A Year in Books: 2022 Reading Challenge

 

Hello, Readers! I hope everyone is doing well. I'm sorry for the lack of reviews; it's been a crazy last few months. My last update was in September when my husband and I were fostering the cute St Bernard named Rylie. She has since been placed in a home with a sweet semi-retired couple who absolutely adore her and have a big fenced-in yard. Around the same time, I was stressed out at work and wasn't in a reading mood.

Additionally, my class was ridiculously hard, and my husband's grandmother passed away. There were some trips to Indiana as a result, and then we had my dad out for Thanksgiving as a belated birthday gift. I was also in the process of interviewing for a new job with another team in my company. I actually got the position and started this week. Some things were good, and some could have been better. It feels like it's been one thing after another throughout 2022. I am hoping that 2023 will be a little less crazy. I will settle for no more broken bones and not losing any loved ones. 

Alright, enough life updates. I highly doubt real-life shenanigans are why anyone comes to this blog. I had initially set a reading goal of 48 books for the year and dropped it down to 36.  I'm currently at 28 books and in the middle of one. It could end up being 29 books read, but I'm not going to push for it. For 2023, I will probably only set a goal of 25-30 books. I don't feel like stressing out over something completely arbitrary and going into the second term of my Doctorate, I don't have much time to read. 

One upside to the books I read this year is that I don't feel like I read anything I really disliked. I really enjoyed most of the books I did get to read. My most disliked book of the year was probably The Lobotomist's Wife by Samantha Green Woodruff. I'm hard-pressed to pick a favorite for the year. I tried to list the top five and kept changing my mind. So the year was not great on quantity but fantastic on quality. The latter is more important anyway. 

I typically try to link back to all the blog posts I did for the year, but  I barely did any because of the previously mentioned chaos this year. If you want to read the few I did, they should all be listed in the A-Z list at the top of the page. If you want to find the original post of the 2022 reading challenge, you can do so here.  If you have yet to see it, you can find the list for 2023 here. 

So without further ado, here's where I ended up with the 2022 Reading Challenge. 

Number               Challenge            Book     Author

Level 1: Book of the Month Club

1             Read a book under $5    The Druid            Jeff Wheeler

2             Read a book that is under 350 pages       The Humans       Matt Haig

3             Read a book that was recommended to you                       

4             Read a newly published book (within a year)        The Egyptian Mystery     Emily Organ

5             Read a book that has a type of plant or flower in the title                             

6             Read a book because of the cover            Daughter of Sparta          Claire M. Andrews

7             Read a book about a mythical creature. All the Murmuring Bones             A.G. Slatter

8             Read a book that takes place in the future                          

9             Read a book by an author that's new to you         Instinct  Rebecca Heiss

10           Read a book from NPR's top 50 Sci-Fi and Fantasy Books of the past decade:  https://www.npr.org/2021/08/18/1027159166/best-books-science-fiction-fantasy-past-decade  The Brass City    S.A. Chakraborty

11           A book by an author whose first or last name has 5 letters             The Colour of Magic               Terry Pratchett

12           Free Space! (Pick any book)         Days of Splendor, Days of Sorrow             Juliet Grey

Level 2: Casual Reader Club

13           Read a book published 5 years ago                        

14           Read a Speculative Fiction            Hominids             Robert J Sawyer

15           Read the first book in a duology               

16           Read the second book in a duology                        

17           A book that was published when you were 5 years old                  

18           Read a book by an author named Alex, Alexander, Alexandra (or variant) Lore               Alexandra Bracken

19           Read a book about Zombies                       

20           Read a book with a black cover   The Octunnumi  Trevor Alan Foris

21           Read a book from AbeBooks.com's list of 100 (fiction) books to read in a lifetime:  https://www.abebooks.com/books/100-book-to-read-in-lifetime/                            

