Starting the Journey

I admit it. I'm a book nerd. I read a lot and I read about reading a lot. I get Bookmarks Magazine, I read blogs, I read articles about books, I read book reviews. I listen to book related podcasts, I track my reading on Goodreads, I professionally facilitate book discussion groups and I participate in book discussion groups.

This week I read an article in Salon by Laura Miller, encouraging her readers to become better readers. She urged us to read more challenging books and to reach out of our reading comfort zone. Ms. Miller went on to discuss the annual January emergence of reading challenges and lists quite a few for 2011.

I'm always up for a challenge. After all, I'm the one that after graduating from high school felt I had missed reading some of the standard high school required reading and set out to create my own reading list for that summer before college.  I read Anna Karenina, Crime and Punishment, A Separate Peace, Catcher in the Rye, Of Human Bondage and a few John Steinbeck novels.

I've already joined a War and Peace read-along group on Facebook which starts in February and last for the rest of the year, so I wasn't sure I was able to take on another reading challenge. But then I saw the 2011 TBR Pile Challenge on Laura Millers list of reading challenges.

If there was ever a reading challenge I need, it is this one!  I have 100 books on my To Be Read list (TBR) and that is no exaggeration - I have it on an Excel spreadsheet (remember - book nerd!). In fact, I may have missed adding a few titles as I have acquired them, so in fact it is probably more than 100.

The challenge has been created by Adam of the Roof Beam Reader blog. By January 15, 2011, participants have to select 12 books and two alternates (in case a couple are unbearable to finish), post them on a blog and submit reviews as they are read. The only stipulation is that they must have been on the TBR pile for a while - no book published after January 1, 2010 can be included.

"Piece of Cake!" says the woman with 100+ books sitting around the house to be read. If nothing else, this challenge will help me create some room on the nightstand for some additional books, right?!

Come along for the journey. It should be an adventure. Join the challenge yourself. You've got the rest of the week to make your picks and post them on Roof Beam Reader!