Big (?) Book Post 2023-2024

I neglected publish my Big Book Post in 2023 (although I did write it, so thank you to past me for doing that work), and since both 2023 and 2024 were pretty light reading years for me, I present to you a combined 2023/2024 Big Book Post (clocking in at 13 books total, roughly the size of a regular Big Book Post, so I won't call it a Bigger Book Post or anything like that).

2023
Jan: Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens
Feb: Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law by Mary Roach
Mar-Apr: The Constant Rabbit by Jasper Fforde
May: The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller
Jun: Raw Dog: The Naked Truth About Hot Dogs by Jamie Loftus
Jul-Oct: Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer
Nov: Happy-Go-Lucky by David Sedaris
Nov-Dec: Heartstopper Vols 1-5 by Alice Oseman

2024
Jan: The Color Purple by Alice Walker
Jan: Babayaga by Toby Barlow
Feb: Eileen by Ottessa Moshfegh
Mar-Apr: The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton (did not finish)
Jun-Sept: The Dispossessed by Ursula K. Le Guin
Oct-Nov: Priestdaddy by Patricia Lockwood
Dec: Nightbitch by Rachel Yoder (still reading but will probably give up)
Dec: 1491 by Charles C. Mann (still reading, haven't given up hope yet)

By the authors

10 female authors and 3 male authors; 11 American authors, 2 British authors, 2 BIPOC authors; 1 deceased (Le Guin), 6 authors over 60 (the oldest being Walker, born 1944), 2 born in the nineties (Loftus and Oseman), and 3 around my age (Lockwood, Miller, and Moshfegh, all born between 1978 and 1982); at least one out queer author.

About the books

Of the non-fiction, 2 were about nature, 1 was about hot dogs, and all of them were at least a little bit autobiographical. Of the fiction, 3 were fantasy, 1 was a mystery, 1 was sci-fi, and the Heartstopper series is a YA graphic novel series. The oldest book I read was The Dispossessed (1974), and the second oldest was The Color Purple (1982). All the rest were published in the last 13 years (oldest being The Song of Achilles in 2011) and two were published in the year I read them (Raw Dog and the latest Hearthstopper). Time periods range from the creation of the world (Sweetgrass) to the future (Dispossessed) with stops in antiquity (Achilles), the early 20th century (Purple), the fifties (Babayaga), and the sixties (Crawdads), and locales include ancient Greece, a trip to India with Mary Roach (among other places), a cross-country road trip with Jamie Loftus, England, Wales, North Carolina, Georgia, NYC, New England, Normandy, Paris, Tau Ceti, "all the worst cities of the midwest" (per Lockwood), and Onondaga and other tribal land with Robin Wall Kimmerer.

From my perspective

Although I read a small number of books in 2023-2024, on reflection, they were the right ones, as I really enjoyed all of them. Since there were so few of them, I'll talk briefly about all of them:

• Crawdads: Owens writes her main character so well. I really connected with Kya and found her so much more fascinating than the mystery the story keeps switching back to.
• Fuzz: I always love Mary Roach, but I really feel this was one of her best. The actions of animals viewed through the lens of the human criminal justice system, and told with Roach's characteristic irresistible humor.
• Rabbit: In such a strong year, this may have been one of the weakest, but only becausy e Fforde delights in writing about the blander aspects of the strange worlds he creates. I still loved it.
• Achilles: I knew I was going to love this book. Miller really makes these characters come to life.
• Raw Dog: I already knew Jamie Loftus from her appearances on the Sarah Marshall Cinematic Universe of podcasts, and then I had the privilege of seeing her live TWICE, once at an event promoting this very book. I love her voice and her attitude. She could have written about anything.
• Sweetgrass: Perhaps another low point of the year only because it took me so long to read it, and if I'm honest, that was probably because the (important) message got a little repetitive after a while. But I still loved Kimmerer's writing and learning what she had to teach me.
• Happy-Go-Lucky: Sedaris gets more and more problematic with each book, but still delicious after all these years.
• Heartstopper: Might be the winner of 2023. This was a rare case of me reading the book(s) after having watched the adaptation. It was a joy to read and marvel at how perfect an adaptation the show is, from the casting to the animation details to the overall mood. Oseman has such a clever style and I'm so glad there's at lease one more volume left!
• The Color Purple: Riveting book. Well told and shocking, sadly very real and believable. Sofia was my favorite character, and the movie (2023) jolts to life when Danielle Brooks comes on the screen playing her. The 1985 was also moving and reasonably faithful to the text.
• Babayaga: I loaned this to a friend not having read it, and when she returned it to me raving about it, I decided to give it a shot. Fun and exciting and tragic, and constantly clever. 
• Eileen: The first 2/3 of the book was a bit of a drag, but it really paid off in the end when the action picks up in a completely unexpected way. I suggested this book for my book club on a recommendation from a friend, and we watched the movie together afterward. The movie missed the mark by a long shot.
• The Dispossessed: This took me forever to read and for no good reason. I loved this book and it was my favorite of 2024 (not that that's saying much). Le Guin was and continues to be revolutionary. I always enjoy her and can't wait to read more.
• Priestdaddy: A friend bought this book for me when we were in a bookstore together and she realized it was my birthday. I'd read Lockwood's No One Is Talking About This and enjoyed it, and this memoir gave me added context for the events of that book. Lockwood is hilarious and unafraid to be blunt, and Priestdaddy is the product of that winning combination of traits. 

