TSS: 2010 in Review
Happy 2011, readers! I can tell already that it’s going to be awesome.
2010 was an big year for me. Despite taking a month and a half off of blogging (and of reading everything except graphic novels) in order to finish my dissertation, I still managed to read more books this year then ever before! My final tally comes in at 163 new-to-me books and audiobooks read, compared to the previous best of 161 in 2008. Probably because a large chunks of those were graphic novels, my page total is actually down from previous years; I wound up at just over 49k. I also spent less time listening to audiobooks than normal (concomitant with less lab work and more time writing) – only 11.8 days of 2010 were spent listening to new books.
If you want to make pretty graphs of your own, you can download my reading tracking spreadsheet. It’s an Excel spreadsheet where you enter the title, author, date finished, page count, and audiobook time, and it calculates all sorts of fun statistics! I’ve updated it for 2011 – you can now set a page count goal as well as a goal for the number of books for the year. If you’ve used previous versions of the sheet, you should be able to just copy/paste your info for previous years into the new version; if you have any problems, let me know!
I’m not going to do a formal “best of” list for 2010, since I always have a really hard time getting my picks down to 5 or even 10 “best” books. Instead, here are my picks of the month for the year!
January |
February |
March |
April |
May |
June |
July |
August    |
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September |
October |
November |
December |
January: Going Bovine by Libba Bray narrowly edging out The Vintner’s Luck by Elizabeth Knox
February: Tooth and Claw by Jo Walton
March: Barrayar by Lois McMaster Bujold
April: Nation by Terry Pratchett, with honorable mentions going to The Unnameables by Ellen Booraem and The Map of True Places by Brunonia Barry
May: Kitchen Confidential by Anthony Bourdain
June: Marvel 1602 by Neil Gaiman
July: Red Seas Under Red Skies by Scott Lynch, just narrowly edging out Will Grayson, Will Grayson by John Green and David Levithan, with another honorable mention to Stealing Fire by Jo Graham
August: Four-way tie: The Magicians and Mrs. Quent by Galen Beckett, Stiff by Mary Roach, Geektastic by Holly Black and Cecil Castellucci, and Shades of Grey by Jasper Fforde
September: The Sharing Knife: Beguilement by Lois McMaster Bujold, with an honorable mention to Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver and the Midnighters trilogy by Scott Westerfeld
October: Revolution by Jennifer Donnelly, with an honorable mention to Behemoth by Scott Westerfeld
November: Tie between Zombies Vs. Unicorns by Holly Black and Justine Larbalestier, and Towers of Midnight by Robert Jordan and Brandon Sanderson
December: Brothers in Arms by Lois McMaster Bujold
What about you, readers? Read any good books this year?
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Mm, I love reading everyone’s best-of lists at the end of the year. Looks like August was particularly good for you, eh? Actually, August was good for me as well — interesting. It’s by far not my favorite month.
Jenny – August was great, reading-wise. Makes up for December, which had a lot of books I liked well enough, but nothing that really blew my socks off.
Wow! You had an amazing year with reading all of those books and completing your dissertation!
You had a great reading year! Congrats on surpassing previous your record. Thanks for making your spreadsheet available. I used it for the first time in 2010 and loved it. I will download it again this year (thanks for adding the page count goal).
And yes, you are right. For the second day in 2011, it’s been a great year so far and it will only get better!
What a fabulous list of favorites. Looks like 2011 is going to be a great year!
Wow … thank you for the spreadsheet! I’ve seen mention of it on a couple other book blogs, and after crunching numbers for hours for my end of year posts, this is exactly what I need.
Looks like you had a great reading year! Here’s to a wonderful 2011!
I love your reading graph to itty bitty bits! I’ve been using it for four years now, and I get such a kick out of seeing how each year’s reading compares to the last.
Great list! Revolution made my list for 2010 too, and I just finished the Sharing Knife books and thoroughly enjoyed them too!
I am glad to see that I am not the only one who loves my spreadsheets to keep track of reads!
I’m so glad you liked Tooth and Claw; it was so wonderful, wasn’t it?
I’ve been using an Excel spreadsheet to track my reading for a couple of years, but I’d actually never thought of putting all the lists on one graph! (Or counting page numbers, for that matter.)
And I’m pleased to see that 3 out of your 12 months involve Bujold. Isn’t she just fantastic? :)
Marian – I did read a lot of Bujold this year (nine books, I think?), but even so, it’s no surprise that so many of them wound up on my best-of lists.
I like how you did your best of list. I still haven’t finished Geektastic. I loved the few stories I read and then got sidetracked by other books. I should really find the time to finish it.
Alyce – Story a day!
I loved Nation, too! And I’m reading Tooth and Claw for a book club– I’m excited to read it even more now!
great list of books! I’m reading Red Seas Under Red Skies for like the millionth time right now, omg do I love Scott Lynch!!!
I’ve been going through everyone’s favorites for the year lists these last few days, my “want to read” list is exploding!
I am so impressed by the number of books read – I thought I was doing well with nearly 100! And to have been completing a dissertation as well…
Yes, here’s to 2011!
I love that you made a list by months – I can only imagine how difficult it must have been to select only a few among so many read. I know it’s always difficult for me, I always feel some books would deserve more attention!
Love the graph! Good timing, as I’ve been playing with revamping my own reading tracker for the last few days. So far I’ve just been tracking the books and whether they’re new or reread, but I’ve been toying with adding a few more columns and coming up with more fun statistics…