Like I mention in the blog description, books have always been a part of my life. My mother has always read lot, and she used to read out loud to my and my younger sister, both when we were too small to read, and even after. Often, we didn’t even turn on the TV, just listened to her reading a story to us.

The way that books give you the opportunity to get into other people’s minds, live their lives without moving at all, has always fascinated me.

Maybe that is even how I ended up writing stories myself. Are you born with the urge and talent to do so, or is it learned? I believe in the latter. Everybody can write a book; it just takes oodles of patience and a will to suffer. 😉

Unfortunately, I do have some kind of writer’s block at the moment, and I hope with my blogs here to re-find the love of writing. At least I do have a lot of fun with my blog “The Dating Chronicles”, so there is hope for the future.

In the meantime, I devour books. I have actually stopped saying that I read a book, because I devour them, experience them as I enjoy stories in all formats. Print-, E- or Audiobook, I don’t care. I enjoy books for their stories and not their format. Or … I do love my audiobooks, that is my preferable way of reading a book.

And don’t get me started on the snobs who will say that you only “read”, if you are reading a printbook. I can tell you the author doesn’t give a sh** of HOW you enjoy their book. I know. I am one.

Normally, if a person reads a lot, they tend to stick to one genre. I would do the same if it wasn’t for reading challenges.

I do love them! They totally speak to my geeky side, and I have found so many gems this way. I also have read some really bad stories on that account, but mostly I find some unexpected and fantastic stories, which I would never have read, if it wasn’t for the challenges.

And there are sooo many brilliant stories out there.

I read about 100 books a year – give or take – depending on how long the books are, and I never stick to just one genre. I like to jump. From reading a horror story, to romance, to erotica, to non-fiction, to crime and apocalyptic stories. Sometimes you just need somebody to be eaten by a zombie.

Every year I follow at least 3 reading challenges; PopSugars Reading Challenge, Around the year in 52 books and a Danish reading challenge group on Facebook.
Furthermore I also am working on “Read a book from every country in the world”, a Harry Potter reading challenge, a Michael Jackson challenge and “Read a book from every American state” challenge. I will probably never get through them, but they do make my inner geek happy. 😉

The joy of going through my 750 book long TBR-list to find a book with a blue cover or with a dog in the title is priceless. (At least for a nerd like me ;-))

There are prompts that I find a bit odd. Sometimes there is a prompt that you should read a book of an author who is either African, Asian or of another ethnicity than you. Or a book by a LBGTQ+ author.

I have NEVER chosen a book from an author that I don’t know because of ethnicity. Half the time I don’t even know what color their skin has or what kind of sexuality they have. I always choose from the description of the story. Unless it is non-fiction, I couldn’t care less about the author. Maybe they are colored, maybe they are gay, maybe they are racists or just a**holes, but it is not THEM I read. It’s their stories.

I never quite understood that.

Anyway, are you familiar with Reading challenges? Do you use them yourself?

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