Repeated authors:

• Fuzz was my 7th Mary Roach book
• Rabbit was my 11th Jasper Fforde book
• Achilles was my 2nd Madeline Miller book
• Happy-Go-Lucky was my 9th David Sedaris book
• Heartstopper Vol 5 was my 5th Alice Oseman book, all 5 of which I read this year
• The Dispossessed was my 4th Ursula K. Le Guin book
• Priestdaddy was my 2nd Patricia Lockwood book

My reading of Mary Roach brings her into a three-way tie for my third-most-read author with J.K. Rowling and Margaret Atwood.

The others I read for the first time this year, because:

• Crawdads, Eileen, and The Color Purple (and House of Mirth and Nightbitch) were Page & Popcorn Book & Movie Club selections
• Raw Dog was handed to me as I entered the Bell House for the book event.
• I bought Sweetgrass at a bookstore in Ithaca, NY after hearing the author talk about moss on Alie Ward's Ologies podcast
• I saw Babayaga in a bookstore years ago and bought it, and then let it languish on my bookshelf. Loaning it to a Paris-bound friend (the book is set in Paris) and hearing her rave about it made me finally pick it up

Most of the books I bought or received as gifts. The Heartstopper series was loaned to me one by one by my friend/neighbor Julia, and my friends Cricket & Mark loaned me The Dispossessed.

My main goal for the coming year is simply to read more books. Some specific ones are these:

• Queer by William S. Burroughs, loaned to me by Julia
• The Door by Madga Szabó, loaned to me by Jess & Kyle
• When We Cease to Understand the World by Benjamín Labatut, loaned to me by Mark S
• Intimations by Zadie Smith and Koji Kondo's Super Mario Bros. Soundtrack by Andrew Schartmann, both of which I picked up in Buffalo Street Books in Ithaca over the summer

2022 Big Book Post

In order:

Jan: Passing by Nella Larsen
Jan: Stay Sexy & Don't Get Murdered by Karen Kilgariff & Georgia Hardstark 
Feb: Circe by Madeline Miller
Mar: A Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K. Le Guin
Apr: The Penelopiad by Margaret Atwood
May: Outline by Rachel Cusk
Jun: Under the Banner of Heaven by Jon Krakauer
Jul: Solutions and Other Problems by Allie Brosh
Jul: Kindred by Octavia E. Butler
Aug: No One Is Talking About This by Patricia Lockwood
Sept: What We Don't Talk About When We Talk About Fat by Aubrey Gordon
Oct-Nov: Early Riser by Jasper Fforde
Dec: Play It As It Lays by Joan Didion
Dec (haven't finished): Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens

By the authors:

In 2022, I finished 13 books by 12 female authors and 2 male authors. Two of the authors are BIPOC, 2 Canadian, 2 British, and at least one is Queer. Four are deceased (Le Guin, Larsen, Butler, Didion). Of the living authors, the oldest is Margaret Atwood (as she usually is) and the youngest is Allie Brosh. One author is one week older than me (Hardstark) and another is the same age as my parents (Krakauer).

About the books:

The oldest book I read is Passing (published 1929) and the newest is No One Is Talking About This (2021). I read 4 books published in the 20th century (Passing, A Wizard of Earthsea, Kindred, Play It As It Lays) and the rest are from this century.

