Happy New Year, EDIWTB readers! I hope you all have a wonderful 2014. I had a good 2013. Some changes on the job front, but otherwise things were pretty steady.
As far as reading, it was an OK year. I wasn’t blown away by a lot of what I read. Some of the books I chose didn’t live up to expectations based on reviews or prior books by the same author. But I also read some debut fiction that I found pretty exciting. Maybe I am just pickier than I used to be? Grumpier? My resolution for 2014 is to be even more selective about what I read so that I don’t waste time with books I don’t love.
In terms of volume, unfortunately I didn’t match my recent watershed reading year of 2011, when I read 54 books. In 2012, I managed to get in 47 books, which I was happy about considering I had a baby and started a new job. In 2013, I hoped to split the difference and reach 50 books. I only made it to 49. So my goal for 2014 is once again to make it to 50.
[Once again, I know there are a lot of book bloggers out there reading this and saying, “50 books? Seriously?” I wish I read as fast as you all do!!]
Here are my standout reads from 2012:
- The Interestings, Meg Wolitzer
- News from Heaven, Jennifer Haigh
- Me Before You, Jojo Moyes
- Three Junes, Julia Glass
- Big Brother, Lionel Shriver
- Longbourn, Jo Baker
- Tampa, Alissa Nutting
Best debut novel goes to Elliott Holt’s You Are One of Them.
Most addictive read goes to The Silent Wife by A.S.A. Harrison.
For the last two years, I have tracked the Depressing Themes of the books I read, and the lists have been impressive. Here are the depressing subjects covered by the books I read in 2013: facial disfigurement (twice), being a widower, 9/11, home invasion, death of a baby (twice), paraplegia, euthanasia, family dysfunction, AIDS, the entire plot of The Little Bride, the entire plot of Little Bee (UGH!), obesity (twice), adolescent friendship, dead best friends, early widowhood, dead sister, breast cancer, death by parasomnia, infertility, thwarted adoption, kids in jail/on drugs, killing people while on a lifeboat, and abandonment of child (back-to-back reads!). Again, I say it: sheesh.
The breakdown:
- 47 fiction, 2 non-fiction
- 16 repeat authors during 2013: Ann Patchett, Elizabeth Strout, Jennifer Haigh, Curtis Sittenfeld, Lionel Shriver, Ian McEwan, Mark Haddon, Jennifer Close, J. Courtney Sullivan, Terry McMillan, Liane Moriarty, Jhumpa Lahiri, Maggie O’Farrell, Meg Wolitzer, Caroline Leavitt and Susanna Daniel.
- 14 audiobooks
- 9 male authors, 40 female author
- Book that disappointed me most: Little Bee by Chris Cleave.
Here’s to a great year of reading in 2014! And let me know what your reading highlights were this year. What was the best book you read in 2013?