My Own Review of 2015 and goals for 2016

Sorry for the flood of posts today, Lovelies! I just have so much I want to talk about with 2015!!!

Last year for goal setting, I used a Top Ten Tuesday post. I'll recap each goal and tell you if I met them or not!

1. Comment on 5 blogs a week. Fail. I did okay for the first six months or so, but I petered out. I still try to keep commenting or at least looking at 5 blogs a week! But this will definitely be a 2016 Redo.

2. Get better at design. Ehhhhh. I don't know if I really met this goal, but I worked on it! So another 2016 Redo.

3. Write one review post and one discussion post a week. Fail. I definitely didn't come close to hitting this one. I think for 2016 I'm going to do One Review Post a Week and One Discussion Post a Month.

4. Finish any Dangling Series left from this year. Fail. I basically went the wrong direction with this one. So for 2016 Finish half of the series I have on my current "seriesly-finish-the-series" shelf. For those of you who are curious I have 28 on there and these are what they are

Mortal Instruments
Ten Tiny Breaths
The Diviners
Amulet
The Darkest Minds
Bone
Alvin Ho
Pretty Little Liars
Beautiful Disaster
Vampire Academy
If I Stay
Throne of Glass
The Giver
The Curse Workers
The Lunar Chronicles
Graceling
Octavian Nothing
Shades of London
Darker Shade of Magic
The Others
Akata Witch
Alex & Ada
Lumberjanes
Tir Alainn
Persepolis
Reboot
Enchanted Forest Chronicles
Micah Grey

5. Read 150 books. Fail. I tried but I fell behind with classes. I got to 132. So...2016 Redo.

6. Read 1 book I own for every 1 new book. Ehhhh. I read 24 books I owned and 29 books I bought new (and 63 I borrowed). The books I borrowed were almost all for class or I would count them as a new book. So I call this one pretty well done. Read 1 for 1 in 2016.

7. Actually participate in a readathon. Fail. What blog should I follow to do this one? I definitely want this as a 2016 Redo.

8. Reread 15 books. SUCCESS!!!! I actually reread 21 books this year. I think about half of them were for class, but I'm still really excited that I met this goal. I think I'm going to lower it to Reread 5 books in 2016.

9. Work on culling. Ehhhhh. I'm trying to be good about it. But it's kind of hard to take used books to used bookstores in Boston. Gotta drag the bag on the subway and go out of my normal route to get here. I'm still keeping this on my list for a 2016 Redo.

10. Start a weekly thing! Ehhhhh. I actually started two new weekly things for my blog -- that aren't really that new or inventive (WCW and TBT) but I stopped actually doing them about half way through the year. I don't know that I loved them that much either. So Think of a new monthly thing to do.

What goals do you have for 2016?? Let me know in the comments! I don't think it's a bad thing to not meet a goal. It gives me a chance to try again. So here we go 2016, I'm coming for you.

More Diversity in Your Book Diet

Hello Lovelies! As usual Top Ten Tuesday is brought to you by the lovely people over at The Broke and the Bookish . Today's topic is Top Ten Books for People Who Like X, and I'm going to go with... Top Ten Books for People Who Like Diversity Thanks to the efforts of groups like We Need Diverse Books, diversity is having a resurgence in young adult and children's books. For the last couple years, I have been trying to read more books with diverse characters or by diverse authors. (Diverse in this respect includes race, sexuality, gender, and disability). I haven't endeavored to challenge myself to only read a certain type of book i.e. only those by women of color or anything that isn't by a white heterosexual male, but I try to be extra aware of the characters and ask myself if they actually are white (sometimes the text doesn't say it, sometimes people just assume it!) and if being white is necessary for the character or not. But here are my top t...

TBT: The Witch of Blackbird Pond

In middle school, I was a member of this reading club where we had a set of books to read as a team, and then we did like little quizzes on them against other teams. (SUPER NERD!). And now, I'm not entirely certain, but I feel pretty sure that club was where I read this book for the first time. The Witch of Blackbird Pond by Elizabeth George Speare is a Newbery award winning historical fiction novel. Orphan Kit Tyler has been moved from her home in the Caribbean to her puritan relative's home in Connecticut. She feels like she has nothing in common with these relatives, but she does form an attachment with an old Quaker woman and a young sailor, Nat. Of course breaking out of the mold is not without its price, and Kit learns this for herself when she is accused of witchcraft. This is one of those books that I think about constantly. I haven't reread it in several years, but I always want to. I recommend it frequently to other. This is a book for readers...

Hello Lovelies!! It's a very special Top Ten Tuesday because it's also my 100th post!! Woohoo!! Honestly this is probably the longest I've stuck with a hobby so I'm pretty excited about this milestone. So The Broke and the Bookish 's topic this week is.. I went with books that I own but haven't read yet which I would like to take to a beach (if I could get to one, hahaha, Montana is a landlocked state). Keeping the Moon by Sarah Dessen Girl at Sea by Maureen Johnson Sloppy Firsts by Megan McCafferty Megan Meade's Guide to the McGowan Boys by Kate Brian If I Stay by Gayle Forman Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight by Jennifer E. Smith Viola in Reel Life by Adriana Trigiani Read My Lips by Teri Brown Going Too Far by Jennifer Echols The Nature of Jade by Deb Caletti So that's my list! It's heavy on contemporary fiction novels because summer brin...