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Top Ten Tuesday | Lunch-Time Librarian

10 Blog and Life Goals for the New Year – Top Ten Tuesday

Top Ten Tuesday is hosted by The Broke and the Bookish. They are great at bringing new top ten themes and they have a huge list of them well in advance for those bloggers that like to plan super far ahead. You can learn about joining in here.

It’s a new year, and with the new year comes a plethora of promises and commitments we make. Do I keep my resolution promises? Almost never. Likely because I never think of them as an actual goal to work towards. It feels more like a wish you throw to the wind, and hope you accomplish. Just like you hope you’ll win the lottery. This year I’m creating goals instead of resolutions to work towards bit by bit. Instead of resolving to lose weight, you might set a goal of losing 10 pounds. Not only is it more concrete, it also means you can’t throw in the towel after losing a pound… So for this week’s Top Ten Tuesday I present to you my 10 Blog and Life Goals for the New Year.

Finish editing my NaNoWriMo novel by Jan 31st

If I could write an entire novel in a month, I should be able to edit it in a month, right? The time limit is also to protect me from myself. The mistake I made with my first novel was that my editing was rushed (maybe a week of editing?), I submitted it to literary agents, got rejected, and got discouraged. So when I went back to edit it again, I went at it with the resolve to make it perfect, which led to me spending weeks trying to edit a single chapter until I got fed up and stopped writing altogether. This time around, I want to dedicate a good amount of time to editing to avoid rushing, but set a deadline to avoid getting caught up in details.

In Defence of YA Cliches | Discussion Post | Lunch-Time Librarian - 10 Blog and Life Goals for the New YearPost at least 2 discussion based posts per month

I recently made a post In Defense of YA Cliches to start a discussion with readers about whether overused tropes/cliches have a place in YA lit. I found that while writing the post I was reminded of why I started this blog. Not only to review books, but also to spark conversations about books with other people and start a dialogue. In the new year, I want to start adding in more posts that engage readers to contribute to a discussion and add their own opinion.

Join a GoodReads group

I read a post by The Scribbling Spite about 7 Ways Book Bloggers Can Effectively Utilize GoodReads which made me more aware of how bad I am at using it. I only recently started cross posting my reviews on GoodReads as well as the blog, but otherwise I only use it for my TRB list. But it’s so much more than that! Like Ally says, GoodReads is a social media website. Except I’ve been really lacking on the social bit. So this year I want to join a group so I can get more active within the community.

Complete my GoodReads challenge (read 50 books)

I really hesitated to even make a GoodReads challenge due to the crippling fear that I wouldn’t be able to complete it and people would throw virtual tomatoes at my head while shouting FRAUD and other such exaggerated terrible things. Finally, I decided to just go ahead and do it. Also everyone else was doing it. And I’ll be damned if there’s a bandwagon I don’t jump on. There’s 52 weeks in a year, so as long as I read roughly 1 book a week I should be able to complete my goal.

Start and finish the Lunar Chronicles

I NEED TO STOP TALKING ABOUT IT AND JUST DO IT. I feel like all I’ve been saying the last little while is that I’m finally going to read this series. Except, I keep getting distracted by other, newer books that I feel I need to read right away before people stop caring about them. But I’m going to get to this series if it kills me, I won’t be distracted. I don’t care if I love it or hate it, I just want to knowwwwwwww.

Review an ARC before its release date

I recently started to delve into the wonder that is NetGalley where I became extraordinarily excited to request and read books before they are released to the public. I felt like a regular Harriet the Spy, getting in on the goods and bringing people the scoop ahead of time. Wonder of wonder, I did receive copies, which I am beyond happy to have (reviews coming soon).  Except then I looked on GoodReads and realized these books had actually already been released. Meaning I kind of missed the ‘ahead of the game’ boat on them. Soooo my goal for this year is to build up my reputation enough to be able to review a book that has yet to be released.

Reach 100 Twitter followers

Twitter is essentially the only social media I use regularly. I’m sad to say. All my books are eBooks, so I dumped Instagram because I figured a million pictures of my Kindle wasn’t what anyone wanted. I really do make attempts at the Facebook page, but I’m not quite as savvy. And you all now know about my GoodReads failure… but Twitter is different! It’s a magical place of hashtags and Emo Kylo Ren and I love it. It took me awhile to stay steady at over 50 followers, and so now the new goal is to expand my audience another 50. I’m hoping that a bigger Twitter audience will increase the chances of blog posts sparking more of a discussion.

Read a non-YA fantasy/sci-fi book

I have a reading comfort zone which consists of YA fantasy/sci-fi and thrillers. Do I deviate from this? Very occasionally, like when I read Furiously Happy. This year I want to force myself to branch out a bit and read something different. Something like a non-YA fantasy or sci-fi book. Okay, so this isn’t a huge leap, but it’s something! I often find myself avoiding non-YA fantasy books because I’ve found them to be unnecessarily focused on small details. I can’t read Lord of the Rings for this exact reason. I am not a fan of description, I want action. But I know that this is a stereotype I’ve built up, and out there somewhere, is a book for me. One that either has less description or manages to be great despite it.

Submit novel to at least 5 literary agenciesyoga pose - 10 Blog and Life Goals for the New Year

I haven’t done queries since I finished my first book in my first year of university. It was a disaster and I haven’t had anything suitable since then. This also seems to be the most scary/frustrating/depressing/nerve-wracking part of the entire book writing process so I can’t say that I’m excited for it. But this year I want to get more serious about and committed to my writing, and part of that is finding representation.

Attend yoga once a week

Okay, usually this is where I would put the “lose 10 pounds” bit, except that every year I lose the ten pounds in 6 months or so, then regain it in the later half of the year. It’s an endless cycle of being very in shape, and then not at all in shape. All I want to do this year, is commit to do this one active thing each week. I was able to make time to go learn sign language once a week (2.5 hrs), so I should be able to manage a 1 hr yoga class once a week.

What are your goals for 2016?

Any non-YA fantasy or sci-fi book recommendations?

2 Comments

  • Shannon @ It Starts At Midnight

    January 6, 2016 at 1:52 AM

    Very nice goals! I need to finish The Lunar Chronicles too- we may be the only ones left 😉 And I am with you on the NaNo editing too. Or at least, writing. Even at 50K, I wasn’t even almost done, but I also may shelf it for a bit and come back later. But writing in general! And I wish you SO much luck on submitting your novel! That is amazing, my fingers will be crossed for you!!

    You can totally achieve the Twitter and Goodreads goals too! And the discussion one is fabulous, I love a good discussion post (and I loved yours about the YA cliches too!). Actually, if you are interested, I co-host a discussion challenge with another blogger, and it’s basically just linking up your discussions so that people can visit each other’s (and a chance to win a book every month!). I just like it because it is a good motivator to get the posts up 😉 OH and the Netgalley one too- it doesn’t take too long to start getting approved for some, and if you’re reviewing the ones you have, you’re doing great!

    Hope you have a FABULOUS 2016, and that you accomplish all your goals!

    Reply
    • ltlibrarian

      January 6, 2016 at 8:51 AM

      I know, right? It seems like everyone else has already been there and done that. That’s amazing, I hit 50k and just about keeled over, I can’t even imagine writing more than that now. Taking a break is always helpful I think, gives you new perspective when you get back to it. And thank you! I’m crossing everything already and I’m not even done.

      I would love to be part of a discussion link up! It would be a great way to discover new blogs too which I’m always trying to do.

      Good luck to you with your goals too! Hopefully we can both achieve most, if not all, of them.

      Reply

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