2019 Reading Challenges

This year I’m going to continue with the 3x long-term reading challenges I have on the go, Ultimate Book Guide, Ultimate Teen Book Guide and Ultimate Book Guide 2nd Edition.

Although I’m still working my way through the older challenge posts I will hopefully finish these soon. So at the beginning of the year this is where I am at with these challenges.

Ultimate Book Guide

• Books Read – 34/672
• Books TBR – 6
• Books Wishlist – 25
• Percentage Complete – 5.07%

Ultimate Teen Book Guide

• Books Read – 37/691
• Books TBR – 35
• Books Wishlist – 43
• Percentage Complete – 5.37%

Ultimate Teen Book Guide 2nd Edition

• Books Read – 44/782
• Books TBR – 19
• Books Wishlist – 32
• Percentage Complete – 5.63%

My goals in relation to this challenge are quite simple

• Update lists and keep them updated
• finish reading challenge wraps
• Do the genre pages
• Read 12 books from each challenge – roughly 1 a month

 

Asterix Series – Rene Goscinny and Albert Uderzo *Reading Challenge Recap*

Challenge – Ultimate Book Guide #2/672

Books in the Series – There are 37 books in this series so I’m not going to list them all but I found them all on Wikipedia.

Synopsis – The series follows the exploits of a village of ancient Gauls as they resist Roman occupation. They do so by means of a magic potion, brewed by their druid, which gives the recipient superhuman strength. The protagonist, the titular character, Asterix, along with his friend Obelix have various adventures.

My Thoughts – I read a few of this when I was growing up – my dad had a few of these on the shelf and I can also recall borrowing a few out of the library. It has probably been about 15-20 years since I read these so my memory is a little hazy but I wanted to log this for the challenge as read but I do remember the books being very funny in places with really good illustrations. I think it was probably one of the first comic books that I read properly. If I came across these books I’d definitely read them again!

Rating – I’m not going to rate them as it was so long ago but I definitely enjoyed them!

Recommendations – Tintin Series – Herge (Challenge book), Nicholas series – Rene Goscinny and Jean-Jacques Sempe (Challenge book), My Mums Going to Explode – Jeremy Strong (Challenge Book), Horrible Histories Series – Terry Deary (Challenge Book)

Alex Rider Series -Anthony Horowitz * Reading Challenge Recap*

Challenges

1/672 Ultimate Book Guide

1/691 Ultimate Teen Book Guide

1/782 Ultimate Teen Book Guide 2nd Edition

Books in the Series

• Stormbreaker
• Point Blanc
• Skeleton Key
• Eagle Strike
• Scorpia
• Ark Angel
• Snake Head
• Crocodile Tears
• Scorpia Rising
• Russian Roulette
• Never Say Die

Synopsis – In the number one bestselling series by Anthony Horowitz, fourteen-year-old Alex Rider is forcibly recruited into the deadly world of espionage and sent on his first mission. But the teenage spy soon finds himself in mortal danger, and in demand again by MI6. The ever popular Alex Rider series has action, adrenaline and adventure at every turn.

My Thoughts on this series – I read the first three books in this series last year however they didn’t capture my imagination as much as I’d hoped they would. I found them quite samey which was quite unfortunate as I really wanted to enjoy this series. I think that I’d probably try to read them again in the future but I think my kids would probably enjoy them once they get old enough!

Rating – 2.5/5

Recommendations from the Challenges

Ultimate Book Guide – The Power of Five – Anthony Horowitz (Challenge Book), Cherub series – Robert Muchamore (Challenge Book), The Joshua Files: invisible City – M. G. Harris (Challenge Book)

Ultimate Teen Book Guide – The Power of Five – Anthony Horowitz (Challenge book), The Extraordinary Adventures of Alfred Kropp

Ultimate Teen Book Guide 2nd Edition – The Power of Five – Anthony Horowitz (Challenge Book), Empty Quarter – Julia Golding, The Devil’s Breath – David Gilman (Challenge Book)

 

Ultimate Book Guide – A Long Term Reading Challenge

I came across this book a little while ago on Amazon. I’ve already been doing the Ultimate Teen Book Guide Challenge (more about that challenge coming up in another post!) but this book is geared towards the age bracket of 8-12. Having gone through the book there is definitely some more grown up titles in this book too so it does look like quite an interesting challenge.

I’ve complied a list of all the titles to track my progress. This can be found – HERE.

This book runs along the same theme as the UTBG book – a book title, review and then some recommendations of both other challenge books and some others too which I always like.

I’m going to do this challenge slightly differently when it comes to series reading – I will read the first book in the different series but if I don’t enjoy it I’m not going to read the full series – this is something that I’ve adopted all throughout my reading lately. Life is just too short to be forcing myself to read books I’m not enjoying.

Having gone through the list I have read 34 books out of a possible 672 – which means I’m about 5.07% of the way through.I will be doing some catch up posts over the next few months of these books that I have read (In between looking after my 3 year old, having another baby in the next month, working full-time running our own business and studying for an accounting qualification!) as I want to catch up on the recommendations etc!

I have also not marked as read some books that I’d like to read again like the Famous Five series – I’m sure that I’ve missed a couple of books in this series so I’m going to try to read these again.

I am really looking forward to this long-term reading challenge and hopefully I will discover some really good reads along the way!