A new year always feels like a blank slate, doesn't it? And that's the approach I've decided to take with my 2021 book list. After all the upheaval last year (isn't it nice to refer to 2020 in the past tense?), I've decided that this is the year to let my whims guide me in my reading life.
I've put together a teeny, tiny skeleton of a list to keep me on track with some of my major reading goals—like reading a biography of every president of the United States and reading the complete works of Shakespeare—but besides that, I plan to read whatever I want, whenever I want.
So here's the skeleton list:
Awake My Heart : J. Sidlow Baxter
Martin Van Buren and the American Political System : Donald B. Cole
Old Tippecanoe : Freeman Cleaves
President without a Party: The Life of John Tyler : Christopher J. Leahy
The Comedy of Errors : William Shakespeare
Troilus and Cressida : William Shakespeare
A 365-day devotional, three presidential bios, one Shakespearean comedy, and one Shakespearean tragedy.
Right now, the possibilities seem endless to me. I have so many unread books on my shelves. My biggest reading goal this year is to black out The Unread Shelf 2021 Bingo Card. I mentioned Whitney's Unread Shelf Project in my year-end post yesterday, but to get into some more specifics: for the last few years, Whitney has been hosting The Unread Shelf Project in which she creates a monthly prompt to help people tackle the unread books they own. This year, she has created an additional twelve prompts for people that want to double up and has also put together all 24 prompts (with a free space) into this fun bingo card. I participated in both of Whitney's Unread Book Bingo games last year which was so fun, but this year I'm looking forward to blacking out the whole card. Among the piles of books and authors I may read this year, The Penderwicks series, The Lord of the Rings trilogy, P.G. Wodehouse, Dorothy L. Sayers, Eudora Welty, and Elizabeth Gaskell are at the top of my list.
But I'm not limiting myself to my unread books. If I decide to re-read the entire Christy Miller series start to finish, I'm doing it. If I feel like a visit to Narnia is in order, to Narnia I will go.
All in all, I'm excited to see where my reading takes me this year, and I hope you'll follow along. Feel free to let me know what some of your 2021 goals are—reading or otherwise. Here's to a bright new year!
Happy New Year!
