Wednesday, December 30, 2015

My Bookish Resolutions of 2016

I'll be honest. While I'm very good at coming up with New Year resolutions, sticking to them is an entirely different story. Still, I thought I would dedicate my last post of the year to those bookish resolutions I really, really, mean to see through. 

Oh and I just realized what I wrote just now. This is my last post of the year. Wow... Just, wow! 




2015 has been a special year for me. I turned 22, graduated from uni, recovered from a one-year long reading slump and got back into reading again and most importantly, I created this blog ^^ Yep, Of Stacks and Cups isn't even one year yet and still, it feels like I've been doing this for years.

And so, before I start with my resolutions, I wanted to thank all of you guys for visiting my blog and making this whole blogging thing such a fun venture. I've made a bunch of new friends here on the blogsphere and I only hope to get to know even more of you next year. It's been a great year guys ^^

And now with my resolutions. No more stalling now :D


Read all the unread books on my shelves

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At the time I was writing this post, I had a total of 29 unread books on my shelves. I know that it's not an impossibly huge TBR and I'm hoping to get through most of them in the first half in the coming year.


Participate in a Read-a-Thon

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I love reading blog posts about them, I love watching videos about them and yet, for some reason, I've never participated in one before. If you have one you think I would enjoy participating in, feel free to let me know.


Read 100 books in 2016

Normally, I would say that it's fairly easy for me to get through 100 books in a year. In 2016 though, I'll be starting my Masters degree and I know I'll have less free time than I had this year. In 2015, I managed to complete my Goodreads challenge of reading 120 books by reading a total of 170+ books. I want to take things a little more easy in 2016 and cut that count down to 100.


Read a Shakespeare play

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I've been meaning to read a Shakespeare play for ages now but never got around to doing so because the language felt a little daunting to me. I do wish to remedy to that in 2016 and I'm thinking I might start with A Midsummer Night's Dream. If you've read other plays by Shakespeare, feel free to recommend me one to start with.


Read the Lord of the Rings

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The first time I tried reading The Fellowship of the Ring I couldn't really get into the story and had to put it down. My sister has since then read the whole trilogy and has gushed about it so many times that I feel like I simply have to give these books another go. 


Give Neil Gaiman another chance

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I seem to be one of the few people on the planet who's not completely in love with Neil Gaiman's books and honestly, I can't really explain it. I do admire Neil Gaiman as a person and love reading his blog posts. Yet I can never really seem to fully enjoy his books. In 2016 I'm planning to read another of his books and see if I like it. I'm thinking of going with Neverwhere. What do you think?

So that's it for my bookish resolutions of 2016 guys. Comment down below and tell me what your resolutions are! I wish you all a Happy New Year and hope you all have a blast. See you all in 2016 ^^


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Cover art by Of Stacks and Cups via Pagemodo   

18 comments:

  1. Neil Gaiman's had plenty of chances; you don't have to give him another one. He's mostly really quite overrated as a writer. I wouldn't feel obligated to try to force yourself to like him or to keep reading his books if they're not your thing. They can just....not be your thing. :) Plenty of people will still love him and his career will not suffer. ;)

    I'm in the same boat as you: time for my unpopular opinion, but while Gaiman is an aces idea man, he's only a so-so words man and a mediocre plot man. I might check out Good Omens (I do genuinely enjoy Terry Pratchett), but I slogged through American Gods and wish I could have those hours back.

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    1. Thanks for the advice Katherine ^^ I think I'll try reading just one more of his books and if I still don't enjoy it, then I'll give up trying to get into them. I enjoy whimsical stories but sometimes, his books feel a little 'too' whimsical to me.

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  2. I had a hard time getting into Lord of the Rings when I read it too! Sooooo many descriptions of hills and trees and fields O.O But if you can get passed the first 50-75 pages, it gets considerable more engaging! Good luck with it :D I also resolve to read the books I already own - I NEED to put dent in my tbr shelf >.< Congrats on keeping the blog going, graduating from Uni and everything else you accomplished in 2015! I hope 2016 brings you lots more wonderful things - bookish and otherwise <3 Happy New Year Soudha!!

