2025 is over, which means it’s time to reflect on how I did on my 2025 reading goals and set some new ones for 2026.

2025 reading goals – how did I do?

Read more than one book from Olivie Blake. Well, I did half of this goal at least. It helps also that Girl Dinner was either my favorite of one of my very favorite books of 2025, although that is also probably more evidence that I need to read more Olivie Blake. In my defense, I did try. I read the first few chapter of 3 other Olivie Blake books, but at the time just wasn’t vibing with any of them. None count as DNFs, and I’ll keep trying.

Read more romantasy. I crushed this goal! Not only did I read 19 books that could be classified as romantasy, but I really enjoyed most of them, and 3 made it to my favorites/runner-up favorites list. Yay!

Read more dark academia. OK, not bad! 2 of these made it to my favorites/runner-up favorites list, continuing to prove that this is one of my favorite subgenres.

Read at least 5 short story collections. Not great. I finished 2 short story collections, one of which was disappointing and the other had some really great stories in it. I also picked up 2 standalone short stories, one of which was a 5-star read. I really wanted to do better with short story collections in 2025, but there’s always next year.

Complete the 2025 Book of the Month reading challenge. I was so close! I needed to read one more BOTM pick that was specifically over 400 pages, but instead chose not to make myself read something I really just didn’t want to at the time. I did, however, find 2 favorites from BOTM this year, and reading 14 books in any category is pretty impressive.

Read more diversely. I started tracking stats on this in 2025, and found that 39% of my reading was from LGBTQIA+ books, and that BIPOC authors made up 32% of my reading. I’m going to continue paying attention to this moving forward, because reading diversely is always a priority.

 

2026 Reading Goals

Read at least 4 short story collections. OK, let’s do better than last year! I’m hoping that not only do I finish 4 collections, but that I find a new favorite from this. A girl can only hope.

Read at least 4 fantasy sequels. It was recently brought to my attention (by my brother) that I’m really bad at continuing in fantasy series, no matter how much I love them. I think part of it is concern that follow-ups won’t live up to the first book, and partly that sometimes I’ve forgotten too much by the time the sequel comes out. But I’m actually going to put in some effort this year.

Read books related to my travel plans. I have 3 international trips planned in 2026: South Africa, Bali, and the Philippines. I’d like to read books either about these countries, or written by authors from these countries, before I visit them so that I’m better informed. I tend to learn a lot when I travel, but I also think it’s important to know more going in.

Read longer books/more long books than last year. Sometimes I feel like I avoid chunkier tomes because it’s a bigger time investment with an unknown return, but I have some long books on my TBR that I really hope I’m going to love.

Read more dark academia. I’m keeping this goal from 2025, and since I read 3 books in this subgenre last year, let’s shoot for 4 in 2026.

Finally read from these authors I keep meaning to try. These are the 3 authors from whom I actually own multiple books without having read any of them yet. Let’s change that.

Find new horror favorites. I read a lot of excellent horror in 2025, and I want to keep finding new standout books in this genre in 2026.

Read more books from my physical TBR. I think the way I’ll track this is by attempting to have a greater percentage of my total books read be physical books in 2026 compared to 2025.