The books were all fiction except for the 2 memoirs (Stay Sexy & Don't Get Murdered and Solutions and Other Problems), Under the Banner of Heaven (Mormons), and What We Don't Talk About When We Talk About Fat (social justice). Of the 9 novels, 4 were fantasy. Of the novels set in recorded time, only Kindred is about a time period other than the author's own (the early 1800s, writing from the 1970s). Locales include New York, Maryland, Chicago, Seattle, Las Vegas, California (southern and northern), Greece (ancient and modern), Mormon country (mostly Utah), the lands of Allie Brosh (Idaho and Oregon), Wales, the Portal, and Earthsea. 

But let's talk about me:

Circe, Kindred, and Under the Banner of Heaven were my favorites of the year. I didn't dislike anything I read this year, but I'll admit that No One Is Talking About This was a challenge.

This year, I read my 10th book by Jasper Fforde, my 7th by Margaret Atwood, my 3rd by Ursula K. Le Guin, and my 2nd by Joan Didion. Of the authors I read for the first time this year, Madeline Miller and Octavia E. Butler will definitely be appearing in future Big Book Posts.

Passing (holiday gift swap), Under the Banner of Heaven (found it on a Brooklyn stoop), and Where the Crawdads Sing (bought with a gift card) were/are book club selections (all chosen because they've been adapted for film/TV). Circe (holiday gift) came recommended to me by many people, and led to me reading The Penelopiad (saw it in Powerhouse Books) due to the subject matter. Kathryn recommended and loaned me A Wizard of Earthsea and Solutions and Other Problems. Kathryn gave me No One Is Talking About This as a gift after seeing it on my Goodreads to-read list, but I don't remember why I put it there. I found Outline in a pile of books in the lobby and the neighbor who put it there recommended it to me. I love the "My Favorite Murder" podcast, so Stay Sexy & Don't Get Murdered (written by the hosts) was an obvious holiday wishlist item. I also love the "Maintenance Phase" podcast, so when a friend posted What We Don't Talk About When We Talk About Fat (written by one of the hosts) as a giveaway on FB, I pounced on it. I got Kindred and Early Riser with a Books Are Magic gift card from my friend Mary (along with The Sword of Achilles which I'll read next year). My friend Sara loaned me Play It As It Lays after I finished Early Riser on my way to visit her and needed something to read on the trip back.

Goals:

• This year's goal was to read only women authors, and while it is pathetic that I did not achieve that goal, I did read more women authors this year than in any previous year. I'd like to continue the trend of reading more women than men, and also better representing Queer, BIPOC, trans, and non-binary authors in the books that I read.
• I read most of the books that were loaned or given to me this year, and that I got for myself. Top of the list for the coming year are the following books that I acquired recently: Fuzz by Mary Roach, Happy-Go-Lucky by David Sedaris, The Sword of Achilles by Madeline Miller, The Constant Rabbit by Jasper Fforde, and more Ursula K. Le Guin (continuing the Earthsea series or the Hainish novels & stories)

The Big Book Post 2021

Welcome to the only time of year I post in this blog: recap time!

Somebody stop me, this is probably the most long-winded one yet.

Jan: Dreyer's English: An Utterly Correct Guide to Clarity and Style by Benjamin Dreyer

Feb: Motherless Brooklyn by Jonathan Lethem

Mar: The Starless Sea by Erin Morgenstern

Apr: Days of Distraction by Alexandra Chang

May: The Godspell Experience: Inside a Transformative Musical by Carol de Giere

Jun: A Favourite of the Gods by Sybille Bedford

Jul: The Midnight Library by Matt Haig

Aug-Sep: Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell

Oct: Dune by Frank Herbert

Nov: ¡Hola Papi!: How to Come Out in a Walmart Parking Lot and Other Life Lessons by John Paul Brammer

Dec: The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman

Dec: Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri

I finished 11 books this year, beating last year's total by 1 and falling short of this year's goal by the same number. I read about 1/4 of Dune before giving up on it, making Dune this year's Outlander (maybe I should stop trying to read 800-page genre fiction?). 

The first book I read this year was probably my favorite: Dreyer's (which Goodreads also tells me was the most highly rated of all the books I finished this year). I also gave high marks (4 stars) to Cloud and Distraction. My only 2-star review was Midnight, which I know is a popular book (the most shelved book of the ones I read this year, according to Goodreads), but I had problems with it (see my Goodreads review, linked above).

More Goodreads nonsense:

• Shortest book I read this year: Ocean (181 pages), but that honor would have gone to Passing if I'd finished it (and I will)
• Longest book I finished this year: Cloud (509 pages), and it took me a good long time, too
• Least popular book I read this year: Godspell (79 people shelved it to Midnight's 1.8 million, but I know one of them! Hi Rebecca if you're reading this.)

