On a New Years Eve like no other ever experienced due to lockdowns, I was still able to gather with 5 friends to watch the fireworks from home on TV and parks nearby as the clock struck midnight. Upon the first couple of minutes of 2021 and the cheers and celebrations heard from neighboring houses we went around and discussed our New Year’s Resolutions. Of course there was the “I want to lose weight” and the “I’m going to save so and so amount of money” and the “I’m going to stop smoking”, it finally came around to me where I said that “I am going to read 75 books this year.”
All my friends looked at me and said “What?” Mind you, I think they were worried as I was working 2 jobs, while still trying to maintain a social life through all the lockdowns plus running on limited sleep and to fit in reading 75 books into the year as well. After the previous year of 2020, where the all the lockdowns, financial strain and isolation that people felt including myself, I lost motivation to read. I read 20 books throughout 2020 and for 2021, I realised that I need to get back into it as it was a comfort to escape for a couple of hours and forget about what is happening around us. So I set my Goodreads goal for 75 books with a commitment to read them all.
January is usually the slowest month of the year, getting back into the swing of things after the Christmas and New Years break. For me that was the case, where I was trying to manage 2 jobs while also finding the time to read. Eventually I found my rhythm and tried to get ahead in my goal however as everyone knows, things happen that you can’t control or there’s not much motivation.
I read my first book on my Kindle titled Geekerella by Ashley Poston (Full review posting soon). I figured some contemporary young adult would help me get eased back into reading and it did. While I was still on break from my full time job while working the same about of hours at my casual job, I still found it difficult to get back into the rhythm of reading. However I figured that 4 days while working was an alright time length to finish this after not reading much the last year, I still thought that I could have finished it sooner if I didn’t spend time trying to finish a series I was watching on Netflix. I gave this one 4 stars as I really enjoyed the characters and the atmosphere.
The second book that I read was Life on Mars by Tracy K. Smith (Full review posting soon). As I don’t read much poetry, which I am hoping to change this year, I didn’t really enjoy it as much. Although it was a quick read, I found it difficult to get into and couldn’t relate much to what was written. I gave this one a 2 stars. It only took me a couple of hours to finish it but it felt like a long time. I was also slightly behind on reading as I had gone back to my full time job along with working 30+ hours at my casual job.
The third book was a reread of one that I have enjoyed and already reviewed called Seven Brief Lessons on Physics by Carlo Rovelli. I really enjoy the way that Rovelli writes and explains each theory to an ordinary person with limited knowledge on physics. It really shows how each theory challenges and correlates to other theories in physics. I also wanted to try and expand my reading to not only read things I normally avoid, but I also wanted to read some non-fiction books as well. This one also received 4 stars.
The fourth book and fifth book for this year was All My Friends Are Dead and All My Friends Are Still Dead by Avery Monsen (Full review posting soon). Again, I had fallen behind on my goal and wanted to get back on top of it quickly so I read both of these books one morning before work. These books had me laughing at some of the pages and I got some friends and work colleagues to read them as they were so quick and they enjoyed them too. Both of these got 4 stars as well.