Back in March, I decided that I wanted to start Project Shop My Shelves (known as PSMS going forward). The goal of PSMS is to read twice as many books per month than I buy, but there are a few sub-goals that are equally important:

• Don’t buy new books unless they are from marginalized authors (indie or trad)
• A 2:1 ratio of old books to newly bought books every month (or more if possible)
• Read through the older books to finally get them off the TBR pile
• Be realistic about my enjoyment of an author and what medium I prefer to read them
• Post quarterly about my progress with this project

I figured now was as good a time as any to update my progress with this self-imposed project. TL;DR: [INSERT]

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Stats

October: I bought 8 ebooks, 0 ARCs, 8 physical books, 1 audiobooks. I read 11 books, 2 of which were preexisting, 17:11 bought to read ratio.

November: I bought 4 ebooks, 0 ARCs, 4 physical books, 0 audiobooks. I read 8 books, 5 of which were preexisting, 1:1 bought to read ratio.

December: I bought 1 ebooks, 0 ARCs, 5 physical books, 0 audiobooks. I read 8 books, 4 of which were preexisting, 3:4 bought to read ratio.

I am actually really happy that I managed to read more than I bought twice in one quarter. I’m still not able to reel in my buying or expand my reading enough to hit 1:2 bought to read, but I will happily take 1:1 for now. I will say that December looks especially good because I don’t count books I got for Christmas as part of the bought books.

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Buying Books: A Breakdown

Part of the success I’ve had this month comes from the fact that Christmas was coming. You can see the hard cut-off in November when my buying dropped off significantly. I try very hard to buy less the last couple months of the year. This is further enabled by most writers not having preorders in December. A lot of the books I bought were the next volume in graphic novel/manga series I enjoy. The other major chunk of books I bought were friends’ books that were on sale. I am a sucker for picking up the whole series at once if I think I’ll enjoy it. In this case, it was A. K. Faulkner’s Jack of Thorns and Trudie Skies’ entire gaslamp series.

I feel like this was the first quarter where I was pointedly mindful about my book purchases. I end to impulse buy books, and I tried this quarter to take a second and be like, “Do I really want this? Will I get to it any time soon?” It’s harder when it’s an author of color or a queer author because I want to make sure they’re supported/their publisher knows people want their work. That’s where I tend to get stuck.

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Reading Books: A Breakdown

Looking at the reading numbers, you can probably tell that I was a reading fiend in October. I was just blowing through books and loving life. Then, November hit, and I got caught in a reading rut. I think trying to finish the book and grading a shit ton of papers just made it really hard to focus and get through books in a timely manner. T. Kingfisher and Martha Wells are quickly becoming comfort authors to me, so when I am in a reading slump, I just read T. Kingfisher book after T. Kingfisher book. Thank god she has a giant backlist.

The downside to that is that my reads for Q4 are rather white (15/27 books were by white authors), but this was also counterbalanced by the manga and graphic novels I have been reading along with several other authors of color. I would like to mix it up a bit more. During a reading slump, it’s very hard for me to make myself read something else. The comfort authors just stick better, no matter how good the other authors are. It’s frustrating.

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Q1 2026 Outlook/Goals

Once again, I am aiming for at least a 1:1 ratio between bought and read. I’m pretty sure I am going to fail that in January because I bought a bunch of manga after a few series I liked wrapped up last year. The reading slump continued into January, but I feel like it’s getting better now. I’m really hoping that I can read much more in Q1 and read much more widely than I did in Q4.

When it comes to purchases, I am going to try to be mindful about mindless buying. I don’t have many preorders for January and February, which will help to keep my purchasing to a minimum. I’m also hoping to focus on reading what I have already, especially books I preordered in 2025 that I never got to. On my phone, I have a list of preorders that I mark off and later delete when I read the book. One of my goals this year is to go through the books on that list from previous years and knock them out. I also need to utilize my TBR coffin because I forget it exists.