22           Read a book with the word City in the title                         

23           Read a book about a musician (non-fiction or fiction)                     

24           Free Space! (Pick any book)         Blood of Troy     Claire M. Andrews

Level 3: Dedicated Reader Club

25           A book with a title that has 5 letters                      

26           Read a book published by Macmillan (or subsidiary)                        

27           Read a book with a title that doesn't start with an article (A, An, The)       Helen of Troy       Margaret George

28           Read a book you recently acquired           The Lobotomist's Wife   Samantha Greene Woodruff

29           Read a book that's been on your TBR for over a year        Becoming Marie Antoinette               Juliet Grey

30           Read a Revenge Story                   

31           Read a book by Philippa Gregory                             

32           Read a book that takes place on an island                           

33           Read a book that does not have a person (or people) on the cover             Hunted               Darcy Coates

34           A book that you intended to read on last year's challenge                            

35           Read a Pyschological Thriller        The Fourth Monkey         J.D. Barker

36           Free Space! (Pick any book)         When He Was Wicked    Julia Quinn

Level 4: Speed Reader Club

37           Read a book over 500 pages        The Broken Eye Brent Weeks

38           Read a book that starts with the letter Z (or has Z in the title)                     

39           Read a book that takes place around your favorite holiday                           

40           A book with 5 objects on the cover          Around the World in Eighty Days               Jules Verne

41           Read a book with the word Wisdom in the title                 

42           Read a Dystopian                           

43           Read a book by an author with the same name as one of your parents (Biological, Step, Adopted)                 

44           Read a book that a movie/show you've watched is based on but have yet to read (example: Watched The Hobbit, but never read the Hobbit)          Witches of East End               Melissa de la Cruz

45           Read a book about a Saint (non-Fiction or Fiction)                           

46           Read any book from the Men's Health most popular book list https://www.menshealth.com/entertainment/g37473997/most-popular-book-by-year/?utm_source=facebook_arb&utm_medium=cpm&utm_campaign=arb_fb_mnh_m_i_g37473997&fbclid=IwAR22Eb95uWUC2FVY_Bdn0CtG3KV8-6-IxwnfABCIZ25fMHLM0Tw4Mee2M2U                 

47           Read a book published in a year that was important to you           To Sir Phillip, With Love      Julia Quinn

48           Free Space! (Pick any book)         Hogfather           Terry Pratchett

Level 5: Overachiever Club

49           Read the 5th book in a series or an author's 5th novel                   

50           Read a True Crime book               

51           Read a book by Georges Simenon (or one of his Pen Names)                      

52           A book with the number 5 in the title                    

53           Read a book that takes place in Russia                  

54           Read a book by an author using initials as part of their name        Sutton   J.R. Moehringer

55           Read a book that has a title in the form of a question                     

56           Read a banned book from this banned book list https://www.ala.org/advocacy/bbooks/frequentlychallengedbooks/decade2019               

57           A book with at least 5 prominent characters         The Fires of Heaven       Robert Jordan

58           Read a book that Linz read previously http://linzthebookworm.blogspot.com/p/reviews-z.html                The Chalk Man   C.J. Tudor

59           Read a book that Tress read previously  https://songstress7.wordpress.com/category/reading/                  

60           Free Space! (Pick any book)         The Iron Queen  Julie Kagawa

2022 Challenge Update June-September

  Hello, Readers! Linz the Neglectful Blogger, here. I hope everyone is doing well. 

There have been a lot of changes going on lately in my life. I haven't really been reading all of that much as a result. I think I announced in a more recent post that I'm going back to school for my Doctorate. So between work and school, it's been a little crazy. In addition, there has been a new addition to our family. 

As of last night, we started the Foster to Adopt process for this beauty. Her name is Riley. She's a St Bernard/Great Pyrenees mix. She's about five years old. We'll see if she lets me read. Thus far, it has been determined that I should be giving her all of the attention instead of ordering groceries online.

