Sunday, December 29, 2013

Goodreads Says I Suck

Goodreads called the other day... Okay, so "they" didn't call; they just sent me an email. Yeah, sure, goodreads sends emails everyday, but this one was different. This one was an update about how many books I'd read in 2013.

Goodreads told me I suck.

I barely read more than a book a month in 2013 and some of those were short! It's not up to my standards at all. At all. And I actually feel quite bad about it.

But figuring out where to squeeze in reading time, lately, has been difficult, to say the least. Especially since school started in the fall. I mean, I started The Casual Vacancy back in, like, March (according to goodreads, which just taunts me with this information), and I haven't finished it yet! It hasn't taken me so long to read a book since I read Dracula back during college (but that was because it was during spring semester, and I had a lot of other reading to do). And it's not like I'm not enjoying it; I am. It's very intricate and interesting, BUT! It's my bedtime book (because I have it as a dictionary-sized hardback, and I don't like to lug those around with me), and, basically, by the time I go to bed these days, the thought of reading isn't even in my head. In fact, there are rarely any coherent thoughts left in my head. [Okay, there's one string of coherent thoughts in my head at bedtime, but they are not polite, and they are all aimed at the cat and what I'm going to do to him if he wakes me up. Which he always does. Every night. More than once. (Does anyone want a pair of cat slippers?)]

As a total aside, I think a pair of cat slippers with the head of the cat at the front of the slipper would be exceedingly cute. Of course, you'd need two cats for that. The other option is that one foot would have the head of the cat and the other would have the... well... the place I want to kick the cat every night when he wakes me up.

No, I'm not bitter at all.

Anyway...

I'm not one to make New Year's resolutions. At all. I hate that whole thing (and I'm pretty sure I posted about that before, so I'm not going into it again). However, I do have the intention of figuring out how to work in more consistent reading time into my schedule, because what I've been doing just isn't cutting it. Specifically, I want to read at least one indie book a month. Even at one a month I won't be reading them as fast as I add them, but I need to start making progress into the... oh, my... triple digit library on my Kindle app. I don't think I'd realized I had that many until I checked. And that's just the indie books, because I do still read traditionally published books, too.

And that's about as close to a resolution as I'm going to get. We'll see how it goes.

22 comments:

  1. Surprised I haven't got that email from Goodreads. Although I tend to forget to note some of the books I am reading or have read on the site. I've probably read over twenty this year.
    Hey, we're human! We have a life. It's all right.

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  2. I was disappointed in my book total too. For me I'm just going to have to learn to live with it. The days of me reading 5 or 6 books a week are long gone.

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  3. I read an okay amount last year, but I want to up that number for sure next year. One of the problems I'm going to have next year is the fact that I'm reading Omnibuses, and thus don't get credit for 3 books even though I am ready, technically, three novels. Oh well... I get a fair balance in the end, because of all the short stories/novellas I read too. *shrug*

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  4. I stopped recording my books ages ago so when I got that email it was not accurate. I haven't got time to record my books, I am too busy reading them. I don't know how many books I have on my Kindle Andrew, but I have 51 pages of titles so I figure that's quite a lot.

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  5. I haven't gotten that e-mail either. Maybe Goodreads is just too embarrassed for me. Either way, being the stubborn jerk I am, I don't need Goodreads to remind me I'm not reading and I'd delete that message on the spot.

    "If a person reads a book in the forest, and there's no computer in which to upload his rating to Goodreads, is the book still read?"

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  6. So I'm sensing some anger toward the cat...

    I set a very low reading goal for myself this year, but still exceeded it, and did so earl enough that Goodreads spent months trying to get me to up my goal to something more challenging.

    Happy reading!

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  7. Yup. I got the same email. Just depressing. Oh well, I knew going in this was going to be a very thin year for reading.

    Hoping to get that total up in 2014 and not get the email of shame.

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  8. Yeah I know what you mean. I felt the same way last year.

    This year, I read about a book every week. :-)

    Good luck with getting more reading done.

    I hope you have a wonderful 2014.

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  9. I think I went on Goodreads once and marked reading stuff, and have since never bothered to return. So I'm safe! I'll never know how many books I've read this year. Victory!

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  10. Goodreads congratulated me on having read 2 books in the past year. Of course I've read more. I tend to neglect Goodreads reviews. Maybe I should do more of those.

    Lee
    Tossing It Out

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  11. Alex C: Oh, if it was because of "having a life" I might not feel so bad.
    heh

    Rusty: Um... I never read that many books.

    Alex H: The way to handle that is also count the individual books. I think that's completely fair.

    Jo: My Kindle app doesn't have "pages" for my reading list. Maybe I don't have enough added to it for it to have "pages"?

    ABftS: Of course not, because, without the computer, how could you read it in the first place?

    M.J.: You know, my cat loves me. And I like him very much. You know, as a friend.

    I didn't set a goal for reading and would never tell goodreads what it was even if I did.

    Jay: Email of shame. Hmm... that could be a new thing.

    Misha: I haven't read a book a week since before I had kids. >sigh<

    You have a wonderful '14, too!

    Shannon: Well, I like knowing. The disappointment with knowing is the only thing that might make me push in more reading time.

    Lee: Woohoo! Two books!
    I do, actually, like goodreads.

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  12. I don't know how I feel about the number of books that I've read this year. But I'm really disappointed that I didn't get to read more.

    www.modernworld4.blogspot.com

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  13. My reading for 2013 was subpar too. Hopefully 2014 will be a better reading year for both of us. There are so many great books in the world. It's finding the time to read them all that is the challenge.

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  14. Gina: Well, I'm sure I'll never actually be satisfied with what I manage to read in any given year, but this year was especially poor.

    Kate: It is a challenge!
    Thanks for coming by!

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  15. That's why I hate keeping track of what I do. I don't want to see how bad I'm doing!

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  16. We're in the same boat, because the number of books that are on my 'to be read' list on my Nook are in the hundreds. And there's been weeks this year where I've read nothing at all.

    If you would have told me five years ago that I would go even one day without reading, I would've found that impossible to believe. Somewhere, my priorities have shifted the wrong way, and I need to make a conscious effort to set aside time for books. Sounds ridiculous, but obviously I need a system.

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  17. Your post reminds me of my own neglect in the book reading department this year. :/ I think I have only read like three the entire year. Ugh!

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  18. I always have the best intentions of working in reading time at the end of the day, and then I find myself weighing an extra hour of sleep versus reading...sleep wins out all too often. Most of my goals these days start or end with the phrase, "when the kids are in school."

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  19. RG: I haven't gone weeks without reading, but I certainly go days at some points. It's not something that I like.

    G_G: I'm not that far above you. Relatively speaking.

    Jessica: Oh, yeah, I've had to decide that I just don't read at bedtime anymore. That used to be my reading time, but I don't read at all when that's my intent.

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  20. DO it. Go on a reading binge. =) I totally stepped up my game about two years ago and made a goal to read one fiction book a week -- above and beyond my regular research/study and educational pursuits. Well, after a couple years of really holding to that, I crunch a 100K novel in 6 hours -- which is really saying something for me...who used to be the world's slowest reader. *sigh* Here's to overcoming!

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  21. Crystal: Theoretically, that is already my goal. However, I'm going to be busy through the rest of the school year reading, editing, and formatting short stories from my middle schoolers for Charter Shorts 3, so I probably won't be able to squeeze in a lot more reading.

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