2025 Reading Challenge discussion

Hi everyone.
This year my challenge is to read 36 books (i.e. 3 a month), however I want to make 12 of the 36 (1 per month) non-fiction books as I don't read many of them and probably should! Wish me luck, peeps!! xx

Good luck :)

Sounds good Catty! good luck & happy reading!

Catty I wish you the best of luck!

Good luck! That's a pretty good goal. I feel like I read about 50/50 non-fiction and fiction myself, but in actuality it is something closer to a third non-fiction. Last year it was 8:12 out of the twenty and 5:13 out of 18 in 2016.

What sort of non-fiction books do you reckon you like?

Thanks everyone!!

Jacob - I like books on movies and music, and I recently read a book called Beautiful Failures about the current education system and the impact it has on kids, which was good. I probably should read some books on science, technology and probably some on psychological subjects for work reasons, but other than that I have no clue! Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

Hmm. I rather liked and learned a fair bit from The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History which I read a couple of years ago and so far I'm enjoying Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind. Otherwise my non-fiction reads are often in that true-crime/psychology territory as well as pop-science and/or neuroscience. I actually have far fewer non-fiction books on my read shelf than I thought, so I'm finding it hard to make any generalization about what I like, hah.

I'm also a fan of Jon Ronson; went through both The Psychopath Test: A Journey Through the Madness Industry and So You've Been Publicly Shamed in one sitting basically. He's an easy quick read.

Oh, and then I read Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking way back in 2014, which was the first book I read after many years in a reading slump. That was quite good.

Also, thanks for bringing Beautiful Failures to my attention. It sounds very interesting. I've studies education, so I'm very aware of the dialogue surrounding how broken the system is.

Thanks for the suggestions Jakob - if you have studied education then you will certainly get something out of Beautiful Failures. Feel free to request me as a friend if you'd like to talk books some more - and that goes for everyone else who was kind enough to comment on this thread too!!

Congratulations on finishing your first five books keep up the great work and of course happy reading!

Two months down ten to go! I hope March is a success for you.

Thanks for the comments Blagica - my last month hasn't been too successful reading-wise, unfortunately. But there is always this month!!

I am sure March will turn things around for you Catty

I hope so! I have been home sick today so I have been reading a vit more of a short story collection I started ages ago - "Nocturnes" by John Connolly. Hoping this will kick start me into the rest of the year in the right fashion!

Catty wrote: "I hope so! I have been home sick today so I have been reading a vit more of a short story collection I started ages ago - "Nocturnes" by John Connolly. Hoping this will kick start me into the rest of the year in the right fashion! "

Good luck Catty!
And I hope you feel better soon.

Looks like you're on track, Catty :)
I feel like every year I start out with every intention of reading more non-fiction, but somewhere along the way it just doesn't happen. Luckily, I do read a gazillion articles and e-journals and such so it's not a complete failure, but would definitely still like to read more.

I hope you do better than me :) Best of luck with your challenge!

Thanks guys!

I hear you, Lisa - I read lots of articles online too so I guess I don't do that badly really. Still - there's nothing quite like reading an actual book I reckon!

Catty wrote: "I hear you, Lisa - I read lots of articles online too so I guess I don't do that badly really. Still - there's nothing quite like reading an actual book I reckon!"

Agreed!

A book is a dream that you hold in your hand. I hope that April brings you many more five star reads.

Well - over a third of the challenge done in the first third of the year - plus another non-fiction book in there to boot! Yay me!!

👍🏻🎉🍾

“Reading brings us unknown friends” While the warm weather is coming I hope you make some new friends in May! You are doing great keep it up!