Read harder or not at all

I’m going to try a reading challenge this year. Not to prove how many books I can ram into a year – I’ve never been the type to sit around and boast how big, how far, how many – but to push the boundaries of exactly what I’m comfortable reading. And what I’m not.

It’s too easy to stay in your happy little comfort zone. Sometimes, when life is busy or tough, knowing your comfort zone and residing there is good and, even more, necessary. Sometimes you need to push the reading envelope a little.

This time of year there are plenty of reading challenges around. There’s one from Pop Sugar that’s quite nice, but I balked when I read their challenge of ‘A book with a blue cover’. Don’t judge a book by the proverbial, right?

Goodreads has you covered if you just want the numbers, but I do not. It’s nice though as they let you set your own goal.

I loved the look of the #BustleReads 20 book challenge. But I loved it a little too much. If I’m feeling comfy, it’s hardly a challenge at all. Yes? Yes. Still, I wholeheartedly reserve the right to go back there and plunder it if I get bored with my final challenge choice.

The challenge that I’ve gone with had a few goals that properly made me screw up my nose in discomfort. It’s still got some easy hits for me as well though. 500+ pages? Sure. Done. Horror? Um, how many can I have? Just one? Oh. But there is more challenge than ease, and so the winner is…

My preferred challenge

http://bookriot.com/2015/12/15/2016-book-riot-read-harder-challenge/

The challenge by Book Riot is a great list (that unfortunately is done as an image. Hello, modern web much?) You can get a text version of the list over at Goodreads.

For my own amusement, I’ve broken it into some useful groups. The point for me is to extend myself. I’m not bothered if I don’t tick all the boxes, but I do want to try and tick all the ones that make me break into a sweat.

Well, it doesn’t say it has to be an adult, right?

• Read a book out loud to someone else

Uh, really? Do I really have to do that?

• Read a food memoir
• Read a biography (not memoir or autobiography)
  {I’m surprised by how much I don’t want to do this}

Oh, I didn’t realise how infrequently I do this

• Listen to an audiobook that has won an Audie Award
• Read a book about religion (fiction or nonfiction)
• Read a book about politics, in your country or another (fiction or nonfiction)
• Read a play
• Read the first book in a series by a person of color
• Read a book that is set in the Middle East

I’ve done this lots before, but I’m due again

• Read a collection of essays
• Read a book with a main character that has a mental illness
• Read a middle grade novel
  {for Australians, this is a book aimed at kids aged around 8-12}
• Read a book that was adapted into a movie, then watch the movie – debate which is better
• Read a book by or about a person that identifies as transgender
• Read a book that is by an author from Southeast Asia
• Read a non-superhero comic that debuted in the last three years
• Read a book originally published in the decade you were born
• Read a book under 100 pages

Too easy, I do this all the time

• Read a horror book
• Read a nonfiction book about science
• Read a book of historical fiction set before 1900
• Read a nonfiction book about feminism or dealing with feminist themes
• Read a book over 500 pages long
  {done, I read Elizabeth Gilbert’s The Signature of All Things}

Is it even possible not to do this?

• Read a dystopian or post-apocalyptic novel

That’s all from me

It’s time to start reading.