Right, let’s assume I’m not going to finish any more books between now and the end of the year. What a ridiculous assumption. Anyway, here’s my 2014-in-reading wrap-up (which won’t cover the books I read between now and the end of the year. I promise to update you if any of them are earth-shattering).
This year I started reading 95 books and got to the end of 87 of them. Nineteen of them were published in 2014. For most of the year I was doing the Australian Women Writers Challenge (my wrap-up of that is here), which made a lot of difference to what I read. I was also in a slipstream book club, shortlisted for two prizes which meant I wanted to read the other shortlistees, concerned with climate change and shipwrecks (thanks to books I’m working on), and a few weeks back I signed up to TBR20 (more on that here).
My favourite books of the year were:
- Familiar by J Robert Lennon – reality and unreality bundled in together in a masterful bit of genre blurring
- Pale Fire by Vladimir Nabokov – as my Goodreads review said, ‘Yes, very good’
- Gone by Jennifer Mills – chilling and enigmatic and just bloody great
- Anguli Ma by Chi Vu – Australia looked utterly different while I was reading this Vietnamese gothic horror set in Footscray
- Beloved by Toni Morrison – I feel like an idiot for not reading this sooner. I had no idea
- Sea Hearts (also published as The Brides of Rollrock Island) by Margo Lanagan – a bleak fairytale that eviscerates the relationship between women and men
- One foot wrong by Sofie Laguna – horrible, beautiful, bewitching and repulsive (look, sorry if you came here looking for feel-good heartwarmers…)
- The sixth extinction by Elizabeth Kolbert – read this book about how humans are killing everything, how in the scheme of things it matters less than you think, and marvel at Kolbert’s light, dry wit
- Cold Light by Frank Moorhouse – there’s not much I like better than the Edith Campbell Berry trilogy.
And now to the entirely unnecessary charts…
Cover image is from http://trail.pugetsound.edu/2011/04/pie-chart-reading-period/
Julianne
December 19, 2014 at 7:27 pmOooh…love entirely unnecessary charts.
Jane Bryony Rawson
December 20, 2014 at 8:21 ammmmm…. unnecessary….
nickgadd
December 19, 2014 at 8:44 pmFinishing 87 books in a year is a damn fine effort. I haven’t kept track of mine but it wouldn’t be anywhere near that many. Finishing 87/95 is also an impressive ratio. I haven’t read any of the books on this list – started Pale Fire but never finished it – but I like the sound of the Kolbert. Thanks for the tip. For what it’s worth the best books I read this year were The Old Ways by Robert MacFarlane and River of Shadows by Rebecca Solnit.
Jane Bryony Rawson
December 20, 2014 at 8:21 amThanks Nick.
Anne Rawson
December 21, 2014 at 10:04 amYour father would be proud of your graphs
Jane Bryony Rawson
December 21, 2014 at 10:10 amYes, he taught me how to do them. He probably hopes I’ll use the skill for something more complex…
whisperinggums
December 22, 2014 at 12:24 amI have read two of your top ten – Beloved which is an astonishing book, and one of the few non-Austen books I’ve read twice, and Cold light, which I also liked a lot. I have Gone in my TBR pile – a gift from my brother – but keep not getting to it. You’ve just increased the pressure. I also feel I should read Sea hearts, but I think Gone is higher on my list.
Jane Bryony Rawson
December 22, 2014 at 8:52 amGone is brilliant, as long as you’re OK with ambiguity. Lots of ambiguity.
whisperinggums
December 22, 2014 at 9:22 amOh, I like ambiguity!
annabelsmith
December 23, 2014 at 4:05 pmYour pie charts are very handsome. 3D! I’m copying that for myself for next year. I like the chart ‘who’s getting my money. I’d like to chart that myself. Next year also! I didn’t finish pale Fire. I was intrigued but not gripped.
Jane Bryony Rawson
December 23, 2014 at 4:08 pmYeah, I’m not sure Pale Fire was gripping, but I was having a lovely time reading it so I just kept on going. I was going through one of those ‘bored with regular books’ phases.
equineocean
January 21, 2015 at 3:59 pmAwesome! Next procrastinatory activity: make totally unnecessary pie charts about my 2014 reading too. I like the idea of the TRB challenge and at the very least am going to pull unread books off my shelf and see what the pile looks like! I suspect it will be largely non fiction, which isn’t very helpful as I am currently in a fiction-devouring stage.
Jane Bryony Rawson
January 25, 2015 at 9:20 amYeah, I tried to include a few non-fictions in my list, but they keep getting pushed to the bottom of the pile…
cjm76
January 21, 2015 at 4:04 pmMammoth effort! The pie charts are getting me all hot under the collar 😉 And oh, Sea Hearts … love.
Jane Bryony Rawson
January 25, 2015 at 9:20 amSea Hearts is pretty much the best.
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