I Read Some More Things

After missing my reading goal last year I attempted to set a more realistic goal this year of 40 books. Considering I read 45 books last year I thought hitting 40 would be easy. I completed the challenge just under the wire finishing book number 40 with two days to spare. I hit a similar wall this year in the November time frame, although I don’t have the excuse of being tripped up by a Brandon Sanderson tome. Once again the challenge was a motivation to read and to set aside time to read. I do think that 40 books is the sweet spot as a goal and I’m going to repeat the attempt next year.

Once again here are some stats with the change from the previous year in parentheses.

  • Books Read: 40 (-4)
  • Fiction Books: 28 (+5)
  • Non-Fiction Books: 12 (-9)
  • Pages Read: 15,145 (-2,791)
  • Longest Book: 909 (A Column of Fire)
  • Shortest Book: 102 (The Lessons of History)
  • Mean Book Length: 379 (-28)
  • Median Book Length: 346 (-34)
  • Month with most books read: February/September/December (5)
  • Month with fewest books read: October (1)

Two of the deltas from last year strike me as interesting. The ration of Fiction to Non-Fiction was rather skewed this year towards Fiction. Not sure why this happened but it will be something I pay attention to next year. The difference in total number of pages read can’t be fully explained by the difference in books read. I wonder if not reading a Sanderson book has that effect.

For next year in addition to number of books read I’m setting two additional goals. First I want to read at least five new fiction authors. I don’t want to get lost in catching up on what some newly discovered authors have written and keeping up with various series and trilogies. Second I want to write some blurb about every book I read. It might not be a review or a summary but something to help me remember the book and how I felt after reading.

Book List

  • City of Stairs Bennett, Robert
  • The Upstarts Stone, Brad
  • Persepolis Rising Corey, James
  • Artemis Weir, Andy
  • Borderline Baker, Mishell
  • Starship Troopers Heinlein, Robert
  • The Dispatcher Scalzi, John
  • All Who Go Do Not Return Deen, Shulem
  • Victorious (The Lost Fleet) Campbell, Jack
  • Why Buddhism is True Wright, Robert
  • Ship Breaker Bacigalupi, Paolo
  • Infomocracy Older, Malka
  • The Ruined House Nanmdar, Ruby
  • City of Thieves Benioff, David
  • Arbitrary Stupid Goal Shopsin, Tamara
  • The Warded Man Brett, Peter
  • A Deepness in the Sky Vinge, Vernor
  • A Column of Fire Follet, Ken
  • Ice Capades Avery, Sean
  • Killers of the Flower Moon Grann, David
  • American War El Akkad, Omar
  • Phantom Pains Baker, Mishell
  • Head On Scalzi, John
  • The House of Broken Angels Urrea, Luis
  • Null States Older, Malka
  • The Armored Saint Cole, Myke
  • The Lessons of History Durant, Will
  • The Women in the Window Finn, A. J.
  • The Drowned Cities Bacigalupi, Paolo
  • New York 2240 Robinson, Kim
  • Progrom: Kishinev and the Tilt of History Zipperstein, Steven
  • The Desert Spear Brett, Peter
  • Countdown to Zero Day Zetter, Kim
  • Space Race: The Battle to Rule the Heavens Cadbury, Deborah
  • Catch-67 Goodman, Micah
  • Word by Word: The Secret Life of Dictionaries Stamper, Kory
  • Red Moon Robinson, Kim
  • Thin Air Morgan, Richard
  • The Consuming Fire Scalzi, John
  • The Queen of Crows Cole, Myke
2019-01-01