Top Ten Bookish Resolutions

Top Ten Tuesday is an original feature/weekly meme created at The Broke and the Bookish.

This week's topic:
Top Ten Bookish Resolutions

We're already in the new year and we want to know what your bookish resolutions are. They can be book-blog related, reading related, writing related and/or book related! If you've already posted your own resolution list on your blog feel free to link it below and let us know how you're doing with your resolutions!

1. Not obtain any new books until my TBR is under 200 I noticed on GoodReads today that my to-read shelf is at 199, and I know that that's going to get higher as I still have some books due to arrive from BookMooch. Considering that all of the shelves in my room at my parents' house are full, I have boxes in the attic and under my bed, as well as a box and several piles of books in my student flat, I physically do not have any space left for new books! 

2. Read more books by L. M. Montgomery I have at least ten books and anthologies by L. M. Montgomery waiting to be read, but for some reason I just keep forgetting about them. Which is crazy as she's one of my favourite authors! This year I need to read more of her books to rekindle my love.

3. Read more non-fiction I think that university has put me off reading non-fiction books for fun, so I should really do something about this. I have a lot of non-fiction books that I've owned for years and never read, so I have plenty to get started on.

4. Realistically schedule the books I'm going to read for review purposes While I have a lot of great books from publishers that I can read and review, I need to think seriously about how many I can review on time, especially during term-time. I should decide which ones I really want to read, and which I just requested because they looked remotely interesting.

5. Read Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen Every year I pick one book that I've been putting off reading that I really do want to read. Last year I read Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte, which my grandma had given me a lovely copy of but I'd tried reading several times as a teenager and always hated. Reading it at 18, I loved it! I hope I'm the same with Pride and Prejudice as I feel it is my duty as both a woman and an English student to read it.

6. Not feel ashamed of the books that I read A lot of people give me flack for being an student of literature whose favourite genre is romance. Specifically, Christian and Amish romances. Yes, I've read Dickens, Pushkin, Milton and Shakespeare, and many more. But I do love my romance novels, and to be honest, when I do get somewhere with my writing I'd much rather be thought of as the next Nora Roberts than be compared to Alessandro Manzoni. I'm not going to let people's comments put me down anymore, especially as I have a wonderful group of friends online that I can talk to about my favourite books. 

7. Read rather than waste time online I procrastinate a lot on the internet, as I'm sure most people are guilty of! But I've realised that I spend a lot of time reading about books rather than actually reading a book. I need to cut down on this as I'm wasting valuable reading time!

8. Be ruthless with my TBR Not just because this will enable me to get it below 200 and buy more books (!) but also because I'm sure I own some books that I don't actually want to read anymore. Either because my tastes have changed dramatically, or because it's a classic that I feel like I should read, or because I bought it purely to support the church/school fundraiser, or because it was ludicrously cheap and looked remotely interesting. Especially as I'm getting married in 2012 and I realise that Simon and I own a ton of books, films and CDs and we're going to try to squish them all into a small flat and I need to be sensible about my belongings from now on.

9. Read 100 books in 2011 I've managed this for the last two years (including rereads and kids books) so this should be fairly easy, but I'll put it down anyway. What would be good would be if I were to manage 100 books that I hadn't read before. Although I read 105 books in 2010, only 83 of them were completely new to me. If I can just read 17 more new books next year I'll reach my goal!

10. Expand my blog While I do primarily write reviews because I enjoy doing it, I'd love to have more followers and get more feedback on my reviews. Perhaps I'll look into doing some giveaways and author interviews to get more publicity to my blog.