Hey Reader 🙂 If you are new to my blog then you probably are not aware that I love reading challenges as seen with my recent, Victober and Gilmorethon challenges. Each year I map out the challenges I want to do and then prepare for them. For the last 2 years I have been toying with the idea of doing the 30 books in 30 days challenge and one thing or another always made me not go ahead. This year I finally did it.
As the challenge says, you read 30 books in 30 days. How I interpreted this is, I don’t need to necessarily read and finish a book every single day, the goal is to read 30 books at the end so how I do it is up to me.
Three things actually made me finally do the challenge:
- My April wrap up. I ended up reading 27 books without realising it, which is the highest number of books I have ever read in a month. After this, 30 books seemed doable.
- Olivia of Olivia’s Catastrophe. Seeing her do the challenge and her progress encouraged me.
- Having time. With being home and significantly having less to do, I saw this as an opportune time. so why not?
My Experience…
I started my challenge on April 25th,2020 which would run all the way until the 24th of May, 2020. Reader, I was psyched! I even made a nice habit tracker in my reading journal. Day one had me saying “I got this!!” – spoiler, I didn’t.
Between those days I read 26 books and it was a struggle as much as it was fun. There were days I had to push myself to read because I really wanted to complete the challenge. You know that sense of achievement? I wanted it, badly. This led me to deviate from my tbr which largely has big, longer books and classics, in favor of shorter books and novellas. I kinda felt bad about this. By book 26 I was exhausted and decided to ‘rest’ because at this point I was forcing myself to read and it wasn’t enjoyable at all. I had about 5 days left and during that time I read nothing at all and honestly it was so freeing and the best decision.
Lessons Learnt…
- Reading fatigue is real. Even after the 30 days were over, I found it hard to pick up a book. I was in a kind of rut/slump and barely read anything. Definitely not a good thing.
- I don’t like reading restrictions. I read the same amount of books in April as I did in May but one felt like a chore and the other was fun.
- The challenge pushed me to my reading limits and it was an experience I don’t regret, but I am never doing it again.
Book Recommendations!
Like I mentioned I read 26 books, some really great while some not so much. I want to share the 9 that I absolutely loved and highly recommend.
- The Confession by John Grisham
- The Alice Network by Kate Quinn
- North And South by Elizabeth Gaskell
- The Kiss Quotient by Helen Hoang
- The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid
- The Island Of Sea Women by Lisa See
- A Cat, A Man, and Two Women by Junichiro Tanizaki
- The Hunting Party by Lucy Foley
- Behold The Dreamers by Imbolo Mbue.
If you pick any of these up, let me know what you think of them. Happy reading!
Have you done the 30 books in 30 days challenge before? If yes, how was your experience? If no, is it something you would do?
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