The 2012 “Books I started but didn’t finish” Reading Challenge

The goal:

• Commit to finish some or all of the books you began to read in 2011 (or before) and never completed.

Prizes:

• I will not give away prizes or otherwise motivate people to complete their goals for this challenge.
• Instead, I encourage you to self-motivate.
• Keep your list central on your blog (or elsewhere) and commit to buy yourself some sort of reward when you finish the task. (A book? A bookmark? Whatever you know will inspire YOU.)

The rules:

• Post a list of the books you began reading in 2011 (or at some point in your life) and never finished reading. (Maybe even say why you stopped reading!) 
• You can list as few or as many titles as you intend to complete in 2012. One or twenty or a hundred – it’s YOUR challenge.
• You can include whatever genres you please in this challenge. 
• It doesn’t matter how you go about finishing these books. You can combine them with any other challenges.
• You do not need a blog to participate. You can simply list the books you want to finish in the comments below.
• List the prize you will gift yourself when you complete this challenge in your challenge post (to make it official.)
• Write yourself a little manifesto about how you intend to approach these left-over books.
• Commit to finish your list by the end of 2012.
• You are NOT allowed to stress if it takes longer than 2012 to finish your list! Just commit again in 2013!!
• Leave a link to your post in the comments below.

That’s it!

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My list:

I began reading several books in 2011 that I lacked the time to finish:

• War & Peace – I finished half of this book and then stopped in the summer, when school overwhelmed me. I’m committing to finish with a few others in 2012.
• Vanity Fair – I started this in the spring of 2011 and read about half. I have no idea why I stopped. Other books and commitments kept calling. I KNOW this book will be a favorite and I can’t wait to finish it.
• Moby-Dick – I read the first several chapters of this in the winter of 2011 and ADORED it. I ran out of time to give it my full attention due to the holidays and my Transcendentalist Event. I will finish this with pleasure in 2012!
• Emerson’s Essays – I barely started this. I read three of the essays and realized the writing was intense and required more than a quick skim. I decided to put it off to 2012 so I can give it more of my attention.
• 50 Great Short Stories - I read all but the last 100 pages! This one should be easy to finish in 2012. I have no excuse for not finishing, beyond the fact that short stories just don’t seem to call me nearly as much as novels.
• Anna Karenina – I read half with Wallace’s group in October/November 2011, and then lost interest just before the holidays, mostly because it’s such a heavy story and I craved something lighter. I like the book and hope to finish in 2012.
• Montaigne’s Essays – I’ve read half!! Like the other books listed above, this one just required too much from me while I was trying to prepare for graduation in the summer of 2011. I’d intended to read it over a year and stopped mid-summer due to time. I’m excited to get back to Montaigne.
• Madame Bovary – I started reading this one to prove my professor wrong in his assertion that Kate Chopin copied Gustave Flaubert when she wrote The Awakening. I realized at several chapters in that that’s the wrong attitude to have while reading. (I was against Flaubert, for some reason. Pumped up to like Chopin better!) So I stopped reading until I could do it for the merit of the novel itself, separate from Chopin. I think I’m ready.
• Uncle Tom’s Cabin – #99 on my Day Zero List was to visit the Harriet Beecher Stowe house while reading her novel. So I read the first 46 pages in July and visited the house, then I pretty much forgot to finish reading. I like the book for its historical significance as well as the story, and I’m excited to get back to it.

My prize: I’m going to buy myself something off my wish list when I complete this challenge.

My manifesto: I will read these books because I want to enjoy the stories — not because I’m scrambling and feeling guilty!! If I have books left-over in 2012, I’ll apply the same laissez-faire attitude.

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Anybody with me on this?

  

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