Fall Into Reading Challenge Conclusion

It's time again (well, next week anyway!) for another Fall Into Reading adventure hosting by Katrina at Callapidder Days

This coming week is the conclusion of the Fall Into Reading Challenge which is hosted by Katrina at Callapidder Days. It is therefore time to see how far we got in our own personal fall reading challenges.

If you were around when I started, you'll remember that I said I wanted to really plow through my review copies so that I could start off 2011 free and clear. Especially given the fact that we have a new baby on the way, and considering that there are a great number of titles on my home book shelf that are sitting unread, I wanted to free up my time to read whatever I wanted whenever I wanted. It's not working for me to have so many deadlines looming over my head.

To that end, I attacked my review shelf and took care of a great number of titles, all of which I'm listing below (all are linked to my reviews):

• The Faithful Parent
• When Molly Was a Harvey Girl
• The 12 Days of Christmas Cookbook
• The Agency: The Body at the Tower
• Sir Quinlan
• Arthur of Albion
• Resources for Biblical Living
• Louisa May Alcott: The Woman Behind Little Women
• Loving God With All Your Mind (DVD series)
• God's Mighty Acts devotionals
• Everything Christmas
• Cookie Swap
• Pioneer Girl
• Loving the Church
• In the Company of Others
• Aesop's Mirror

I opted not to read the following titles, which I had mentioned to you at the beginning of the challenge:

• Fame: What the Classics Tell Us About Our Cult of Celebrity (I started it but just couldn't understand where the author was ultimately going with it.)
• Jane Austen and Marriage (Which honestly still has some appeal, but I couldn't bring myself to it.)

Despite my reading "work" - I still have a few titles left dangling as I go into the next year. But I have declined what feels like a billion offers for more as I really would like more freedom in my reading life. I do LOVE reading books and reviewing new titles. I'm certainly not saying I'm going to stop cold turkey from doing that. I'll still take review titles but I am being much more selective than I have ever been before. I think there are some really awesome titles and subjects out there that I am curious to read. But there are also a lot of older titles that I'd like to be able to give more attention to.

Like, for example, I intend to kick off 2011 with my FAVORITE older titles, all written by Lucy Maud Montgomery for the 2011 Lucy Maud Montgomery Challenge. I'll be hosting that challenge in January and I'm glad to have a fairly clean slate so that I can spend some quality time with one of my favorite authors without a lot of "reviewers guilt" hanging over my head.




I feel pretty good about what I was able to get to this fall and I'm happy with my reading "load" a I go into 2011. Participating in the Fall Into Reading Challenge really motivated me to set myself up well for the start of a new reading year and for that I am most grateful to Katrina! Thank you for the motivation!