And because I love a good, scripted, survey!
Number of books I read cover to cover this year: 52.
Number of books that were rereads from previous years: 3
Genre I read the most from: Nonfiction, also loads of short story collections and juvenile fiction with the boychild.
Most employed bookmark of 2014: The ol' corner fold. Sorry Library.
Best Book I read in 2014: Neverhome, by Laird Hunt
Book I thought I would love but didn't: Deadeye Dick, by Kurt Vonnegut. Let's All Kill Constance, by Ray Bradbury. Holy The Firm, by Annie Dillard. Three of my favorite authors...all dud works. Go figure.
Most surprising read (in a good or bad way): Eat, Pray, Love, by Elizabeth Gilbert. I knew it was going to be bad, and it was bad. But I was surprised by how readable it was, when not totally and completely enraging.
Best series of 2014: Harry Potter books 1-4. Which I read with my 7 year old, and it was my first time. Thoroughly enjoyable. I generally avoid things that people go bananas over because they are generally awful (TWILIGHT!!!). I'm so glad that isn't the case with HP.
Favorite new author discovered in 2014: Rainbow Rowell and Laird Hunt. Both quite different, but both quite amazeballs.
Best book read from a genre outside of normal comfort zone: everything was in my comfort zone. Except possibly Eat, Pray, Love, I'm typically uncomfortable reading books with Oprah's seal emblazoned on them. For completely arbitrary and judgy reasons. It's a character flaw I can live with. I died a little bit inside when Oprah inducted The Good Earth into her club. No, Oprah! Nooooooo!
Most action packed, thrilling, unputdownable book: Company of Liars, by Karen Maitland. Also, Illuminations, by Mary Sharratt. (Holla at ya, Medieval historical fiction!)
Favorite cover of a book read in 2014: Meh. Maybe The Signature of All Things, by Elizabeth Gilbert. It's planty.
Most memorable character: Hildegard Von Bingen, care of Mary Sharratt. Or Constance/Ash via Laird Hunt. Or Alma, from Elizabeth Gilbert's Signature Of All Things.
Most beautifully written book of 2014: Dept. of Speculation, by Jenny Offil. And, again, Neverhome, by Laird Hunt.
Most thought provoking/life-changing book: Outliers, by Malcolm Gladwell. Or Bird by Bird, y Anne Lamott. Or If This Isn't Nice What Is, Vonnegut speeches.
Book you can't believe you waited until 2014 to read: Harry Potter. Though I'm glad I did, because reading them with my kid for the first time is pretty neat.
Shortest read: something poetry, like Splinter Factory, by Jeffrey McDaniels.
Longest Read: A History of the World in 100 Objects... can't remember who wrote it. I listened to it on audio technically, and got the hard copy from the library strictly for the pictures. it was over 1000 pages. phew.
Book that shocked you the most: Psychopath Test, by Jon Ronson. Yeeeeeesh!
Book you pushed the most people to read and they did: Currently it's Attachments, by Rainbow Rowell. Though I'm still pushing Neverhome on everybody and awaiting results.
Favorite non-romantic relationship. The girls in Attachments. Or Bill Bryson and his kids in I'm A Stranger Here Myself.
Favorite book read in 2014 from a previously read author: Great Expectations, by Dickens. Or, Look At The Birdie, by Vonnegut. Or At The Gates Of The Animal Kingdom, by Amy Hempel.
Best book read in 2014 that I read because of peer pressure: probably Harry Potter. Does offspring pressure count as peer pressure?
Best 2014 debut I read: Neverhome, by Laird Hunt. And so I don't sound like a broken record, One More Thing, by BJ Novak. That's an excellent book.
Most fun to read: I'm A Stranger Here Myself, by Bill Bryson. Or, My Planet, by Mary Roach. Or, Adam And Eve's Diaries, by Mark Twain.
Made me cry, or nearly cry: Slouching Toward Bethlehem, by Joan Didion. I NEVER cry at books or movies. I just don't. The joke is that I probably have a heart of stone. But damn, that one essay about Hawaii and Pearl Harbor and the teenage soldier boys...damn. It must've been an off day for me.
Hidden gem of the year: Wide Sargasso Sea, by Jean Rhys. Quite literally a HIDDEN gem. Though not an actual gem. I found this while cleaning out my garage. I think it used to belong to my sister-in-law. It's anyone's guess as to how it ended up in our garage. I read it back to back with Jane Eyre. Very neat.
Book that crushed your soul: Farewell To The East End, by Jennifer Worth. The workhouses! The poverty! If that's not soul crushing, I don't know what is.
Book that made you the most mad: Eat Pray Love, UGH! The whining. THE WHINING! It should be titled, Throwing Money At First World Problems. Also, it should be a criminal offense to base an entire book on some giant, catastrophic, life-altering horribleness and then refuse to delve into or explain what the horribleness is, like at all, but still constantly, CONSTANTLY elude to it, and use the phrase, "suffice it to say..." a bunch. Bleck. Elizabeth Gilbert, you're so much better than that. Stick to fiction.
Also The Good Life Lab, by Wendy Tremayne made me pretty mad. Do not, seriously DO NOT, claim to have zero homesteading skills over and over and over, and chant "if I can do it, anybody can!" and then later reveal that you had a 6 figure salary banked before starting a rural homestead and also a wealth of previously acquired homesteading skills...like being well trained in welding. Sheesh. I have strong feels about this.
The Numbers Breakdown (that will be interesting to no one).
Fiction: 30
Nonfiction or other: 22
Authored by women: 27
Authored by men: 23
2 were collections authored by both men and women.
Goodreads Star Breakdown
5 stars: 12
4 stars: 21
3 stars: 10
2 stars: 7
1 star: 2
Pages read in 2014: 14,600 not including abandoned and unfinished books.
Hard Copies: 37
Audio books: 7
Ebooks: 5
Owned: 22
Free Audiobooks App: 4
Library: 26
