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.
Let’s Talk Bookish 26th December:
How do you decide your yearly reading goals?
(suggested by Jillian @ Jillian the Bookish Butterfly)
Prompts: Do you set annual reading and/or blogging goals? Have you decided on any bookish/blogging resolutions for 2026? How do you decide what goals you want to pursue for the year ahead?
Short answer: by vibes!
Yes, I set yearly reading goals. I don’t set yearly blogging goals, as I really do this for fun and don’t want to put that pressure on myself. Bookish resolution for 2026 is, however, to keep a reading journal! There were times this year where due to various reasons, there was a bit of a gap between me finishing a book, and writing the review. It made it hard! I have tried to keep a journal before, and got a specific journal for this, but it was a little too structured for me. So I’m going to repurpose a notebook and turn it into a journal.
I’m hoping this will help me when I come to writing reviews, rather than having to spend time searching for this or that character’s name. I’m also hoping to catch up on posts for both here and DHR, so I’m a bit more ahead than I have been in a while!
Other than that, my goals are – to read 70 books. 70 is a sweet spot for me, high enough it feels like an achievement, low enough it’s achievable! I used to add to my reading goal if I looked close to it, but I stopped doing that a fair while ago and have kept it at 70 for a few years now. At the time of writing this, I’ve read 74 books this year. I’ve done much better in previous years – 2023 I read 103 books, 95 in 2022, and 94 in 2021. 2020 I hit 127, for…reasons I think pretty much everyone understands! But last year and this year, 70ish has been right.
Other goals are to complete my reading challenges! Which I don’t think I’ll be able to do in 2025. I try and have a mix of prompt based challenges that any genre can be used for, and genre specific challenges – I pick these based on what genres I haven’t read as much the previous year as I would have liked! For 2025, this was SFF, Non-Fiction and Romance. The romance challenge I especially enjoyed, as it focused on diversity, and I’m hoping the creator does more diversity challenges for 2026.
For 2026, I wanted to read more horror, so I’m doing both the Divination Hollow Reviews Horror Challenge (new for this year!) and the Grim Readers 2026 Horror Reading Challenge. Then I have my Musicals Reading Challenge, which are non-genre specific prompts, and Twenty Genres in 2026. I haven’t yet picked out my books for these, but I am excited to.
One other small goal – I want to fit in more seasonal reads! Something I really struggled with this year, and have been missing. But that’s a “nice to have” rather than a “must have”. What are your goals for 2026? How do you decide on them? Do you do something similar every year or mix it up?
Unwrapping Words 