I’ve just looked at my TBR pile and it’s heinous. I used to have a single TBR shelf, and now I’ve spread across three. The problem is the books that are brand new and unread are intertwined between books that I actually have read already, which makes no sense. But I have no strength at the moment to reorganize my bookshelves completely, so I’m hoping this challenge will help me get organized.

It’s run by Adam @ RoofBeamReader.com . The aim is to get reading those TBR books that have been on our shelves for longer than a year.

1. Virginia Woolf Night and Day (1919) A book I bought when I was still an undergraduate student, which means at least… 4 years ago. [Insert gasp of horror here]. I need to get to it
2. Henry James Princess Casamassima (1886) A book I bought when I was doing my Master’s. That would be three years ago. Yeah, I’m not proud of myself.
3. Peter Frankopan The Silk Roads (2015) I bought this book around Christmas 2016 or 2017? Everyone I know who read it has loved it. It’s time to catch up.
4. Zdzisław Najder Życie Josepha Conrada Korzeniowskiego (2006) I received this one for Christmas 2017. It’s still in its foil wrapping. It’s not that I don’t want to read it ( I really, really do), it’s just that… well… it’s so big and scary
5. Patrick Rothfuss The Wise Man’s Fear (2012)—it has been living on the shelf for a while. My boyfriend read it before I did. It really needs to be read.
6. Abdel Selou Odmieniles moje Życie (2012) I think I got this one as soon as the film based on it was published (a friend of mine got it for my birthday), and I still haven’t read it. Ooops
7. Simone de Beauvoir Les Mandarins – This has reappeared on this blog again and again. It’s a long book, okay? And I know it has sad bits.  I still want to read it though.
8. Olga Tokarczuk Bieguni (Flights) (2017) – this is a Polish book that won the international Man Booker Prize- and, guess what, I still haven’t read it. It’s been on my shelf since 2017 and I still haven’t read it. My English friends have read it in translation. I haven’t. It doesn’t get much embarrassing than this.
9. David Olusoga Black and British (2016) – I got this one when I was in a flurry of buying books the civil rights movement. I read all the other books I bought that time, but not this one. So yeah.
10. Mary Wollstonecraft A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792) – has been staring from my bookshelf at me for ages. I don’t even have an excuse at this stage.
11. Gillian Beer Alice in Space (2016) I received this book as a present at least three years back, and it has a lovely cover, but I never got round to reading it.
12. Dodie Smith I Capture the Castle (1949) I can’t even remember when I bought this book, but embarrassingly enough I know I was still in high school. And yet I never read it…

Which books have been in your TBR for an embarrassingly long time? Are you planning to join the challenge?