Welcome to a bright and shiny new year!  There are wide empty metaphorical bookshelves to be filled with this year’s reading, so let’s dive in to new plans.

Newbery Medal Winners
Goal: 20 Newbery Medal Winners, halving the number remaining
Host: Smiling Shelves

It’s probably no surprise I’m returning to this one.  It went very well last year, and besides–now I feel invested.  With 41 to go, I can’t quit on this list now!  Not every book on here has been good, but I’m intrigued by what they all are and I like the challenge of reading down a specific list.

Diverse Reading
Goal: 20 books with non-Caucasian protagonists
Host: ???  Haven’t found an official challenge yet

Now more than ever, this feels important.  I’m setting the goal at 20, which is what I read last year, and hope to exceed. I may expand this to minority groups of categories other than race, but we’ll see.  For the moment, I’m looking for books–recommendations of titles or helpful lists very welcome!

Spiritual Reading
Goal: 6 books on spiritual topics

This relates to some other threads in my life that don’t really come up here–but I want to do more spiritual reading next year so I’m making it a challenge.  I haven’t found a challenge that fits what I want so I’m striking off on my own.  I’m practicing Catholic but I take a broad view of what qualifies as spiritual, so I may wind up with something by a Buddhist monk–and I’ve been eying Rumi lately.   I have a horror of being pushy about religion, so I promise there won’t be any proselytizing.  I’m setting the number fairly low, because I feel like these may be slower reads–not in the sense of dull, just more thoughtful ones.

L.M. Montgomery Reading
Goal: 12 Montgomery-related books

So I think we all know I’m slightly attached to L. M. Montgomery, author of Anne of Green Gables and many others.  People who know me in person know that I reference Montgomery and her life as though she’s a personal friend.  I’m not even looking for a challenge to fit what I want because I know I’m way out in obscurity here: I’ve read all of her books, so my challenge goal is to read related ones.  That means books about Montgomery and (here’s the odder one) books Montgomery loved.  I’m getting to the end of the fifth volume of her journal (again), and throughout she references beloved books.  I always think, huh, I should read some of these.  So that’s the challenge!  There are three or four promising books about Montgomery (that I haven’t already read…) and I plan to fill in the rest of the twelve with Montgomery’s own favorites.

So there’s the plans!  Some new reading and some returns to familiar topics.  Are you making plans for the new year too?  What will 2017 look like for you?