Discussions

My reading and blogging goals for 2021 and a reflection of 2020

studious-saturday

Although 2020 was a tough year, books and blogging were a wonderful escape for me and I still managed to focus on some of the goals I had set for myself at the beginning of the year. As in previous years I decided to review some of those goals and also set new ones for this year.

My goals from last year were:

Read 55 books from a variety of genres – achieved

I kept my goals of reading 55 books the same as in 2019 and I once again managed to reach this goal by reading my last book on New Year’s Eve! I also read a wide variety of genres including Fantasy, Young Adult and Science Fiction in addition to my usual favourites Contemporary Fiction, Historical Fiction and Thrillers.

Discover Spanish Contemporary Literature – sort of achieved

I read three books in Spanish last year which was an improvement from the previous year however I was hoping to read many more books in Spanish. It feels like my TBR list is ever growing and mostly with recommendations for books written in English so I was constantly trying to beat the backlist and read those books in English that were piling up on my list.

Don’t overload myself with ARCs – achieved

My goal from last year was to only request one ARC per month which I followed however unfortunately a lot of the ARCs were published in October, November and December. Even though I read the ARCs throughout the year my reviews were written and published mostly at the end of the year.

Redesign my blog – achieved

I redesigned my blog in May and at first was happy with the final look however I now want to redesign it again! This often happens a few months after I choose a new theme as I start to find flaws and research new ways to enhance the design.

Get more involved in the book blogging community – not achieved

Unfortunately I did not focus on this goal as much as I would have liked. I had originally planned to blog hop at least twice per week however there were moments in 2020 when I would not blog hop for two-three weeks at a time – something I hope to correct this year! However, I was very pleased to become a member of TheWriteReads and connect with so many wonderful book bloggers!

My goals for 2021

Read 60 books

I have decided to increase my target by 5 books this year and hope to read a total of 60 books by the end of the year. I think this is achievable however I would have to read consistently throughout the year.

Read at least one Spanish book per month

I have several Spanish books on my Kindle and a few paperbacks in my bookcase waiting to be read. There are already several Spanish authors whose work I enjoyed so I hope to read some more of their books and discover new Spanish authors too.

Read at least one Non-Fiction book per month

I discovered Non-Fiction, in particular Self Help and Personal Development books, towards the end of 2020. I like how it breaks up my usual pace in reading Fiction books so I hope to continue with this trend this year. There are already several Non-Fiction books on my bookshelf so I think that this goal should hopefully be easy to achieve.

Restart my Studious Saturday posts

Back in 2018 and 2019 I was regularly publishing discussion posts in a segment called Studious Saturday which involved sharing my thoughts on different aspects of reading and authors. This winded down in 2020 however I have many ideas and hope to continue this segment in 2021.

Refine my blog from a design and statistics point of view

I am still not completely satisfied with my blog’s design and believe that this can be improved. I hope to look into this as well as the possibility to change my blog to self-hosted and use this as a way to improve my stats in the community and wider web. Although I blog for pleasure and don’t focus too much on stats, I recognise that there is still a lot to improve and I hope to research this area more during this year.

Question time

What are your reading and blogging goals for 2021? Did you achieve your goals from 2020?

13 Comments

  • stargazer

    Good luck with all of it. I don’t set myself any goals for reading or blogging – I am afraid, it would take the joy out of it. But I do have a vague notion about reading more translated literature in 2021. Let’s see how that goes…

  • bookbugworld

    All the best for your 2021 plans. I hope engaging with bookish community will be achieved now that you are a part of TheWriteReads gang. I never thought I would find a like minded community before the gang. πŸ˜€

    • Darina

      Thank you! I really like being a part of TheWriteReads and I completely agree, I didn’t expect to find such a community either so it’s been a nice surprise!

  • FictionFan

    Good luck with your goals! I’m always envious of people who can read in more than one language – I fear what little French I knew is now so rusty I’d struggle to read it at all, and I was never able to read it easily. Haha, mind you, sometimes I even struggle with American English! πŸ˜‰ Looking forward to your discussion posts. πŸ˜€

    • Darina

      Thank you! Ah yes reading in a non native language is always difficult and it takes so much longer to finish a book but I also use it as a way to improve my languages.

  • Annie

    Fantastic goals, Darina. I look forward to reading your Studious Saturday posts, I really enjoy those. Also, how would you read sixty books- that’s more than a book a week!! It is commendable that you achieved almost all your goals in 2020, that’s great and shows determination and consistency.

  • Stephen Writes

    Congratulations on reaching your reading target and for all the other things you achieved in 2020, Darina! I’m so glad you managed to read a wide variety of genres 😊

    Good luck for this year, too! You can certainly get 60 books. I’d love to read more nonfiction but it’s hard to fit in with all the amazing novels that are released! Can’t wait to find out what ideas you have for Studious Saturday as I love those posts. And good luck with the redesign, I’m sure it will look great! Going self-hosted is honestly not essential.

    I hope 2021 is a wonderful year for you πŸ“š

    • Darina

      Thank you, Stephen! I agree with you about nonfiction, it will be super hard for me to keep up with it but it’s something I’m going to push myself to do. I honestly haven’t looked into going self-hosted but many say it isn’t that essential so might decide to skip it in the end though I’m hoping to focus on the redesign. Thanks and I hope that 2021 is a brilliant year for you too! πŸ™‚

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