As a result of all the craziness that's been going on, I think I will switch how I do my blog posts for a little while. Instead of doing a post for each book, I'm going to try and just do a monthly update or a review when I can. I don't really want to stress myself out even further. I'll still try and give some general thoughts on them. I may try to do more discussion posts to compensate. We'll see. I'm not making any promises. Literally, all I want to do right now is take a nap.

Challenge

Level 1: Book of the Month Club

1 Read a book under $5: The Druid by Jeff Wheeler

2 Read a book that is under 350 pages: The Humans by Matt Haig 

3 Read a book that was recommended to you

4 Read a newly published book (within a year): The Egyptian Mystery by Emily Organ

5 Read a book that has a type of plant or flower in the title

6 Read a book because of the cover - Daughter of Sparta by Claire M. Andrews ( No blog post, but rated 5 stars on Goodreads)

7. Read a book about a mythical creature.: All the Murmuring Bones by A.G. Slatter

8 Read a book that takes place in the future

9 Read a book by an author that's new to you  Instinct by Rebecca Heiss

10 Read a book from NPR's top 50 Sci-Fi and Fantasy Books of the past decade: https://www.npr.org/2021/08/18/1027159166/best-books-science-fiction-fantasy-past-decade: The Brass City by S.A. Chakraborty

11 A book by an author whose first or last name has 5 letters: The Colour of Magic by Terry Pratchett

12 Free Space! (Pick any book) Days of Splendor, Days of Sorrow by Juliet Grey

Level 2: Casual Reader Club

13 Read a book published 5 years ago

14 Read a Speculative Fiction Hominids by Robert J. Sawyer

15 Read the first book in a duology

16 Read the second book in a duology

17 A book that was published when you were 5 years old

18 Read a book by an author named Alex, Alexander, Alexandra (or variant): Lore by Alexandra Bracken

19 Read a book about Zombies

20 Read a book with a black cover: The Octonumi Fosbit Files Prologue by Trevor Alan Foris

21 Read a book from AbeBooks.com's list of 100 (fiction) books to read in a lifetime: https://www.abebooks.com/books/100-book-to-read-in-lifetime/

22 Read a book with the word City in the title

23 Read a book about a musician (non-fiction or fiction)

24 Free Space! (Pick any book)

Level 3: Dedicated Reader Club

25 A book with a title that has 5 letters

26 Read a book published by Macmillan (or subsidiary)

27 Read a book with a title that doesn't start with an article (A, An, The): Helen of Troy by Margaret George

28 Read a book you recently acquired: The Lobotomist's Wife by Samantha Greene Woodruff

29 Read a book that's been on your TBR for over a year, Becoming Marie Antoinette by Juliet Grey

30 Read a Revenge Story

31 Read a book by Philippa Gregory

32 Read a book that takes place on an island

33 Read a book that does not have a person (or people) on the cover. Hunted by Darcy Coates

34 A book that you intended to read on last year's challenge

35 Read a Psychological Thriller: The Fourth Monkey by J.D. Barker

36 Free Space! (Pick any book)

Level 4: Speed Reader Club

37 Read a book over 500 pages: The Broken Eye by Brent Weeks

38 Read a book that starts with the letter Z (or has Z in the title)

39 Read a book that takes place around your favorite holiday

40 A book with 5 objects on the cover

41 Read a book with the word Wisdom in the title

42 Read a Dystopian

43 Read a book by an author with the same name as one of your parents (Biological, Step, Adopted)

44 Read a book that a movie/show you've watched is based on but have yet to read (example: Watched The Hobbit, but never read the Hobbit) Witches of East End by Melissa de la Cruz

45 Read a book about a Saint (non-Fiction or Fiction)

46 Read any book from the Men's Health most popular book list https://www.menshealth.com/entertainment/g37473997/most-popular-book-by-year/?utm_source=facebook_arb&utm_medium=cpm&utm_campaign=arb_fb_mnh_m_i_g37473997&fbclid=IwAR22Eb95uWUC2FVY_Bdn0CtG3KV8-6-IxwnfABCIZ25fMHLM0Tw4Mee2M2U

