1So a new year means resolutions. Normally anyway. I haven’t made any this year. I mean I have goals, but I never really counted them as resolutions. Mainly because I haven’t started most of them yet. One is editing, which I am currently doing, one (the inevitable health kick one) starts next week and others are sort of backbenchers.

But then an email came around work. For those of you that don’t know I work in a library, so books are a fairly big part of our job. And this email was saying that in the spirit of the new year we were going to do a piece on resolutions, but specifically reading resolutions. And since then we’ve had emails with some nifty links to campaigns and other bits and pieces.

Did you know that reading for six minutes a day lowers your stress levels significantly? http://t.co/0M9yOgcxcO #JustSixMins. 26th January is meant to be the day of the year that people are at their bluest, so spread the word that reading helps with stress. Take a shelfie and post it up, telling the world what you plan to read.

If you think that all libraries are boring, stuffy places to be check out these: http://www.theguardian.com/teacher-network/gallery/2015/jan/08/school-libraries-world-books-gallery The kids get all the best stuff.

We’ve already put in our applications to be book givers on World Book Night in April. Encourage people you know who don’t read by signing up to give out books. You can either choose one from the selection, or give out your own. And check out their reading resolutions: https://ccnlibraryblog.wordpress.com/2013/02/26/reading-resolutions/ Give you any ideas?

So with all this stuff being thrown at me, and now you, I thought, well why not. Let’s make some reading resolutions. And to make sure I try to stick to them, I’m going to share them with you as well.

  1. I’m going to read one book a week. Or 52 books in the year. However it manages to work out.
  2. I will read a mixture of fiction and non-fiction. Fiction is great, but so is learning new things.
  3. I will read outside of my comfort range. Normally this extends to fantasy and science. So I’m going book-genreto try and read at least one book in each of the following genre’s:
    • Romance
    • Mystery
    • Science Fiction (you would think I would read this one more, but no)
    • Literary
    • Comedy
    • And a Biography

Having discovered more and more recently that GoodReads is an amazing site, I have an account over there and shall be keeping track of the books that I read over the coming year. https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/30833009-princess-of-dragons if you’re interested in following me. They also have a goal tracker for 2015, so I set that to 52, and I am two books into the challenge already. So far this year I have read The Ice Dragon and How to Self Edit for Fiction Writers. Well the last one is technically a re-read, but I read it during 2015, so it counts. I shall keep the re-reads I track to a minimum. This year is all about new reads!

What about you, my lovely reader? Do you have any resolutions for 2015? Are they reading resolutions?