And by the way, I think I'm in good book-nerd company on Goodreads this New Year's Day as the site is super slow.

By the authors

I finished 6 books by male authors and 5 by female authors (Passing by Nella Larsen would have evened the score). Bedford is the oldest author I read this year, Dreyer the oldest living author (unless de Giere, whose age I could not find, is older). I could not find the birth years of Chang or Brammer, but I suspect the latter is the youngest author I read this year. Morgenstern, 43, is the youngest author I read this year whose age I could track down. This year I read mostly American authors, with the exception of 4 English authors (Bedford, Haig, Mitchell, Gaiman) and possibly de Giere who may be Canadian (and let's give her the benefit of the doubt). Bedford was born in Germany but is considered English. Lahiri was born in England but identifies as American. I didn't dig too deep into this, but I read at least 2 LGBTQ+ authors (Dreyer, Brammer), and three authors in particular shared their ethnic heritage in their books (Chang, Brammer, Lahiri). Most of the authors were new to me, but this year I read my second book of Morgenstern's, Bedford's, and Lahiri's, and my sixth by Gaiman.

By publication date

The only book I finished this year published before 1999 was Favourite (1963). Passing, published in 1929, would have been the oldest. Many of my reading years feature a return to the books that were on the best sellers list when I was working at Borders in 2002, and this year's selection from that pool are Interpreter (1999) and Motherless (1999). The only book I read that was published in 2021 was Papi, but Distraction and Midnight were from 2020 and Dreyer's and Starless were 2019.

By setting

Most of the books I read this year take place in the present day (for the book). Godspell reaches back into the seventies to tell the beginning of that story. Favourite is mostly set in and around WWI. Cloud covers the widest time period, from the mid-19th century to unfathomably in the future. Five books take place partially or entirely in NYC (Dreyer's, Motherless, Starless, Godspell, Papi) and Distraction takes place mostly in New York state. The books by the UK authors take place mostly in the UK (Favourite, Midnight, Ocean) except Cloud, which is mostly in and around the Pacific Ocean. Interpreter takes us to Boston and India.

By genre

Fiction: 8

• Fantasy: 3 (Midnight, Starless, Ocean)
• Historical: 2 (Favourite, Cloud)
• Sci-fi: 1 (Cloud)
• Short stories: 1 (Interpreter)
• Other: 2 (Distraction, Motherless)

Non-fiction: 3

• Language/Writing: 1 (Dreyer's)
• Arts & Entertainment: 1 (Godspell)
• Memoir: 1 (Papi)

Awards

• Motherless won the 1999 National Books Critics Circle Award for fiction
• Interpreter won the 2000 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction
• Cloud won the 2005 British Book Award for literary fiction and was shortlisted for the Booker Prize
• Ocean was the 2013 British Book Awards Book of the Year, and is the only book I read this year that was a #1 on the NYT best seller list

Movies and book clubs

• I read Motherless with the Page & Popcorn (P&P) Book & Movie Club, and we watched the 2019 film together (remotely). Motherless was also a selection in WNYC's Get Lit with All of It book club, and I watched Alison Stewart's interview with Jonathan Lethem. 
• Passing, which I am reading now, is also a P&P selection. I also watched The White Tiger and the 1984 and 2021 Dune adaptations with P&P but did not read the former and did not finish the latter.
• I haven't yet but plan to watch the 2012 film adaptation of Cloud, despite reports that it is bad and/or weird.
• I watched the 1993 film of Remains of the Day, which I read 8 years ago.
• I watched season 4 of Hulu's The Handmaid's Tale, which has by now gone way beyond the book, which I read in 2005 with the CHA book club. I also watched all of Anne With an "E" and The Wheel of Time, but have not read either of those book series.

How the books came to me

• Interpreter and Ocean were loaned to me by Holly and Garrett (respectively) when I arrived at their home having finished Papi on the train ride there. Distraction was a loaner from a coworker and Cloud was loaned to me by a neighbor, despite that I have a copy of it on my shelf loaned to me by a former roommate (Sharon, if you're reading this, do you want that back?).
• Godspell was mailed to me by a friend whose job I guess is to get rid of books? I saw Godspell and an Ursula K. Le Guin compilation and claimed them both, and Aubrey Gordon's book What We Don't Talk About When We Talk About Fat is also on its way to me thanks to him.
• Dreyer's and Starless were both holiday or birthday gifts from my parents, and Papi was a birthday gift from Álvaro
• I found Midnight on the bargain table at Powerhouse in Industry City (it was damaged). Motherless must have been either a Housing Works or roadside giveaway find because it is ravaged. Favourite has been on my shelf for a few years, but I think it originally came from McNally Jackson.

