When I was going back through my list of reading matter for 2022, I noticed quite a few omissions that I would like to rectify during 2023. The first was very obvious. In my alphabetised list of the authors I had read, there was nothing under the letters Q or U. So my first goal will be to read something by authors whose surnames begin with every letter of the alphabet.

I also noticed I had only read two books of poetry and no plays. Now I like poetry and I like plays so some of those must be added to this year’s reading lists. There were also no anthologies or short stories to speak of, so they also must be added.

Actually, I am cheating slightly on that front because I am already midway through an old anthology of diaries and the Faber Book of Reportage – eye-witness accounts of events in history (it’s really good).

I imagine there is going to be plenty of fiction in my reading list for this year and that will also include children’s books which I love. But I think I need to add more classics to my selection, particularly as I now have more than 50 classic penguins to peruse.

And my fiction-to-fact ratio was a bit skewed last year. I estimated it to be about 85% fiction and 15% non-fiction. I think I need to be more educated (it’s never to late to learn and all that) and so a greater percentage of non-fiction books should be included. I particularly like books on history, geography, politics, economics and travel so expect to see a selection of those.

There are shelves of books here that I haven’t read for ages and am longing to read again but the unread books in my house also run into the many hundreds so I am going to have to balance that carefully.

I have already added a page for the 2023 list of read books to my homepage. It is currently empty (come on, we are only on day one) but I will start populating it as soon as I have finished the first book. I plan to review every single book I read but you’ll have to wait and see how that pans out as I also have a number of writing projects underway with the aim of hopefully earning an income – I can’t be an idle layabout forever (sadly).

So, in a nutshell then my reading goals for 2023 are as follows:

• Read 200 books
• Read more poetry
• Read some plays
• Read more non-fiction
• Read something by authors whose surnames start with every letter of the alphabet
• Read some anthologies
• Read some short stories.

That seems like a good list (I do love a nice list). Now I am heading off to start working on it.

Do you have reading goals for this year? I’d love to know what they are.