Just as I have for the past three years, I’ve created a list of books I want to read this new year. I’ve found that making a TBR list at the beginning of the year is extremely helpful for staying in the habit of reading consistently. Instead of waiting weeks until I finally find a new book I want to read after finishing one, I can just glance at the list I’ve made and make a much quicker decision. Of course, I don’t limit myself to the books on that list or read every book I have written down — the list simply serves as a reminder to myself of what I wanted to read when the year began.

I started the year by finishing one of the first books on my TBR list — Nick Hornby’s “High Fidelity,” which I highly recommend to anyone looking for a quick and funny read. Now, I’m turning my attention to some of the nonfiction I’ve been wanting to read for years but never got around to. 

Earlier this week, I started reading “All About Love: New Visions” by bell hooks. I was beyond excited to receive this book as a Christmas gift because of how many people I’ve heard talk about how amazing it is. While I’ve only read the first 40 pages of this book, I already have a lot of appreciation for it. hooks dives deep into the necessity of love in all aspects of life and what it takes to create a more living society. 

I also want to read a few Joan Didion books this year. I have a goal to read every book Joan Didion wrote, and I’m going to spend some time in 2025 inching closer to completing that goal. After I finish “All About Love,” I plan to start reading Didion’s “Blue Nights” — a memoir in which Didion grapples with the death of her only child. I have read “The Year of Magical Thinking ”— Didion’s memoir about the sudden death of her husband amid her daughter’s time spent in different hospitals to be treated for life-threatening pneumonia — three times, and I am curious to see how Didion writes about another significant loss. Along with “Blue Nights,” I want to read Didion’s “Slouching Towards Bethlehem” and “Let Me Tell You What I Mean.”

Another reading goal I have for this year is to return to books I started but never finished in the past. Sometimes, a book starts to feel boring or repetitive, or I feel like I become too busy to read a long and complicated book. This doesn’t mean, however, that I’m abandoning those books for good. Instead, I can pick up where I left off and finally finish the book. This past summer, I began Stephen King’s novel “11/22/63,” but stopped reading halfway through. When books surpass 500 pages, it can be intimidating, and “11/22/63” is over 800 pages long, so I’m not entirely surprised I couldn’t get through it on my first attempt. Despite that, I would like to give this historical and science fiction novel another shot. 

Finally, I want to start reading more mysteries. This is a genre I haven’t read much of at all, so I want to explore it this year. When I think of mystery novels, the first author that always comes to mind is Agatha Christie. With 66 mystery/detective novels under her belt, it’s uncommon to walk into a bookstore without a mystery shelf filled with Christie’s books. On several occasions, I’ve almost purchased one of her novels, but decided to grab something more familiar to me. This year, I want to change that pattern and read at least two Agatha Christie books. “And Then There Were None” is Christie’s best-selling book, so naturally, I’ve decided that it’s the one I will start with. After browsing several lists of her best books and their summaries, I’ve become intrigued by the plot of “The A.B.C. Murders,” a story about a private detective solving a serial murder case. 

For anyone who wants to read more this new year, I highly recommend making a TBR list. It helps minimize the chance of procrastination when it comes to choosing a book to read, as I have seen through my own experience over the last few years. Maybe it’s just me, but making a list of books that I want to read can genuinely be fun and it makes me excited to read more. As I said before, I don’t read every book on my TBR for the year, but it’s something I can rely on each time I finish a book.