Hello, my lovely lemons! š I hope youāre well and that 2022 has given you plenty of good reads so far. For the past 2 years, Iāve set myself a challenge every January to read or unhaul every single book I own at the start of the year before the end of it. And itās worked out really well for me so far! Itās encouraging me to get through the books I own, to enjoy ticking off my list rather than continuing to hoard books. There was only one book I failed to read last year (Clap When You Land by Elizabeth Acevedo) so as per the rules of the challenge I have to either read it immediately or get rid of it. The idea is pretty simple – if I can own a book for 12 months or more and not want to read it during that time, then clearly itās not the right book for me.
Can I be honest right here, before I even start this list? Iām not even sure how many of these books interest me now. My reading tastes changed a lot over the last year, and I donāt feel like the same person who bought a lot of these books. The dreaded day has come and I feel myself growing tired of YA. Last year I was so deeply invested in hype and anticipated releases that I bought quite a few books purely because they were popular. And now I hate to give up a book without giving it a chance, but I just donāt feel the desire to read a lot of them. I suppose this is the blessing of the TBR challenge – I have this year to decide.
My 2022 TBR Challenge
The Rules: Read or unhaul every book on this list by December 31st 2022
Now you may have noticed, thatās a lot of books. My buying got a liiiiittle out of control last year. Now I find myself facing a TBR of 37 books – almost as bad as the 40 I had when I first started my TBR challenge. I aim to read 52 books in a year, so if I read one a week at this rate Iāll be able to start new books by the middle of September. Thatās not a fun or comforting prospect as I embark on a new year!
While I donāt like the idea of unhauling books without even trying to read them, there are certainly titles on this list that I am less excited for than others. There probably are some that I could get rid of right now, but Iām putting them on here anyway so I have a record of what my TBR looked like at the beginning of the year. That way I can at least make stats at the end of the year to see how I cleared this list!
So, there you have it. All the books I have to get through in 2022. Itās a bit of an intimidating list, if Iām honest. But Iāve got a whole 12 months to work on it. Iām sure once I start getting through them it wonāt seem half as bad. Optimism!
Do you make a TBR for the year? Do you dare count up how many unread books you own?? Let me know in the comments!
Scribbles & Stories 
This is such a great way to keep track of your purchases and reading! I need to do book unhaul soon too hahaha!
That cover of Fire is stunning!
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Yeah, it really helps me out! Yesss, it’s the new UK cover, I especially love it in real life because it has gold foil š
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Good luck! That’s a lot of books. I definitely recommend prioritizing Beach Read, it’s really good. On the opposite end of things, I watched I’ve Been Killing Slimes for 300 Years and Have Maxed Out My Level as an anime with my husband and personally found it a little meh, the main character was super annoying (to me at least) lol.
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Thank you! Ooh okay, I’ll definitely keep that in mind next time I’m feeling like a romance š
I’ve not seen the anime of I’ve Been Killing Slimes but I have read half the manga and I quite enjoyed it! I suppose it will come across differently in different formats. I actually only have the light novel by accident (I thought I was ordering vol 1 of the manga) š¤¦āāļø so I guess I’ll just see how it goes, haha
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This may get rambly, but here are my thoughts on some!
Rebel of the Sands, while really well done, is also VERY YA. It falls into a lot of tropes, and it very much reads like a young adult high fantasy. It’s good, but some food for thought.
I am always & forever going to be a McLemore fan, and I do think that their books have trended away from the YA familiarity lately, so Dark & Deepest Red is a good one. It’s weird, it’s unpredictable, and I can still remember what happened in it almost a year later, so that always feels like a plus!
The Henna Wars also felt like a bit of a departure from YA, but Late to the Party did not. That said, I loved Late to the Party so much that I’m going to reread it this year, and I am begging & pleading with the universe to let Netflix adapt it into a summer hit.
I’ve seen a lot of meh reviews of Kingdom of Copper, and while I get it, I really thought Chakraborty did a fantastic job with this trilogy. It fell into some tropes while completely sidelining others, and I appreciate the way that she ended it, even if it didn’t fall in line with readers’ wishes.
Daughter of Smoke & Bone is one of my rereads this year, and probably one of my all-time favorite books. There is nothing I don’t wholeheartedly love about it.
And I’m hopefully reading This Poison Heart next month! I just bough it the other day, and it sounds exactly like something I’d enjoy, so hopefully we both like it!
I really love this idea of reading everything you’ve purchased in a previous year, and I think once I get my owned TBR under control again (it’s over 100 right now, ughhhh), I want to try to do something similar, so thank you for the inspiration!
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Oh my goodness Mary, thank you for all this! Itās really helpful to hear someone elseās thoughts. Iām in a bit of a weird place with YA – Iām leaning away from contemporaries but thereās still something in me that canāt help but love YA fantasy and all the cheesiness and tropes that go with it. I think itās a nostalgia thing.
Both Dark & Deepest Red and This Poison Heart are inspired by my two favourite classic novels/stories and theyāre ones that I havenāt seen retellings of before so I am hyped to get to them at some point. (I donāt know why I loved The Red Shoes so much, I was a morbid child.)
And again, Iām totally contradicting myself here with what I do and donāt feel like reading, but even though teenage high school drama is the type of YA Iām most tired of, Iām really excited for Late to the Party? It just sounds like itās about the exact type of person I was back in school, and maybe I want to see what couldāve happened if Iād bothered to have any sort of adventure back then.
I seem to have a thing for enjoying endings that the majority of people donāt, so maybe thatās a good sign for Kingdom of Copper! I really enjoyed City of Brass anyway, so Iām going in optimistically.
Iām working on a post at the moment about the books that have been on my Want to Read list the longest and Daughter of Smoke and Bone wins by a mile since itās been there since 2013!! I donāt know what Iāve been doing for nearly a decade (not reading DOSAB, clearly) but I think itās really time I fixed that.
I really enjoy doing this challenge because it keeps me accountable for what books Iām buying. I have a bad habit of buying books for no real reason, and I also get stressed when I own too many unread books, which is not a good combination! It also makes me go for older books first, rather than always jumping at the newest shiny thing. Itās been really good for me so Iām so glad it inspired you! š
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