Bloggin' 'bout Books: Boo and Yeah: A (Mostly) Successful Year With Reading Challenges

2026 Literary Escapes Challenge

- Alabama

- Alaska

- Arizona

- Arkansas

- ~~California~~ (1)

- Colorado

- Connecticut

- Delaware

- Florida

- Georgia

- Hawaii

- Idaho

- ~~Illinois~~ (1)

- ~~Indiana~~ (1)

- Iowa

- Kansas

- ~~Kentucky~~ (1)

- Louisiana

- ~~Maine~~ (2)

- ~~Maryland~~ (1)

- Massachusetts

- Michigan

- ~~Minnesota~~ (2)

- Mississippi

- Missouri

- Montana

- Nebraska

- Nevada

- New Hampshire

- New Jersey

- New Mexico

- ~~New York~~ (2)

- North Carolina

- North Dakota

- ~~Ohio~~ (2)

- Oklahoma

- Oregon

- Pennsylvania

- ~~Rhode Island~~ (1)

- South Carolina

- South Dakota

- Tennessee

- ~~Texas~~ (1)

- Utah

- ~~Vermont~~ (1)

- ~~Virginia~~ (1)

- Washington

- West Virginia

- Wisconsin

- Wyoming

- Washington, D.C.*

International:

- England (4)

- Ireland (1)

-Scotland (1)

Boo and Yeah: A (Mostly) Successful Year With Reading Challenges

10:08 AM

So, book lovers, what are your thoughts on reading challenges? Obviously, I adore them. Even when I don't finish them (which is most of the time), I still have a ball finding books that fit prompts, making check marks on challenge lists, and seeing others challengers' progress. It's just...fun. This year, I'm patting myself on the back a bit because I actually did pretty well with all of my challenges. Just because I only completed a few of them doesn't mean I didn't expand my reading horizons, find some great books to read, and have myself a good ole time. My kids say I have no idea what real fun is. I can't imagine why...

Let's start with my successes. My biggest one is first:

2021 Reading Challenge

Susan has completed her goal of reading 200 books in 2021!

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203 of 200 (100%)

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Boom! For the first time ever, I met (and surpasses, thank you very much) my goal of reading 200 books in a year. I love tracking my reading with Goodreads.

The Literary Escapes Challenge is one I enjoy doing every year. This time around, I read at least one book set in every state in the U.S. plus D.C. I also read books set in 14 different countries.

My Top Five most traveled to U.S. destinations were:

1. New York (12 books)

2. California (11 books)

3. Illinois, Ohio, and Texas (tie—7 books each)

4. Washington (6 books)

5. Pennsylvania and Vermont (tie—5 books)

My Top Five most traveled to international destinations were:

1. England (21 books)

2. Canada (8 books)

3. Australia (3 books)

4. China, France, and Ireland (tie—2 books)

5. The rest tied with one book each.

Let's be honest: I read so much historical fiction anyway that the annual Historical Fiction Reading Challenge isn't really a challenge for me. Still, I pledged to complete the "Prehistoric" level, which involved reading at least 50 historical novels and I ended up reading 61. Boo yeah!

Same goes with mysteries. I read tons of them, so the Medical Examiner Mystery Reading Challenge is a yearly no-brainer for me. According to Rick's meticulous notes, I read 82 murder mysteries and tied 433 toe tags (meaning I recorded that many fictional deaths, at least those that included names and causes of deaths). Incredibly, this only put me in 11th place for this challenge. The winner tied a total of 1782 toe tags. Wow!

Update: I thought I hadn't reached my goal with this year's Craving for Cozies Reading Challenge, but then I took a closer look at the rules. I signed up for the "Peckish" level, which requires reading 1-25 cozies. With 12 read, I'd say I met my goal. Sweet.

I didn't do quite as well on these:

Sadly, I did not finish my own challenge. For shame! You can read my wrap-up post for all the deets on this one.

I've yet to ever complete this yearly challenge. It features 50 main book prompts and 10 advanced ones. How did I do with the 2021 challenge?

42 / 52 books. 81% done!

Not too shabby, thank you very much. There are A LOT of prompts in this one and I'm kind of anal about fulfilling them with exactness. So, yeah.

Booklist Queen's annual challenge has 52 prompts. How many did I complete?

44 / 52 books. 85% done!

Again, not too bad.

As its name indicates, the 52 Club's annual reading challenge involves knocking out 52 reading prompts. How many did I get?

48 / 52 books. 92% done!

So close!

All in all, I did pretty well with my reading challenges. I'm proud of my 2021 efforts.

Stay tuned to see which reading challenges I'm tackling in 2022. Also, if you're a reading challenge fanatic like I am, definitely check out my other blog, where I list all the reading challenges I can find in the book blogosphere. If you're hosting one that I haven't mentioned there yet, please let me know so I can add it to the database.

6 comments:

Cath30 December, 2021 15:10
I think you did really well as you had quite a lot to complete. You did amazing in the Goodreads challenge too! I'm not a challenge fanatic but I do like to take on 2 or 3 each year and I like them to be a bit tricky... to make me think a bit. I find I need a little bit of structure to my reading year. Happy New Year, Susan!
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Kami31 December, 2021 08:15
I think you should consider your year of challenges a success. Wow! You did amazing.
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WendyW 31 December, 2021 12:00
Wow, what an amazing year! I think challenges are great for getting you to read more book, or at least more books out of your comfort zone, and you certainly achieved that!
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Helen's Book Blog31 December, 2021 14:26
You did really well with your challenges in 2021! I agree, half the fun is knowing the challenge and seeing if we can find books to satisfy them. If I complete them is sort of a side note at the end of the year. It's the hunt that's fun.
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Marg31 December, 2021 16:58
Well done on your achievements in all these challenges!
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Katherine P04 January, 2022 19:49
Great job! This was the first time I went over 200 books too and was so excited. I'm hoping for the same this year but we will see.
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