Every New Year voracious readers seem to make the same set of reading resolutions: read more, reread the classics, or finish reading the books piled high on your bedside table. No matter how much we read, it sometimes seems like we can never quite catch up. The Week talked to some avid readers to find out their reading goals for 2017.
Subhechchha Shrestha
I have made a resolution this year to read at least one book a month. With the stress of work and household chores and all other responsibilities I realized last year that I didn’t read as much as I would have liked to and I didn’t really like that. Right now, I’m about to start “All the Lights We Cannot See” by Anthony Doerr. One of my friends on Facebook shared it and had rave reviews, so I’m really excited to start it. I hope I can finish it in a month though.
Anurag Acharya
Helping children enjoy reading
This year I have shortlisted 20 or so books on my shelf that I really want to finish. I always find myself gravitating towards fiction books though I always make it a point to read books from all kinds of genres. I’m looking forward to reading and then watching the movies of Dan Brown’s Da Vinci Code, Angels and Demons, and Inferno. Apart from this, I want to start reading more non-fiction works this year. I want to start reading Mahatma Gandhi’s The Story of My Experiments with Truths and take it from there. Hopefully that choice is a good way to begin my non-fiction reading journey.
Ashu Sharma
This year will be the year I finally finish reading The Lord of the Rings, or so I hope. It has been five years that I started the series and I have yet to finish it. It has become a running joke in my circle. When somebody is late they will more often than not receive a message that reads ‘Are you planning to arrive after Ashu finishes The Lord of the Rings?’ After reading the books, I will also watch the movie. That too I paused after an hour and half into it and couldn’t pick it back up again. I did try a couple of times but I always dosed off twenty minutes into the movie.
Manushi Dhakal
In 2017, I want to complete the Harry Potter series. It was always a topic of discussion amongst my friends but I was never really interested back then. I thought it was a mainstream phase which would eventually pass. However, even after all these years, I still meet people who are very enthusiastic about it and I have finally decided to give it a go. I have finished The Chamber of Secrets which is just the second book in the seven-book series and I have begun to see what it is all about. I don’t think I will become a ‘potterhead’ but it will be nice to finally be in the loop about “always.”
Sewa Bhattrai
I have made a list of around 30 books I want to read this year. These are all books I have bought and have in the house but haven’t got around to reading them yet. I always seem to be buying books whenever I’m out regardless of the number of books I haven’t yet read sitting on my bookshelf. I had originally planned to finish one book every week but sometimes I fail to meet that goal and a book takes up to three weeks to finish. I plan to work on my reading speed this year. Currently I’m reading a book named Madhavi by Madan Mani Dixit.
Pawan Dhami
A Monster Calls is a book that came out in 2011 and they are about to come out with a movie adaptation of the story. I watched the trailer and was instantly hooked so I will begin this year by finishing the book. I have been meaning to read Fatherland by Robert Harris which is a political thriller from an alternate timeline where the Nazi’s won the WW2. His other book that I finished reading was Archangel, which is about post-Stalin Russia. When people are losing hope in the current supposedly democratic regime there are a series of events that unfold that blew my mind. This book had me completely hooked and so I’m looking forward to reading more books by the same author this year.
Pramila Rai
My friends tell me I make very ambitious reading goals and I do that so I read as much as I can. I have been taking the good reads reading challenge for a couple of years now and I did that this year as well. I always challenge myself to read 100 books a year. Last year I had only read about 57 books on the list so this year I want to finish all 100 and maybe even more. This year I also want to read more classics. I haven’t been reading them for a long time and would like to get back to it this year; that is, if I finish the good reads challenge in the first place.
