TTT – Bookish Resolutions

It’s a quick one today because I’ve written resolutions, anti-resolutions, goals and reflections, but I love to join in with Top Ten Tuesday. It is one of the best-loved memes of the bookish community and I meet so many different bloggers by taking part. I have reflected on the past year, and written a couple of goals for 2018. It is by no means ten, but these were my top thoughts. Do share your links and tell me how your reading changed across the past year. 

2017

Start a blog – BookMurmuration was born in February 2017 (it moved to WordPress in May). Writing about books taught me to read in more depth, and it gave me a network of bookish people to talk to about my reading. 

 

Read different genres – the genre which widened my perceptions was contemporary YA. Before I stared blogging, I thought it would only be relevant to teenagers. I thought it would be about love-triangles and giggly girls and lipstick. How wrong I was. Everybody was reading Wing Jones. I picked it up in a ‘3 for 2’ and read with my mouth open. I have learned more about writing by reading across a huge range of genres. 2018

Picture Books – At long last, YA readers are discovering Middle Grade thanks to some brilliant promotion and community events on Twitter. There still seems to be an assumption that picture books are only read by children, and adults who pick them on behalf of children. Picture books are one of the greatest pleasures on this planet. They are quick-reads with hidden depth, and some outstanding artists work in this format. Lets see picture books loved by a wider audience! 

 

Literary Fiction – As a teenager, my staple diet was literary fiction. I rediscovered children’s literature when I sorted books in a charity shop aged 19/20, and it became my passion during the children’s literature module of my degree. I love literary fiction too, and the depth of understanding I have has increased ten-fold between my degree and blogging experience. It would be lovely to feature some on my blog, and I very much enjoyed The Devil’s Highway, which I read over Christmas. Check back for my review on Thursday. 

 

Get to more events – Introverts find it difficult to come out of their book pages, but I gained so much last year from an Arvon course, and a couple of events hosted by Seven Stories. I’ve already booked for the Northern YA Fest at Lancaster Uni, and a talk with Brian Connaghan and Sarah Crossan hosted by Seven Stories. Both of these events are *free* – if you’re in travelling distance, make sure you don’t miss out!