The 2024 TBR Challenge
I’m a quarter of the way through my 2024 TBR Challenge to focus my reading on the (many, many) books that I own and to avoid buying books that will sit on my shelves unread.
How’s it going?
I’ve read 49 books in the first three months, which puts me about 7 books ahead of schedule to read 170 books this year.
I’m at 90% of my Year-to-date target for reading books from my TBR (27 books out of an annual target of 120).
I’ve added 59 books so far this year of which I’ve read 22, so my TBR is going up, not down.
Here’s the status at the goal level:
- Read all books added to my library in 2024
- Year to date I’ve added 59 books,
- I’ve read 22 of the books that I’ve added,
- I now have 37 new books on my TBR shelf which is a net rise of 10 books.
- Read 90 books from my TBR pile that were added in 2023
- Year to date I’ve read 19 of the 90 books, which means I’m 3 books behind plan.
- Read 30 books selected from my 2012-2022 TBR shelf
- I’ve read 8 of the 30 which means I’m on plan.
- Move some TBR books to the Unlikely To Read shelf
- This is complete. I’ve selected 24 books.
So what have I gotten from this exercise?
Firstly, it’s made me appreciate what a resource my TBR is. There are some great books on there that I’ve lost sight of. Two of my four-star reads this month have been on my shelves for years: My Sister’s Grave by Robert Dugoni has been on my shelves for 9 years and Alice Munro’s Too Much Happiness has been there for an astonishing 12 years.
Secondly, I’ve accepted that buying books gives me a different but equally valid form of pleasure than reading books. I’m still buying at a slightly faster rate than I can read but I’m being selective about what I’m adding. Each book added gives me something to look forward to and to be excited about.
Looking beyond 2024, it seems to me that it would make sense to have a goal to pull at least 50% of the books I read each year from my TBR. Next year I may tilt more of my TBR reading towards my oldest books.
What I read in March
I read 22 books in March. Almost all of them were fun. Two were outstanding, two were disappointing and four of them I set aside.
My two best reads were Josephine Tey’s Golden Age mystery ‘The Franchise Affair‘ (1948) and Jennie Godfrey’s recently released ‘The List Of Suspicious Things‘ (2024), neither of which I’ve had time to write reviews for yet.
What I reviewed in March
I reviewed 18 titles in March:
Too Much Happiness by Alice Munro
The Murder After The Night Before by Katy Brent
Lovers At The Museum by Isabelle Allende
The Silver Pigs by Lindsey Davis
A Wolf In Thief’s Clothing by Lily Anne Crow
Shadows In Bronze by Lindsey Davis
Holly by Stephen King
Evil Eye by Madhuri Shekar
Nightfall by Marisela Treviño Orta
Over My Dead Body by Maz Evans
Persephone by Lev Grossman
The Candles Are Burning by Veronica G. Henry
Blood Kissed by Keri Arthur
Gallows Court by Martin Edwards
Camp Zero by Michelle Min Sterling
Coven Mitt by Rebecca Regnier
Long Time Dead by T. M. Payne
They Came To Baghdad by Agatha Christie
What I added in March
I added 25 books in March. Yeah, I know that’s three more than I read in the whole month. What can I say? Three of them were very short. Four of them were free. I read seven of them and my wife read another six. And really, is it my fault that there are so many good books being published?
Mike Finn's Fiction 