I avoided making a TBR list for January because I felt the hints of an oncoming reading slump and wanted to try to avoid it by not putting reading pressure on myself. It worked (sort of)–I did end up reading a lot in January, but they weren’t the books that I had really wanted to read; even if I didn’t really have a TBR, I sort of subconsciously did make one.

So for February, I’m back to making an actual TBR. I’d like to actually pick up books that I’m really excited about and have been really looking forward to reading and challenge myself to stick to that TBR as much as possible. (We’ll see how that goes.) I’d like to start by finishing the books I started but wasn’t able to finish during January, and finish by starting some enticing new ones. And, most importantly, I actually really need to #readmyowndamnbooks.

Currently reading and would like to finish in Feb:

I’ve been in such an audiobook slump lately (I’ve talked a lot in the past about how not being an auditory learner kept me away from audiobooks for a long time, but I’d actually gotten into a pretty decent rhythm with them until recently) and so I wasn’t able to finish Lab Girl by Hope Jahren within my checkout time from the library back in December; unfortunately I’m still on the wait list for it, so I’ll have to see if I’m able to get ahold of it in February. If not, it goes on the TBR for March. I’m about 1/2 of the way done with the audio of Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng and, since I just checked it out from the library for another two weeks, I am very hopeful about finishing it this month. The writing is really beautifully done; I don’t typically pick up books that are mainly character studies like this one is, but it’s really resonating with me so far.

I’m also part of the way through Claire Fuller’s Our Endless Numbered Days (print, not audio) and honestly just haven’t been in the right mood to pick it up in awhile, despite the fact that it’s very good. It’s about a young girl who’s essentially kidnapped from her mother by her survivalist father, although she doesn’t see it that way, and about those events and their aftermath once she’s been returned home years later. I’m only about fifty pages in so far.

New TBR books for Feb:

I’d love to pick up one of my Book of the Month Club picks during February (since all of them sound so good) and I think I’m going to start with the book that was voted 2016’s Book of the Year–All The Ugly and Wonderful Things by Bryn Greenwood. I really don’t know how I’m going to feel about this one, but I’m super curious from all the hype. I’d also like to pick up a classic at the beginning of the  year rather than keep procrastinating and never actually read one (like I did in 2016) and I recently ordered a copy of William Golding’s Lord of the Flies, which is one of those books that it seems like everyone else got assigned to read in high school but I never did, and then I never picked it up later because I felt like I’d heard so much about it that it wasn’t worth reading. But I changed my mind and would actually like to read it now.

I also want to pick up at least one short story collection in February, and I think I’m probably going to go with Emma Donoghue’s Kissing the Witch, which is a collection of interconnected feminist fairy tale retellings. This sounds right up my alley and I’d meant to read it during Bout of Books, so now I’m actually going to get to it this month. Other TBR picks include Sleeping Giants by Sylvain Neuvel, which I actually started last night and am really liking; The Mothers by Brit Bennet, because I do not want to be missing out on the amazingness that I have heard about any longer; and Wild by Cheryl Strayed, which will be the next audiobook I start after Everything I Never Told You unless Lab Girl comes in first.

So, my TBR is a little ambitious but I do feel like it’s do-able, although I could always get distracted and pick up something different (let’s be honest, I totally will). But at least some of these are definitely getting read this month! And I’m totally going to hold myself to #readmyowndamnbooks only this month, except for audiobooks.

What are you planning on reading in February? Let me know!