2014: What Lies Ahead

Posted by bennardfajardo on January 7, 2014 · 7 Comments 

Everyone considers the start of the new year to be a time for making resolutions and setting goals. Although I do not usually get caught up in such pursuits, I do concede that the proliferation of 2014 reading goals across book blogs all over the internet has inspired me to do some new year’s reading resolutions and objectives. Before I reveal my goals, let’s recap my reading year first (got the idea from my friend’s blog: I Like It Dog-Eared).

• Number of Books Read: 70 (excluding some graphic novels)
• Pages Read: 16,260
• Number of Male Authors Read: 60
• Number of Female Authors Read: 10(!)
• Reviews Written: 8(!)
• Ratings: 5 Stars (26); 4 Stars (33); 3 Stars (10); 2 Stars (1); 1 Star (0)
• Unfinished Books: 6

However, as these things usually go, I cannot promise that I will fulfill the goals that I will set up for 2014 but I will do my best to see them to fruition. Anyway, here they are:

1. Read 60 books – As part of the Goodreads Reading Challenge, I pledged the same number of books that I pledged last year. I know this is doable since I exceeded my last year’s pledge by 10 books.
2. Read at least 2 of the following: Poetry, Non-Fiction – I have a respectable number of poetry collections (Heaney, Neruda, Tennyson) that remains untouched in my shelf and the same goes for works of non-fiction (Hitchens, Sullivan, Didion). This year, I will pledge to at least make a dent in my TBR for these to oft-neglected genres.
3. Read at least 5 translated works – I have been increasingly drawn to translated works ever since, last year, I discovered writers who writes in a language other than English (Sorokin, Zweig, Borges). Most of the writers that I read last year wrote in English including those who reside in the Philippines so I think it would be great if I can strike a balance this year between English and Non-English writers.
4. Read at least 5 books written by a Filipino – I have been falling in love, book by book, with authors who reside in the Philippines or those that have Filipino roots. I’m interested in the works of Gina Apostol, R. Zamora Linmark, and Sarge Lacuesta to name a few.
5. Create a balance between male and female authors – I only read 10 books written by female authors last year and, hopefully, this year I can read an equal amount (or at least minimize the disconnect) of books written by female and male writers. There are a lot of female writers out there and I want to discover them.
6. Write at least 1 review a week – Among the 6 goals that I made, this is probably the hardest. It’s quite a challenge to write clear and intelligent reviews about a certain book but, as one of my friends said, “I am not from the New Yorker,” so why the heck do I make such a big fuss in writing reviews?

So these are my reading resolutions for 2014 but, really, one resolution trumps them all: Read with joy. As John Williams, author of Stoner, has said: “My God, to read without joy is stupid.”

Filed under A Year in Reading · Tagged with Books, John Williams, Reading, Stoner, What Lies Ahead