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    1. It's because of all those descriptions that I couldn't get into the book the first time I tried reading it. I'm willing to try get past these pages though to give it another go. Good luck for putting that dent in your TBR. You can do it ^^ Thanks for the kind words Micheline! I wish you the best for 2016 too. Happy New Year <3

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  3. Wow, so many great resolutions! The TBR list and reading a Shakespeare play are such great things to accomplish especially I think. I love Midsummer Night's Dream, but will also highly recommend Much Ado About Nothing. Perfect Hiddleston gif usage btw. :P I love the idea of a readathon but I haven't participated in one either - I should make that a goal of mine too. It would be nice to just give up days to only reading. And for Neil Gaiman, I completely understand - I don't always love his books. American Gods was so hard to get through. But I did love Neverwhere, and I also recommend The Graveyard Book - that might be more enjoyable since it's YA. But I love Neil as a person, and I just love the way he reads his audiobooks too. :) His voice is just perfect!

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    1. Thanks for the rec Charlene. Much Ado sounds like a great one to start with. Haha, when I saw that Hiddleson gif I just knew I had to include it somehow. I did read The Graveyard Book and actually really enjoyed it. I might go ahead and try reading Neverwhere next. And you're right, Neil Gaiman is a great narrator. A fascinating person too!

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  4. Great goals! I haven't been able to get into Gaiman either and I am wanting to give him another chance as well. I am told starting with his short stories was a bad, bad idea. Who knew? I am going to try to read Hamlet this year. I have not read Shakespeare since high school. I didn't even in college. So this will be a big task for me.

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    1. Oh I feel like I've made the same mistake because I did try reading his short stories at first. I guess you need to have read more of his books to truly enjoy his short stories. I hope you enjoy Hamlet. I want to read this one too but first I think I'm going to start with his lighter plays.

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  5. I loved Shakespeare in high school because our textbook had LOTS of footnotes. So I would recommend reading a heavily annotated edition. Libraries are great for that. Excellent goals! You can do this.

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    1. Thanks for the tip. I'm going to look for copies with notes ^^

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  6. All of these could be my resolutions as well, I've wanted to do all of these! I too have so many unread books on my shelves but keep heading to the library. I've only read one novel by Gaiman, The Ocean At The End of The Lane, and it was pretty good. All his stuff is a bit eccentric though. Shakespeare is so tough! I have the omnibus edition of Lord of Rings and it's so intimidating! I want to get through it sometime though, too.

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    1. Yeah, I suppose some people in fact really enjoy Neil Gaiman's books because of the eccentric nature of the stories. I guess my tastes are simply too different. I can only guess at how huge your omnibus of LOTR must be! I hope you'll be able to get through it though :)

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  7. Awesome goals for this year! I failed some of my bookish resolutions for 2015 but there's always this year, right? Good luck on your resolutions! I just might steal your Lord Of Rings goal for myself ;D

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    1. After all, who ever fulfills all of their resolutions, right?? XD Good luck for this year though :)

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  8. It has been a great year in books and blogging hasn't it? I'm so glad that we started out blogs around the same time. Even though we both have very different tastes I feel like we grew our blogs together.

    You have some great resolutions here. You can do it.

    As for the read-a-thon, the Bout-of-books read-a-thon starts monday. It is week long in length and a lot of fun. I'm going to be signing up for it today. Here is the link if you'd like to check it out and sign up too:
    http://boutofbooks.blogspot.ca/

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    1. Indeed, it's cool that we've developed our blogs together ^^ And thanks for the info Melissa!

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  9. I hope you can achieve these things! I am also planning on cutting my TBR by at least half this year, and want to read 100 books to help me achieve that! I didn't stick a number on how much is half so that I will limit my book buying otherwise the half I need to read grows! Also, loving the idea of more Shakespeare. A Midsummers Night is the perfect place to start.

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    1. Thanks Olivia. I hope you can achieve your reading goals too! I think I will indeed be reading A Midsummer Night before Shakespeare's other works.

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