Let’s Talk Bookish is a weekly meme that was originally created and hosted by Rukky @ Eternity Books starting in August 2019, and was then cohosted with Dani @ Literary Lion from May 2020 to March 2022. Book Nook Bits has hosted since April 2022, with Dini at Dini Panda Reads as co-host from February 2025.
What a great topic! If you’ve read this blog for a while, you’ll know I do take part in Reading Challenges and have done so for the last couple of years, so this should be a fun one to discuss.
Let’s Talk Bookish February 7th:
Reading Challenges: Do we love them or hate them?
(Dini)
Prompts: What do you think of reading challenges—do they motivate you, or do they feel restrictive and end up making reading feel like a chore? Are there any challenges you participate in yearly? What reading challenges are you joining in 2025?
I’m a fan of reading challenges and have found in the last couple of years they do help motivate me. They also help me plan out my reading better so I’m not spending ages trying to work out what I might want to read next. At times they might feel a little restrictive, but I’m trying to find a better balance between reading challenge books and books not on my reading challenges for this year. Ultimately though, the beauty of them is you can do them exactly how you like – I haven’t completed many since I started doing them, but the only person really paying attention to them is me.
As for yearly challenges, I did try the Disney Challenge for the last two years, but eventually found I really struggled with it. Depending on how the challenges for this year go, I might do them if they’re available again next year, or pick one or two I’ve really liked to try again. Then there’s my Musicals Challenge, which I created so will do pretty much every year I decide to create it!
I’m doing quite a few smaller challenges in 2025 – most have 12 prompts, so I’m hoping it makes it a little easier to work through these. I’m doing my Musicals Reading Challenge 2025, 2025 SFF Title Challenge, Romance Readers Diversity Challenge 2025, Be Curious – Non-Fiction Challenge 2025 and the 2025 TV Shows Reading Challenge, as well as continuing the Netflix Movies & TV Shows Challenge.
What are your thoughts on reading challenges? Do you love them, avoid them? find them useful or restrictive?
Unwrapping Words 
I have a love-hate relationship with them haha.
My post: https://laurieisreading.com/2025/02/07/lets-talk-bookish-reading-challenges-a-love-hate-relationship/
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I can see that – they can be stressful, which is also why I adjusted what I was doing for this year!
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Wow, I haven’t heard of any of the challenges that you’ve mentioned here and that’s awesome! There are so many interesting challenges out there and my brain has perked up hearing the name of some of these (especially the Disney and Romance ones!) but I’m already doing 4 more than I normally would so I’m going to restrain myself. Maybe next year, haha!
I like (and do agree) with what you said about the beauty of challenges being that you can do them however you like! It’s so easy to forget sometimes cos I like to “stick by the rules” and all that but that’s what makes it feel so restrictive to me.
Great post! Thanks for participating in LTB this week 🙂
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Thank you! Yeah – I found them on Storygraph, usually went for the pop culture ones but this year I switched it up and decided some genre ones were needed. Good luck with your challenges!
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