Yes, it is very narcissistic to name a reading challenge after myself, but frankly all the good names were taken and I’m not one to plagiarize.  So what’s my challenge for myself and for anyone who wants to participate?  Well, here it is:

The Mad Reviewer Reading Challenge is to read and review (either on Goodreads, Amazon or your own blog) 104 books in one year starting January 1, 2013 and ending December 31, 2013.

Yes, this is an insane amount of books and I know that not many people may be able to achieve it.  That’s why there are different levels you can strive for:

1.  Mad Reviewer: 104 books in one year. (2 books a week all year.)

2.  Crazy Reviewer: 52 books in one year. (1 book a week all year.)

3.  Slightly Sane Reviewer: 26 books in one year. (1 book every fortnight all year.)

4.  Sane Reviewer: 12 books in one year.  (1 book every month all year.)

Got that?  So, of course, there are some rules to go along with it:

1.  Self-published, independently published and traditionally published books are all completely acceptable.  You can even read them on an e-reader.

2.  No audiobooks.  The point is to read books, not have someone reading to you.

3.  I don’t have a sign-up form like many reading challenges, but if you have a blog you can copy and paste the code below into a text widget:

Goal:  104 books read and reviewed<br>
Current:  0<br>
<div style=”height:15px;background:#A9D0F5;border:solid;”>
<div style=”background:#3366FF;color:white;width:0;”><b>0</b>
</div>
</div>

(A huge thanks goes to Stacking Pennies for the initial format of the progress bar.)

This is the one I used, but you can of course modify it to fit your goal.  Don’t have a blog?  Don’t worry.  Just keep track of all the books you read somewhere and comment on my year-end post on December 31.  I’m trusting you guys to stay honest, but if I need to I’ll check out whether you actually posted reviews.

4.  Everyone who achieves their goal will be entered into a draw for a grand prize, provided by me.  What that prize is I’m not sure yet, but it will obviously be book related.  If you have any suggestions for a possible prize, please let me know!

5.  You can review your books on any site.  Your own blog, Goodreads, someone else’s blog, Amazon, Barnes and Noble, etc.  The point is just to review the books you read!

So who wants to sign up?  Just post your intentions in the comments below and what level you want to aim for.  Personally, I’m going to go for ‘Mad Reviewer’ because I really should earn my name.

It would also be great if you could publicize this in any way possible because I want as many people in my draw as possible.  Obviously being Freshly Pressed would be too much to hope for, but I can still dream, can’t I?