Yes, it is that time again. The time where I spend hours, if not days, procrastinating in front of my bookshelves, pulling down dozens of books and generally making a mess of my office. All in the name of finding the “perfect” TBR. If you’ve read my post Preparing for 2019, you know that this year my main focus is to be downsizing my TBR pile dramatically.

To help me narrow down my list for this month, I’ve come up with a way to sort of challenge myself to make sure that I’m reading those books that I’ve ignored for far too long. So first let’s get into my personal challenges to myself.

Clear My Shelves Challenge

So this challenge is simple. I start at the very beginning of my shelves (which are currently sorted alphabetically by author’s last name) and grab the first book that I haven’t read. For this I’ll be reading The Invasion by K.A. Applegate.

Read the Alphabet Challenge

I know there are other official readathons like this, but for me I’m going to keep this simple. Going through my shelves, I’ll be reading a book by each author whose last name starts with a different letter in the alphabet. This month I want to tackle the letters A, B, and C. For the letter A I’ll be reading The Visitor by K.A. Applegate. For the letter B I’ll be reading The Secret Mistress by Mary Balogh. For the letter C I’ll be reading The Heir by Kiera Cass.

A Book From My 2019 Reading Bucket List

If you haven’t already seen my 2019 reading bucket list, click here. For this month I am choosing to read a book by my favorite author and that is Only With Your Love by Lisa Kleypas.

#AYEARATHON

This month’s theme for #AYEARATHON is Throwbacks. Read old favorite books from your childhood or some that had an impact on your teens. With my already daunting list of books, I’m going to read The Encounter by K.A. Applegate.

Romanceopoly

Romanceopoly is a new reading challenge created and hosted by Jessica (Peace Love Books) and the lovely ladies from Under the Covers Book Blog. Styled to resemble the classic board game Monopoly, they’ve created a year long reading challenge that is sure to broaden my reading scope. Though it may be called Romanceopoly, there are reading challenges for everything from sci-fy to young adult. For more information for the rules, printables, and to register, go to romanceopoly.com.

There are different ways to go about the board. You can go around by rolling the dice as you would a normal game, or you could go the direct route, which simply means you go one tile at a team. I’m choosing to go the direct route, mostly because I like having my books already chosen weeks in advance. The books that I will be reading for this month’s tiles are:

• City of Bones by Cassandra Clare (Read an urban fantasy where the series is already completed)
• Desire After Dark by Amanda Ashley (Free Choice)
• City of Ashes by Cassandra Clare (read an urban fantasy with a picture of a kickass heroine on the cover)
• Moon Fever by Susan Sizemore, Maggie Shayne, Lori Handeland, Caridad Pineiro (read a rock star romance)
• Tower of Dawn by Sarah J. Maas (read a young adult book)

I was off to a rough start with this as I definitely had to stretch the “official” definition of Urban Fantasy to find something on my shelves that I could read for this. However, since City of Bones and City of Ashes were both on Goodreads Popular Urban Fantasy list, I figured it was safe to use them for those challenges.

Need to Finish

There are also a few books that I have started but have not finished.

• City of Ghosts by Victoria Schwab
• The Raven King by Maggie Stiefvater
• Snow In Love by Melissa De La Cruz, Nic Stone, Aimee Friedman, Kasie West

NetGalley ARCS

Last, but not least, I have a few ARCs that I was invited to read that are coming out towards the end of January. They are:

• One Tough Cowboy by Lora Leigh; Veronica Chadwick
• Katie’s Highlander by Maeve Greyson