47 Read a book published in a year that was important to you: To Sir Phillip, With Love by Julia Quinn

48 Free Space! (Pick any book)

Level 5: Overachiever Club

49 Read the 5th book in a series or an author's 5th novel

50 Read a True Crime book

51 Read a book by Georges Simenon (or one of his Pen Names)

52 A book with the number 5 in the title

53 Read a book that takes place in Russia

54 Read a book by an author using initials as part of their name Sutton by J.R. Moehringer

55 Read a book that has a title in the form of a question

56 Read a banned book from this banned book list https://www.ala.org/advocacy/bbooks/frequentlychallengedbooks/decade2019

57 A book with at least 5 prominent characters, The Fires of Heaven by Robert Jordan

58 Read a book that Linz read previously http://linzthebookworm.blogspot.com/p/reviews-z.html

59 Read a book that Tress read previously https://songstress7.wordpress.com/category/reading/

60 Free Space! (Pick any book)

2022 Reading Challenge Update January- May

 

Hello, Readers! I hope everyone is doing well. The end of the month seemed like a good time to do the first reading challenge update of 2022. I'm disappointed with my reading totals thus far in the year. I would have thought that with finishing my Master's in January that I'd be excited to read more for fun, but it's been one thing after another since Christmas. Because of that, I just haven't been in a reading mood. I'm hoping to get back into reading here soon. On the bright side, my husband and I are mostly recovered from Covid. I have some lingering issues, but definitely on the mend finally. 

There are a lot of books I've read this year that don't have blog posts associated with them. I've also given up on updating Storygraph. I'll try to do an update on there eventually. There's a lot of updating I do for my blog posts (write the post, figure out where to put it on the challenge, write a Goodreads review, and share posts on Pinterest, Twitter, and Facebook), so I'm kind of regretting adding one more thing to that list. Sorry I've been a lazy and neglectful blogger. 

According to Goodreads, I'm at 13 books for the year. I'm definitely behind, and I may update my total. I genuinely don't think I will get to the 48 books that I set. Currently, I'm working on two books. I've been trying to have one physical book and one kindle book going simultaneously. The physical book is Under The Dome by Stephen King. Thee kindle book is Sutton by J.R. Moehringer.

 Challenge

Level 1: Book of the Month Club

1 Read a book under $5: The Druid by Jeff Wheeler

2 Read a book that is under 350 pages: The Humans by Matt Haig 

3 Read a book that was recommended to you

4 Read a newly published book (within a year): The Egyptian Mystery by Emily Organ

5 Read a book that has a type of plant or flower in the title

6 Read a book because of the cover

7. Read a book about a mythical creature.: All the Murmuring Bones by A.G. Slatter

8 Read a book that takes place in the future

9 Read a book by an author that's new to you

10 Read a book from NPR's top 50 Sci-Fi and Fantasy Books of the past decade: https://www.npr.org/2021/08/18/1027159166/best-books-science-fiction-fantasy-past-decade: The Brass City by S.A. Chakraborty

11 A book by an author whose first or last name has 5 letters: The Colour of Magic by Terry Pratchett

12 Free Space! (Pick any book)

Level 2: Casual Reader Club

13 Read a book published 5 years ago

14 Read a Speculative Fiction

15 Read the first book in a duology

16 Read the second book in a duology

17 A book that was published when you were 5 years old

18 Read a book by an author named Alex, Alexander, Alexandra (or variant): Lore by Alexandra Bracken

19 Read a book about Zombies

20 Read a book with a black cover: The Octonumi Fosbit Files Prologue by Trevor Alan Foris

21 Read a book from AbeBooks.com's list of 100 (fiction) books to read in a lifetime: https://www.abebooks.com/books/100-book-to-read-in-lifetime/

