan what I will find.

>9 John5918: Oh, dear!

>10 mlfhlibrarian: Do you spot trends in the charity shop selections? I always find it interesting to browse second hand stores to figure out what people are drawn to--and what they throw out or turn over.

Well, I know what I’ll be reading in the near future, as I’ve become a college student again. The one course I’m taking (auditing) has three textbooks!

But usually, I’m blown by the winds of chance and LT friend recommendations.

>11 nohrt4me2: oh yes, reading group booklists’ titles and set texts from school/college appear at certain times. I found a copy of Malory’s Morte d’Arthur just before Xmas. I’m a King Arthur freak so that was a nice surprise.

>11 nohrt4me2: I have been finding more Clive Cussler books and a few years ago I was able to find a lot of books by Elizabeth Peters.

I've decided to leave my reading comfort zone of England & the US and this year am focusing on the 3 A's: Africa, Asia, and Australia. Having a great time, so far. Of course, there will be things outside the focus, as the whim moves me.

>8 nohrt4me2: One year I did focus on true crime. Read quite a few by Anne Rule.

I also read Evangeline by Longfellow each year as I think it's one of the greatest works of verse I've ever read.

>15 Tess_W: I read Evangeline in high school in 1956 so maybe should read again.

>15 Tess_W: Reading The Stranger Beside Me right now. It's not bad.

>17 nohrt4me2: That's on my TBR!

I got back from Egypt two days ago and took my Death on the Nile by Agatha Christie. I was able to read a little while on our Nile cruise ship. I found Temples, Tombs, and Hieroglyphs by Barbara Mertz at a store while I was there and bought it.

>19 mnleona: How exciting! Can you share some of the highlights?

>20 Tess_W: I will. I am 83 and with the help of my kids was able to see and do many things.

I haven't joined any reading challenges this year, so will be freewheeling it.

My TBR stack is shelved in the order they arrived in the house, so I usually grab the three oldest from one end and the three newest from the other end, stack them up, and start reading. Sometimes I pick up something that has been "maturing" in the stack and wonder "Why in the world did I bring this one home?"

Then there are the peripherals -- one book a month for my F2F group, and one ILL book a month chosen at random from my never-ending wish-list on Paperback Swap (currently at 250 titles & growing).

So far this month:
OLDIES: Liar's Bench, The Same Sky, The Mismeasure of Woman, The Murder of Tutankhamen, City of Secrets
NEW ARRIVALS: My Cat's Life, Fuzz, Cat-A-Lyst, Flying Angels
F2F SELECTION: A Good Neighborhood
ILL: The Witches Are Coming

For some reason I have been reading a lot of religious history lately. Karen Armstrong is very good, but extremely precise and so her books occasionally become exhausting. I am in the middle of her book, Islam: A Short History and had to put it down for a while. I keep getting all the wars mixed up and forgetting what a caliphate is etc. The part about Muhammad was really interesting. Too bad he takes up so little of the story. I am now reading her book, Buddha. It is very good — just as detailed but since you are not going over a thousand year history — just the life of one person — the details are not so overwhelming.

I belong to the "CATegory" Challenge group and one Cat is a Shakespeare read each month. You can read the selected play or read a book that is based on that play. I like to do both: Read the play first and then the novel. I'm enjoying re-reading some Shakespeare that I have not read in maybe 40 years. Thus far I have read: King Lear, Richard III, and Much Ado About Nothing. I much prefer the histories and tragedies over the comedies, which I find very formulaic.

I am re-reading some of my books on my shelves and now re-reading Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf. Still not my cup of tea but I will finish.

>25 mnleona: Woolf is not my cup o'tea, either. I've read 2 of her's, including Mrs. Dalloway and that will be it!

Finished Death on the Nile by Agatha Christie yesterday. I printed a copy of the cast of the 1978 movie so I could picture the characters.

I am in a reading slump--not quantity, but quality! I've read far too many mediocre/average books in the last 2 months. I must get back to the classics and some deep historical fiction.

I got a notice from LT that I need to write reviews about the books I have won. I read the books but did not review. I will probaly re-read some of them.