the 2021 reading challenge

I set myself a reading challenge back in summer. My goal was to read 10 books by the end of 2021. Here is an update on how that challenge went…

The list of books:

• Siberian Village: Land and Life in the Sakha Republic by Bella Bychkova Jordan and Terry G. Jordan-Bychkov. A (now slightly outdated) look at village life in the Sakha Republic.
• Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson. A classic that has been on my want-to-read list for years.
• At the End of the Matinee by Keiichiro Hirano. Amazon made a selection of translated books available for free download for this year’s World Book Day.
• Pachinko by Min Jin Lee. I initially had mixed feelings about this book to be honest, but I am glad that I read it and I have a lot to say about it!
• The Broken Circle: A Memoir of Escaping Afghanistan by Enjeela Ahmadi-Miller. Another one from the Amazon list and part of my read the world challenge.
• Parenting with an Accent: How Immigrants Honor Their Heritage, Navigate Setbacks, and Chart New Paths for Their Children by Masha Rumer. I enjoyed this book immensely and am extremely grateful to Rumer for writing it. I have already reviewed it here

On the one hand, I am of course disappointed that I wasn’t able to get through 10 books. But I am proud of myself for setting myself this challenge. I normally hate to-do style lists as I get stressed out and disappointed if I’m unable to complete them. I was beating myself up over the fact that I failed to read even 10 books this year, especially as I consider myself to be someone who enjoys reading. I get upset that there aren’t enough hours in the day to fill with things we enjoy doing because they’re taken up by things we MUST do (like working, laundry, grocery shopping etc).

Here I am though making this post and realising that I did in fact do well this year, especially considering the range of books on the list. Between my busy job and my pregnancy sickness, I probably would not have pushed myself to read this many books without this challenge. I probably could have squeezed in a short book or audio-book in the last week of Dec too, but rushing a book in order to finish a challenge made me uncomfortable. I also had a few DNF books that I left off the list.

Hopefully I will be able to read more in 2022!