I'll be the first to admit that most of my New Year's resolutions seldom make it past Jan. 2. I'm hoping that by sharing my reading resolutions with you, I'll not only engender some much-needed accountability, but encourage you to make some resolutions of your own.

1. I will reread a book I loved as a child.
Only one book? I can think of at least a dozen. Here are several at the top of my list:
The Secret Garden and A Little Princess by Frances Hodgsdon Burnett
Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl
The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster
The Boxcar Children by Gertrude Chandler Warner

2. I will read a book published in the year I was born.
No, I'm not going to tell you the year! By giving you the titles, however, it won't take too much sleuthing to figure it out. I found the easiest way to generate a list of titles for your birth year is to go to http://en.wikipedia.org and do a search for "19xx in Literature," filling in the x's with the appropriate numbers. Here are some titles from my birth year:
Seize the Day by Saul Bellow
The City and the Stars by Arthur C. Clarke
The Nun's Story by Kathryn Hulme
Peyton Place by Grace Metalious
Profiles in Courage by John F. Kennedy

3. I will finally read that classic I've been avoiding.
Once again, only one? I'll let you in on a little secret. Having frittered away much of my youth reading Tiger Beat and Mad magazines, there are some serious holes in my literary knowledge. I hereby resolve to plug a few of them:
Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
Moby Dick by Herman Melville
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger

4. I will read a book written from a political viewpoint totally opposite of my own.
A friend once told me the best way to respond to someone whose political beliefs you disdain is to take a deep breath and say, "Now that's an interesting way of looking at things." It's nonconfrontational and leaves the door open for dialog instead of diatribe. Here a few titles from across the political spectrum:
American Grit by Tony Blankley
Liberty and Tyranny by Mark R. Levin
The Pornography of Power by Robert Scheer
Right is Wrong by Arianna Huffngton

5. I will reread a book I just didn't get when I was 18.
Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlet Letter, comes immediately to mind. All I can say about that one is, "Thank goodness for Cliffs Notes." And since I got a C- on a wildly original and apparently erroneous essay I wrote about Arthur Miller's play The Crucible, maybe I'll go back and give that one a re-read as well. Here are a few more:
Beowulf
Silas Marner by George Eliot
Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman

What are your reading resolutions for the New Year? Send me an e-mail at joyce.deming@jeffcolibrary.org and we may include your ideas in a future column.
Happy New Year and Happy Reading!
You can check out these titles and many more at any Jefferson County Public Library location. Talk to your librarian for more recommendations.