Two Reading Challenges: The Unread Shelf and Reading Women

On episode 158 of the What Should I Read Next podcast, Whitney Conard talks about her mission to read from her own bookshelves.  Listening to that episode and thinking on the stashes of unread books in my flat inspired me to emphasize reading from my own bookshelves in 2019.  There's still over a week of 2019 left, and so far I have read 51 books from my own bookshelves.

Conard recently posted the first task of the 2020 Unread Shelf Project: find the number of books of yours that you haven't read.  I've used Libib for the past couple of years to track my book collection here in the CZ.  I scrolled through and added a tag for unread books.  The final count? 215 books. Frankly, I expected the number to be much higher.  This number includes mainly novels, especially middle grade, and it excludes books such as cookbooks or textbooks/reference books.

Though I did this count electronically, it was satisfying to find myself saying, "oh, do I really have a hard copy of that book?" and, "how could I have forgotten that title; I must read it at once!"

This year I have read significantly more pages than in past years, but I'm not entirely satisfied with my reading, as I feel a lot of it is very impulsive, and certain titles I had my eye on all year (Rebecca, All The Light We Cannot See, Lila, Virgil Wander, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, etc.) I have still not read.  So rather than aiming for quantity, I really want to aim for intentionality in my reading in 2020, which is why I will be content to read just 30 of those 215 books, especially if those be books that will challenge me spiritually and inspire me personally.  In 2019 I read plenty of books from my own shelves, but the vast majority were novels while some carefully chosen books on Christianity, parenting, empathy, and similar topics were left aside.

In addition to purposefully reading my unread books, I have been -- with varying levels of commitment and attention - - participating in the Reading Women Challenge hosted by K. D. and Autumn, who have a podcast also called Reading Women.  Their challenge consists of reading books by female authors or with female protagonists in 24 categories, with 2 bonus prompts.  I have completed just 20/24, with two books in progress to take me up to 22; below you can see each of the prompts and the book I read in that category.  Italicized entries show books contemplated or in-progress.

2019 Reading Women Challenge

1. A mystery or thriller written by a woman of color - The Cutting Season by Attica Locke
2. A book about a woman with a mental illness - Everything Here is Beautiful Mira T. Lee
3. A book by an author from Nigeria or New Zealand - What it Means When a Man Falls From the Sky or The Thing Around Your Neck
4. A book about or set in Appalachia - Prodigal Summer by Barbara Kingsolver
5. A children's book - Heidi by Johanna Spyri, The Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett
6. A multigenerational family saga - The Shell Seekers by Rosamunde Pilcher
7. A book featuring a woman in science - The Story of Madame Curie by Alice Thorne
8. A play Fantastic Beasts - the Crimes of Grindelwald, the Original Screenplay by J. K. Rowling
9. A novella - Ellen Foster by Kaye Gibbons or The Hen Who Dreamed She Could Fly by Sun Mi Hwang
10. A book about a woman athlete Swimming in the Sink by Lynne Cox
11. A book featuring a religion other than your own - Inheritance by Dani Shapiro
12. A Lambda Literary Award winner - 
13. A myth retelling - Home Fire by Kamila Shamsie
14. A translated book published before 1945 - Heidi by Johanna Spyri
15. A book written by a South Asian author - In Other Words by Jhumpa Lahiri, Home Fire by Kamila Shamsie
16. A book by an Indigenous woman - Soft Rain by Cornelia Cornelissen
17. A book from the 2018 Reading Women Award shortlist -  I Am, I Am, I Am by Maggie O’Farrell
18. A romance or love story - Becoming Mrs. Lewis by Patti Callahan
19. A book about nature - Prodigal Summer and Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver
20. A historical fiction book - The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah 
21. A book you bought or borrowed in 2019 Home by Marilynne Robinson
22. A book you picked up because of the cover - Heidi by Johanna Spyri and A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett
23. Any book from a series - Nancy Drew 1-5
24. A young adult book by a woman of color The Story of Harriet Tubman: Freedom Train by Dorothy Sterling

BONUS:

A book by Jesmyn Ward
A book by Jhumpa Lahiri - In Other Words

As I reread through those titles, I find myself smiling at how many standout books are in the list.  Home Fire completely surprised me. Prodigal Summer was so evocative and so eye-opening in regards to different ecological concerns; something that expanded as I read Animal, Vegetable, Miracle.  Heidi and A Little Princess were each cleansing and uplifting.  Everything Here is Beautiful had me anxious with stress dreams.  And The Shell Seekers was a beautiful novel filled with rich storytelling and deep character development.  Reading Women definitely enriched my 2019.

If you are interested, both the #unreadshelfproject and #readingwomenchallenge are doing 2020 challenges.  So if being in community or having a concrete challenge helps motivate and inspire your reading, check out Instagram or Goodreads to join in.