My Favorite Reads of 2020

Man, what a year, right? And I mean, I want to be optimistic but like...I think we have more 2020 coming to us next year. I can't say I want to do too much recapping of this year. That sounds like it would be a bit of a sad exercise. But there were rays of light in this year and since this is a book blog, why not focus on those books that I liked this year? 

Top books - new (to me) reads

The Body: A Guide for Occupants by Bill Bryson 

Go to Sleep, I Miss You by Lucy Knisley

The Southern Book Club's Guide to Slaying Vampires by Grady Hendrix

Andrea Vernon and the Corporation for UltraHuman Protection by Alexander C. Kane

Andrea Vernon and the Superhero Industrial Complex by Alexander C. Kane

Top books - the rereads

The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde

A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson

The Martian by Andy Weir

Lost in a Good Book by Jasper Fforde

The Well of Lost Plots by Jasper Fforde

Hyperbole and a Half by Allie Brosh

Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal by Christopher Moore

Unsurprisingly, there were more top rereads than new books. Which I mean, makes sense. Why would I reread a book if I wasn't a fan? And this year especially has required comfort reads. I ALMOST included Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell because it is excellent and also I have been listening to it for about 100 years and I'm very close to finishing but no promises it'll happen in time to be counted in 2020. Does this mean I should wait on this post until after tomorrow to see if I finish the book in time? Perhaps but I didn't think of that till now and you know what, I'm not changing it now.

I'm going to attempt a future post with a round up of the year's stats and top authors and whatnot but for now, staying positive and look at these books I enjoyed so much. 

November Reading Wrap Up

Hope those that celebrate had a nice and safe Thanksgiving with tasty food, even if things were a bit different from past years. Hopefully next year will be a bit more traditional if people would just GET IT TOGETHER. In the meantime, I have taken some additional time off from work to binge Leverage, get some Christmas decorations up and maybe try to clean up the house, as futile an exercise as that is. And of course, update my blog.

I had a surprisingly productive reading month. I don't know why or what made it so but here we are. Sure there were some short ones in there, which definitely helped make the total number look higher. I actually started relistening to Lamb while I waited for a library hold to come in. And then, even though I have read the book multiple times, I was invested in hearing how Lamb turned out (would it be different this time, YOU NEVER KNOW) and then I pushed my library hold out. Again. For roughly the 10th time. But it was worth it.

Here are the stats and also a picture of the little one in some festive old man jammies

Number of books read

5

Life of Pi by Yann Martel

The Woman in Cabin 10 by Ruth Ware

The Hallowe'en Party by Agatha Christie

Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal by Christopher Moore

A River in Darkness: One Man's Escape from North Korea by Masaji Ishikawa

Pages read

1,740

Fiction

80% - only May had a higher share of Fiction read. And even this month was almost 100% had that last book not been so short

BIPOC author

20%

Female author

40%

US authors

20%

Rereads

20%

Bookclub

20%

Translation

20%

Book format

audiobook: 80%

hardback: 20%

Where'd I get the book

library: 100%

Decades published

1960s: 20%

2000s: 60%

2010s: 20%

Resolution books

80%

Mostly non-US authors: Life of Pi (Yann Martel - Canada), The Woman in Cabin 10 (Ruth Ware - UK), Hallowe'en Party (Agatha Christie - UK), A River in Darkness (Masaji Ishikawa - Japan)

But that isn't all. A River in Darkness is also by BIPOC author and a translation