22 Read a book with the word City in the title

23 Read a book about a musician (non-fiction or fiction)

24 Free Space! (Pick any book)

Level 3: Dedicated Reader Club

25 A book with a title that has 5 letters

26 Read a book published by Macmillan (or subsidiary)

27 Read a book with a title that doesn't start with an article (A, An, The): Helen of Troy by Margaret George

28 Read a book you recently acquired: The Lobotomist's Wife by Samantha Greene Woodruff

29 Read a book that's been on your TBR for over a year

30 Read a Revenge Story

31 Read a book by Philippa Gregory

32 Read a book that takes place on an island

33 Read a book that does not have a person (or people) on the cover

34 A book that you intended to read on last year's challenge

35 Read a Psychological Thriller: The Fourth Monkey by J.D. Barker

36 Free Space! (Pick any book)

Level 4: Speed Reader Club

37 Read a book over 500 pages: The Broken Eye by Brent Weeks

38 Read a book that starts with the letter Z (or has Z in the title)

39 Read a book that takes place around your favorite holiday

40 A book with 5 objects on the cover

41 Read a book with the word Wisdom in the title

42 Read a Dystopian

43 Read a book by an author with the same name as one of your parents (Biological, Step, Adopted)

44 Read a book that a movie/show you've watched is based on but have yet to read (example: Watched The Hobbit, but never read the Hobbit)

45 Read a book about a Saint (non-Fiction or Fiction)

46 Read any book from the Men's Health most popular book list https://www.menshealth.com/entertainment/g37473997/most-popular-book-by-year/?utm_source=facebook_arb&utm_medium=cpm&utm_campaign=arb_fb_mnh_m_i_g37473997&fbclid=IwAR22Eb95uWUC2FVY_Bdn0CtG3KV8-6-IxwnfABCIZ25fMHLM0Tw4Mee2M2U

47 Read a book published in a year that was important to you: To Sir Phillip, With Love by Julia Quinn

48 Free Space! (Pick any book)

Level 5: Overachiever Club

49 Read the 5th book in a series or an author's 5th novel

50 Read a True Crime book

51 Read a book by Georges Simenon (or one of his Pen Names)

52 A book with the number 5 in the title

53 Read a book that takes place in Russia

54 Read a book by an author using initials as part of their name

55 Read a book that has a title in the form of a question

56 Read a banned book from this banned book list https://www.ala.org/advocacy/bbooks/frequentlychallengedbooks/decade2019

57 A book with at least 5 prominent characters

58 Read a book that Linz read previously http://linzthebookworm.blogspot.com/p/reviews-z.html

59 Read a book that Tress read previously https://songstress7.wordpress.com/category/reading/

60 Free Space! (Pick any book)

2022 Reading Challenge

 

It's here, readers! The 2022 Reading Challenge is here! Tress and I both had an evening to sit down together and get the challenge finalized. We typically try and get this out around Thanksgiving, but my life is chaos right now. Sorry for the delay. If you are curious about how these challenges come to be, check out my post on creating this annual challenge here.

This is a very special challenge for Tress and me. This is our fifth year creating a challenge for our respective reading blogs! As a result, we tried to include a lot of special nods to our anniversary. Most of these involve incorporating the number 5. Two prompts use our blogs as a challenge. We also recycled some categories from earlier challenges as a throwback. You can find all of the challenges here: 2017, 2018, 2020, 2021. You can find Tress's blog here. Depending on how much time I can dedicate to it, I'll do a final update for the 2021 challenge either at the end of the month or in January.

As always, Tress created a fancy PDF which can be found here.

I just wanted to say thank you to all of my readers. It has been a good kind of overwhelming to see how many people have joined us in these challenges. I love seeing everyone's blogs and progress when they update me in various social media forms. Connecting with you all on this has been very humbling and amazing. If you want to follow me on Social Media, I created a new section on the side of the blog. It links Goodreads, Facebook, Twitter, and The Storygraph, which I just signed up for this week. As always, I love to hear from you in the comments. Let me know your thoughts or how you plan on tackling the challenge. If you post about the challenge on your own blog, feel free to link them in the comments. I try to answer everyone as I can. We designed this so that it is somewhat customizable. You can read it in order or pick and choose what you want to complete. Tress usually is very organized about it and plans it out. I go at it like I do everything - chaos. Complete as much as you want. Any format of reading is acceptable - physical, kindle, audio, etc.

