Tuesday, January 3, 2017

A New Year

How is it 2017 already? Where did the last year go? Regardless of where it went, I'd like to take a quick look at the upcoming year and a nice glance back at 2016. (With plenty of side notes in parentheses, of course).


Reading Goals

In 2016, I read over 60 books, beating my goal on GoodReads! My goal for 2017 is to read 65 books and to make at least 2 of those books be non-fiction. Many of these books were reviewed on the blog.

Connections

In 2016, we were visited by three authors for interviews coinciding with book releases: Jaye L. Knight, with Samara's Peril; Kerry Nietz with Frayed; and Matthew Dickerson with The Betrayed. The Book Hound was also part of the Rise Tour with Nadine Brandes and her release of A Time to Rise. I'd like to give a hearty thank-you to all of these authors for taking the time to stop by!

I'd love to continue hosting interviews, book spotlights, and tours in the upcoming year! You can contact me using the form in the left-hand column if you or someone you know is interested.

The Blog

This was the first full year for the blog, which was very exciting. The grand total of posts was 114 (I'm capable of that much writing?), the number of followers nearly doubled (Thank you!), and it was just a really great year. You guys have made blogging a lot of fun. 

New series this year included: "The Writer's Mind" (in which I rambled about my writing), "We Write Books" (where I attempted to write a novel with Go Teen Writers and essentially faceplanted), "Pastors in Fiction",  "Reality, Meet Fiction" (in which I basically ranted about current events and tried to apply it to writing), and  "NaNo Survival Guide". 

Based on poll results, viewing numbers/comments, and my personal interests, I will be continuing "Reality, Meet Fiction" and "Pastors in Fiction". I'm also looking into re-booting "The Writer's Mind" or re-designing a way to update you on my personal writing goals. Have an idea? Shoot it to me using the contact form on the left hand side!

Survey

So, I know I did a small one a while back, but I had more questions that I'd like to ask and I finally had some time to explore survey applications. If you can fill it out, I'd really appreciate it! It's short, I promise!


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So, that's a wrap on 2016! Any suggestions? Thanks for another great year!

6 comments:

  1. Congratulations on beating your Goodreads goal! I haven't figured out my reading goals for 2017 yet, but I'd like to include more nonfiction, too (I think I tried that last year. I'm kind of afraid to look at what my goals were...).

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    1. I didn't have a nonfiction goal last year and I was disappointed to find that all of the non-school books I read were fiction. We'll see what happens this year! (Hopefully I can read 2 non-fiction books in an entire year; that'd be rather disappointing if I couldn't). Thanks for the comment!

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  2. Eep, yay for 60 books! That's an awesome amount. AND NADINE BRANDES! She's such a fabulous author and it makes me happy that you share in my love for her books. :D

    katie grace
    a writer's faith

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    1. Thank you!

      Nadine Brandes is awesome. It's going to be hard to wait more than a year without one of her books coming out this year :( . It's always fun to find someone with similar author interests! Thanks for the comment!

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  3. 60 books is awesome! Congrats! And you did great with all the authors you interviewed and stuff, that's so cool. Also surviving your first full year of blogging is absolutely amazing, and probably the hardest bit of blogging. *raises glass* Here's to an epic 2017!

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    1. I don't know if the end of the first full year is more or less difficult than that first post. It's certainly less terrifying, I suppose.

      Thanks for the encouragement!

      *Clinks glasses together* Here's to 2017!

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