It’s a new month, which means one month of my National Year of Reading challenge has passed. If you haven’t been reading my posts, or following my updates on Twitter or Facebook, I’ll explain.
This year is the National year of Reading here in Australia. Hooray! A whole year of focus on one of life’s great treasures. All around the country there are events,promotions and challenges designed to get people of all ages, from all walks of life reading more – and loving it! You can see details of the goings on at the official website.
So, I woke up on the first of January and thought to myself – wow, it’s the Year of Reading. I wonder if I can really make it a year of reading, and read a book for every day of the year. And before I could stop and think about it, I’d told the world that that was what I was trying to do. And people have encouraged me, so I’ve run with it. You can see my original post which explains the parameters I’ve set for myself, here.
Anyway, it’s been a month, so I thought the end of the month (or, in fact, the first day of the new one) was a good time to check in and see how I’m doing – and, so far, I;m doing fine. 31 days of the year down, and I;ve read 33 books. Here’s the list so far, with links to the ones I’ve reviewed on Aussiereviews.
| 1 | Straight Line to My Heart | Bill Condon | Allen & Unwin | Young Adult |
| 2 | Only Ever Always | Penni Russon | Allen & Unwin | Young Adult |
| 3 | Harry’s War | John Heffernan | Omnibus | Children’s |
| 4 | Just Like That | Janet Poole | Mountain View | Self Help |
| 5 | Shadrach | Meindert Dejong | Harper Trophy | Chidlren’s |
| 6 | Nanberry | Jackie French | Angus&RObertson | Young Adult |
| 7 | Extinction 2 | Lizzie Wilcock | Scholastic | Young Adult |
| 8 | The Filth Licker | Cristy Burne | Frances Lincoln | Children’s |
| 9 | Crow Country | Kate Constable | Allen & Unwin | Young Adult |
| 10 | Note on the Door | Lorraine Marwood | Walker | Children’s/Poetry |
| 11 | The Golden Door | Emily Rodda | Scholastic | Children’s |
| 12 | Lily Gets Her Wings | Elizabeth Pulford | Scholastic | Children’s |
| 13 | Animal People | Charlotte Wood | Allen & Unwin | Contemporary Adult |
| 14 | Lily Has a Secret | Elizabeth Pulford | Scholastic | Children’s |
| 15 | Button Boy | Rebecca Young & Sue deGennaro | Scholastic | Picture Book |
| 16 | I Heart You, You Haunt Me | Lisa Schroeder | Simon Pulse | YA Verse Novel |
| 17 | Froi of the Exiles | Melina Marchetta | Penguin | Young Adult |
| 18 | The Red Bridge | Kylie Dunstan | Windy Hollow | Picture Book |
| 19 | Nog and the Land of Noses | Bruce Whatley | Scholastic | Picture Book |
| 20 | How Now Brown Frau | Merridy Eastman | Allen & Unwin | NonFiction – Memoir |
| 21 | Revenge | Gabrielle Lord | Scholastic | Children’s |
| 22 | Selected Poems | TS Eliot | Faber and Faber | Poetry |
| 23 | Lola’s Secret | Monica McInerney | Penguin | Contemporary Adult |
| 24 | The Little Refugee | Ahn Do | Allen & Unwin | Picture Book |
| 25 | Cooking the Books | Kerry Greenwood | Allen & Unwin | Adult |
| 26 | Flood | Jackie French | Scholastic | Picture Book |
| 27 | City of Lies | Lian Tanner | Allen & Unwin | Children’s |
| 28 | Bilby Secrets | Edel Wignell | Walker | Picture Book |
| 29 | The Biggest Estate on Earth | Bill Gammage | Allen & Unwin | NonFiction – Memoir |
| 30 | Selby Sprung | Duncan Ball | Angus&Robertson | Children’s |
| 31 | For All Creatures | Glenda Millard | Walker | Picture Book |
| 32 | Autumn Laing | Alex Miller | Allen & Unwin | Adult – Literary Fiction |
| 33 | The Attractor Factor | Joe Vitale | Wiley | Self Help |
You can see I’ve read a real range of books – across age groups, formats and subject matter. So far 7 picture books (yes, I know these are short and help my total, which is why I’m only counting them if it’s the first time I;ve read them AND I review them), 10 children’s books, 7 young adult, 4 adult fiction, 4 adult nonfiction. Lengthwise they’ve ranged from the picture books to one of over 600 pages. Some have taken more than one day to read, and one of the challenges I’ve had is to not worry about the tally so much but to really enjoy each book. It’s not a race – it’s an adventure.
I must say that the big revelation for me has been that setting myself this challenge has helped me rediscover some of the fun of reading. Yes, I;ve always loved reading, but as a reviewer with an always-large review pile, sometimes it feels like a chore – especially when I feel guilt about the size of that pile. Suddenly, in January, my pile is going down and I’ve also allowed myself time to read things not in that pile.
Onto February. I’m halfway through two different books at the moment – because I’ve decided to read a chapter of a writing book every day. And, looking at my pile, I have some great reads ahead of me in the next 29 days. I’ll update you again soon.
In the meantime, I would love to hear about any challenges you are participating in this year.
Sally