It’s been a really great reading year with loads of choice within my favourite genres. Although I kept my reading challenge to read and review at least 100 books, I ended up reading 162 books with 125 reviews published and another 23 in hand.
I have read 104 books written by female authors and 60 by men – the sharp-eyed among you will have notice that adds up to 164, but there were two books in this year’s list with joint authorship – Windhaven by George R.R. Martin and Lisa Tuttle and Athena’s Champion by David Hair and Cath Mayo.
In a related challenge I set myself the task of reading at least two books by female authors previously unknown to me in the Discovery Challenge, as set out by Jo Hall. I managed to read 43 books in this category, which is 27% of my 2018 reading list, while 32 books were by male authors I hadn’t previously read, which means that 47% of the book I read last year were by authors new to me. I’m really happy with that – it means I am continuing to expand my reading experience, rather than only sticking with authors I know and like, which was the case before I started this challenge.
I have continued requesting review copies from Netgalley and have also occasionally taken review copies from writing colleagues, so that during 2018 I read and reviewed 64 new releases. I also was determined to read more books on my ever-teetering TBR pile – in the event I managed 55 books, which I’m really pleased about. The huge shock is that this year we only read 6 library books – this simply won’t do. I am a real fan of our local library and I am determined that during the coming year, we will be using the library a whole lot more, otherwise we risk losing it.
In 2018 I read 72 science fiction books, 57 fantasy books, 19 crime adventures, 6 contemporary fiction, 4 historical books, 4 non-fiction books. Science fiction includes sub-genres such as space opera, colony adventures, apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic, time travel, alternate history, military, futuristic crime, literary and steampunk. Fantasy includes sub-genres such as epic, urban, swords and sorcery, musket and magic, sand and sorcery, underworld, historical, grimdark and coming of age. While I’m aware I probably should widen my reading, I’m not going to. I read for pleasure and escape, these days. I reckon I’ve earnt the right.
So much for my determination to read more children’s books… I’m going to give up on this one. It clearly isn’t going to happen, given this has been an ongoing target ever since I started monitoring my reading statistics and each year it’s been a failure. But this year that failure has reached a new low – last year I read 19 children’s books in comparison to the measly 6 of this year. Whereas YA is holding fairly constant at 34 this year, compared with 30 last year.
This is a new category I have added. I have read 52 books by small presses and self-published authors, which is 32% of my 2018 reading list. This is an outcome I would like to improve on next year.
How did you get on this year with your reading targets and challenges?
year was only a few days old. After the success of the last few years, I have become a real fan of this process as it has given me clear targets to work towards throughout the year and then at the end of every month, hold myself to account in fulfilling these goals. So how did I do in February?
Keeper of the Watch
Fire and Bone
Brainfluff 