 Challenge

Level 1: Book of the Month Club

1 Read a book under $5

2 Read a book that is under 350 pages

3 Read a book that was recommended to you

4 Read a newly published book (within a year)

5 Read a book that has a type of plant or flower in the title

6 Read a book because of the cover

7 Read a book about a mythical creature.

8 Read a book that takes place in the future

9 Read a book by an author that's new to you

10 Read a book from NPR's top 50 Sci-Fi and Fantasy Books of the past decade: https://www.npr.org/2021/08/18/1027159166/best-books-science-fiction-fantasy-past-decade

11 A book by an author whose first or last name has 5 letters

12 Free Space! (Pick any book)

Level 2: Casual Reader Club

13 Read a book published 5 years ago

14 Read a Speculative Fiction

15 Read the first book in a duology

16 Read the second book in a duology

17 A book that was published when you were 5 years old

18 Read a book by an author named Alex, Alexander, Alexandra (or variant)

19 Read a book about Zombies

20 Read a book with a black cover

21 Read a book from AbeBooks.com's list of 100 (fiction) books to read in a lifetime: https://www.abebooks.com/books/100-book-to-read-in-lifetime/

22 Read a book with the word City in the title

23 Read a book about a musician (non-fiction or fiction)

24 Free Space! (Pick any book)

Level 3: Dedicated Reader Club

25 A book with a title that has 5 letters

26 Read a book published by Macmillan (or subsidiary)

27 Read a book with a title that doesn't start with an article (A, An, The)

28 Read a book you recently acquired

29 Read a book that's been on your TBR for over a year

30 Read a Revenge Story

31 Read a book by Philippa Gregory

32 Read a book that takes place on an island

33 Read a book that does not have a person (or people) on the cover

34 A book that you intended to read on last year's challenge

35 Read a Psychological Thriller

36 Free Space! (Pick any book)

Level 4: Speed Reader Club

37 Read a book over 500 pages

38 Read a book that starts with the letter Z (or has Z in the title)

39 Read a book that takes place around your favorite holiday

40 A book with 5 objects on the cover

41 Read a book with the word Wisdom in the title

42 Read a Dystopian

43 Read a book by an author with the same name as one of your parents (Biological, Step, Adopted)

44 Read a book that a movie/show you've watched is based on but have yet to read (example: Watched The Hobbit, but never read the Hobbit)

45 Read a book about a Saint (non-Fiction or Fiction)

46 Read any book from the Men's Health most popular book list https://www.menshealth.com/entertainment/g37473997/most-popular-book-by-year/?utm_source=facebook_arb&utm_medium=cpm&utm_campaign=arb_fb_mnh_m_i_g37473997&fbclid=IwAR22Eb95uWUC2FVY_Bdn0CtG3KV8-6-IxwnfABCIZ25fMHLM0Tw4Mee2M2U

47 Read a book published in a year that was important to you

48 Free Space! (Pick any book)

Level 5: Overachiever Club

49 Read the 5th book in a series or an author's 5th novel

50 Read a True Crime book

51 Read a book by Georges Simenon (or one of his Pen Names)

52 A book with the number 5 in the title

53 Read a book that takes place in Russia

54 Read a book by an author using initials as part of their name

55 Read a book that has a title in the form of a question

56 Read a banned book from this banned book list https://www.ala.org/advocacy/bbooks/frequentlychallengedbooks/decade2019

57 A book with at least 5 prominent characters

58 Read a book that Linz read previously http://linzthebookworm.blogspot.com/p/reviews-z.html

59 Read a book that Tress read previously https://songstress7.wordpress.com/category/reading/

60 Free Space! (Pick any book)