January - Looking Back, Looking Forward
In this month's Bookish News, I am looking back on the reading year as well as ahead.
Image via Austinkleon.com
LOOKING BACK
I finished 78 books last year! I track the books I read on an excel spreadsheet, listing the title, author, fiction or non-fiction, the country where the book takes place and the genre. When I look back on the year, I can see that 62% of the books I read were fiction (38% non-fiction), and 67% of the books were written by female authors. My top three genres are mystery (21), general fiction (19) and memoir (14). Mystery is my go-to for escape reading and/or getting out of a reading slump. I am surprised that I finished 14 memoirs; I knew they were some of my favorites but didn’t realize I had read so many. I read more books set in the U.S. in 2019 and the range of countries I read in decreased from 18 to 11 countries. I plan to expand this number in 2020.
BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR
I love looking at all the 2019 Best Books lists. Below are a few links to check out if you have not seen any.
The Library Reads list shows the 10 most popular books as chosen by librarians for 2019. There are a lot of familiar titles on this list and any of these would be great next reads.
The NYTimes 10 Best Book List is a bit aspirational and honestly doesn’t look like too much fun. I read one book on that list, Say Nothing by Patrick Keefe. It is a detailed history of the Troubles in Northern Ireland that is anchored around his investigation into the disappearance of a single mother of 8.
Podcaster and avid reader Laura Tremane has a great podcast 10 Things to Tell You, and excellent taste in books. Here is her list of the Best books she read.
And my personal reading guru Anne Bogel from Modern Mrs Darcy (MMD) also publishes her best of list which is more upbeat and includes some backlist titles.
LOOKING AHEAD
So what are you going to read in 2020? One way to have a great reading year is to plan ahead. The new year is when a lot of reading challenges come out and these can help you build a reading plan. I don’t always do a reading challenge but I am going to link to a few I have followed before or look interesting.
Modern Mrs. Darcy’s Reading Challenge is a good place to start with 12 categories.
Mom Advice Reading Challenge has 24 reading prompts.
Book Riot’s Read Harder Challenge is geared towards breaking you out of a rut and pushing your comfort zone. There are also 24 different categories with some unique ideas.
As mentioned above, this year I am planning to expand the geography of my books and so far I am off to a great start. I have already read books set in Japan, Canada, France and Iran.
Short Reviews of Recent Reads:
The Stationary Shop by Marjan Kamali– Highly recommend this touching story about young couple who fall in love in a stationary/book shop in Iran in 1953. Tho deeply in love, their lives do not go according to plan. I don’t want to give too much away but I LOVE this book: the story, the characters and the beautiful setting. I have not read a story in a while that drew me in and made me feel so much and I won’t be surprised if this is on my “best of list” in December.
A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki– The diary of 16 year old Japanese student, Nao, washes ashore in a remote area of British Columbia and is found by an author. This story, told in multiple time periods and view points, is beautifully written and often tragic - Nao’s life is really unhappy both at home and at school. There is not a lot of action in this book but the characters are beautifully drawn and the story feels like a meditation on perseverance.
Behold and Becoming by Ruth Chou Simms – I am using this as a devotional this month. I loved her first book GraceLaced and she continues to pair beautiful watercolor with illuminating scripture in unique ways.
Atomic Habits by James Clear– This short book is filled with clear concise information about creating and keeping good habits and would make an excellent choice for the new year. I listened to the audio version but plan invest in my own copy to really dig into.
Thanks for joining me on this bookish journey. Please pass this newsletter along to anyone who would enjoy. I would also love to hear what you are reading and loving lately!