A New Year and new beginnings and promises. I’d like to start with wishing all who read this a Happy New Year and hope health, happiness and prosperity finds them.

For me this year I’m hoping to keep this updated more regularly (famous last words) and maybe diversify the content here. Though the name is ValleyReading It won’t just be a book or reading blog. I will also post stuff from my other interests such as wet shaving Shave of The Days (SotD) and a new interest of mine anime and manga, mostly Attack On Titan which I love.

For shaving I’m starting the year growing a bit of a beard, though I may shave it soon as I have a slight breakout of excema so I may shave this week to sort that and enjoy the use of one of my recent razors (Rockwell T2 Stainless Steel or Tatara Masamune).

In terms of anime I’m looking forward to watching Attack On Titan again, I enjoyed it immensely from start to finish and I would like to watch the English dub of the final episode which is coming out this weekend (7th January). I would also like to watch more of One Punch Man which I am enjoying very much as well as Death Note. I have several others lined up to watch and the Attack On Titan manga which I’m 5 books into out of 34.

Finally my reading flagged last year when I discovered Attack On Titan and it is no lie that I was and am completely consumed by it and its lore, fan theories etc. So my reading took a hit. I was on about 35 or 38 books when I discovered it and I was flagging on my reading goal of 50 books until the end of November (I would have smashed it by June if I didn’t discover AoT). I finished the year with 61 books thanks to my Christmas reading, which I always make time for and enjoy very much.

This year my goal is set at 25 which is easily accomplished and just merely used as a placeholder. My true goal remains to read daily whether its a short book, a chapter or a page. It all counts. I also wish to read longer books. I started reading The World by Simon Sebag Montefiore (1350 pages) 18 months ago and been dipping in and out of it. I hope to finish it this year! As a challenge I would like to read Finnegan’s Wake by James Joyce too.

My first book of the year will be a short one and a humourous one. The Diary of A Nobody by George Grossmith. I have read it before and thoroughly enjoyed it. Seemed a nice choice to start the year with, though usually I start with a Yasunari Kawabata novel either Thousand Cranes, Beauty & Sadness or Snow Country.

So that’s my plans for this bit of internet over the next year. Let’s see how we get on!