November/December Plans

Yesterday, I came across this blog post written by Joel at I'd Rather Be Reading. It was rather apropos, as I had a similar reaction to the fact that it's now November, and I have so many books left to read. (I also have so many life goals that aren't going to happen and don't need to be discussed in this blog. I made good headway with most of them, but there are a couple niggling ones that just aren't going to happen, and I'm a bit disappointed with myself.)

Anyway, without further ado, here's what I had planned to read in November, the status of each of those goals, and my future plans.

What Were My Reading Goals

1) Read 70 Books - I am at 55 books read as of today. Looking at Goodreads, I'm apparently 6 behind schedule which means to get to 70, I need to read 15 books between now and December 31st. I originally chose this goal because I easily hit it last year. Not so much this year. To be fair, this year also tried to kick the snot out of me... I'm okay with not hitting this goal.

2) Read 12 Classics for the Back to the Classics Challenge - According to the list I made last year, I am three books away from finishing this. However, my parents and I also do a book club that's classics focused. With the books we've read for that, combined with the books I've read for the challenge, I've made it. With that being said, I'd like to try and finish my original list if at all possible.

3) Read All Seven of David Mitchell's books in order - According to David Mitchell, his books are all part of one uber-novel. I'd read a couple of his books before, but decided to read them all again in order. I finished this challenge in July. It was an interesting experiment, but I found I didn't enjoy all his books the way I enjoyed the two I'd read before.

4) Read Five Books Off My Very Incomplete To Be Read List - I'm 3 for 5 on this one... and it's really 2 for 5. I stopped reading the third one because it was so bad. That being said, I'm not going to pick up another one. I'm happy with this list and happy with how it's going.

5) Doing Dewey Challenge: Read One Book from Every Dewey Century - Hahahaha. I added this because I was doing so well with my reading. I was actually running out of stuff to read, not that that was hard remedy. I work in a library. But I thought it'd be a great way to add more nonfiction in my life. As of right now, I've read 3 out of 10. I don't foresee myself making it any further than that.

All in all, I feel good about these goals. I feel like goals 1 through 4 were very realistic, and Goal 5 was added as an afterthought anyway. It makes sense that I won't finish it.

What My November/December Reading Plans Are:

• Finish The Count of Monte Cristo I've been working on this book since January. I thought I had a great plan for finishing it. I didn't. I'm about 250 pages from the end, so I should get it done by December 31st. (Finished 11/17/18)
• Read the last two books for my personal Reading Challenge. Both of these are sitting on my nightstand, and I plan on bringing both on our trip to Denver next week. I am positive that I'll finish both by New Year's Eve
• Read the last two books for Back to the Classics My last two books are The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins and One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. One of these is on hold for me at work; the other is on my nightstand. The plan is to read both of these, but if I'm pressed for time, I will eschew Solitude in favor of Woman in White
• Complete the last Classics Club Spin for the year (if there is one) I really enjoy this challenge every time it comes up. I enjoy it so much that I even have my list ready! There is usually one for November/December. Both of the above titles are on my spin list as well as 18 other books from my Classics Club. Hopefully, I'll get either one of these titles, or another slim novel. Unfortunately, I have some chunkters on there as well. If I end up with one of my other books I'm avoiding, likely neither of my Back to the Classics will show up this year.

With Count, the two books for my reading challenge, and at least one more classics, that brings me to 59 books for the year which is definitely respectable. I also should add, this doesn't count all the audiobooks I've listened to. Adding those brings me closer to the 70 range considering how many of the Rebecca Caudill Books I worked my way through this year.