Goals

• Starless, Favourite, Dreyer's, and Motherless were goals from last year that I successfully completed, yay. I didn't make it to The Testaments by Margaret Atwood, so that will come with me into the new year
• I've just been handed a pile of loaners from Kathryn which I will prioritize, including Solutions and Other Problems by Allie Brosh, and the first three books in Ursula K. Le Guin's Earthsea series. I also have When Brooklyn Was Queer by Hugh Ryan on my shelf, a gift from Kathryn.
• And speaking of gifts, I am now the proud owner of the following pile of books gifted from my parents which I should get on: 12 Bytes by Jeanette Winterson, Circe by Madeline Miller, and Stay Sexy & Don't Get Murdered by the My Favorite Murder ladies. I also got A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles from an office gift exchange, as well as the aforementioned Passing which I'm already half-way through.
• As if the above weren't enough for one year, I'm also hoping to get through some of these which have been on the top of my pile for a while but keep getting bypassed: The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson, The Name of the Rose by Umberto Eco, and Goodbye to Berlin by Christopher Isherwood.
• Do I dare to want more books after accumulating so many (the above being the tip of the iceberg)? Yes. This year I would like to acquire and read Fuzz by Mary Roach and Early Riser and The Constant Rabbit by Jasper Fforde.

And lastly

In 2018, I made a post listing my most-read authors. Since then, my top three have not changed (Jasper Fforde with 9 books, David Sedaris with 8, J.K. Rowling with 7), but three authors have ascended into what is now a five-way tie for fourth place, I/me having read six of their books each. Joining Sarah Vowell and Margaret Atwood in this category are: 

• Neil Gaiman after I read Ocean last year
• Gregory Maguire after I read Hiddensee and Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister in 2019 and 2020 respectively
• Mary Roach after I read Gulp in 2019

And these authors have moved into the category of authors I've read more than once:

• Donna Tartt after I read The Goldfinch in 2019
• John Hodgman after I read Medallion Status in 2020
• Erin Morgenstern, Sybille Bedford, and Jhumpa Lahiri having read their books in 2021
• Ursula K. Le Guin, having read her for the first time in 2019 (The Lathe of Heaven) and again in 2020 (The Left Hand of Darkness)

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OK that's (more than) enough. See you in my next recap post!

The Big Book Post 2020

Merry bookmas! 

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What that tree and 2020 have in common is I did not read very many books in either. My books-completed count is lower this year (10) than in past years (usually between 14 and 18) due to the lack of a subway commute for most of it (where I now realize I get most of my reading done), reduced time out in the world (in other words, away from my TV), and a newfound passion for jigsaw puzzles at home. I've had a puzzle going on my kitchen table almost non-stop since April.

But 10 is more than 0, so let's talk about the books I read this year.

In order

JAN: Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami
JAN: The Library Book by Susan Orlean
FEB: The Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin
FEB: Belgravia by Julian Fellowes
MAR: Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister by Gregory Maguire
APR: Other Minds: The Octopus, the Sea, and the Deep Origins of Consciousness by Peter Godfrey-Smith
MAY: Willful Creatures by Aimee Bender
JUN-AUG: half of Outlander by Diana Gabaldon
SEP-NOV: half of The Overstory by Richard Powers
OCT: The Witches by Roald Dahl
DEC: Bel Canto by Ann Patchett
DEC: Medallion Status: True Stories from Secret Rooms by John Hodgman

10 is the number finished, but if you'll allow me to count Outlander and Overstory has half a book each, the count of total books read is 11.

The year was very front-heavy, most of the second half of the year taken up by long or dense books I did not end up finishing. My favorite book of the year was Darkness, garnering my only Goodreads 5-star review of 2020. I did not like Norwegian (which Goodreads tells me was the most popular book on their site that I read this year) or Witches.

One other interesting fact from Goodreads: Medallion was both the least popular (least shelved/reviewed) and highest rated book I read this year, which I think John Hodgman would find appropriate.

By the authors

Of the books I finished, 6 were by men and 4 by women. The authors were British (Fellowes, Dahl), Australian (Godfrey-Smith), Japanese (Murakami), and from the US (the rest). Two are deceased (Dahl, Le Guin). Of the living authors I read, Murakami is the oldest (although only 7 months older than Fellowes) and Hodgman is the youngest at 49. This year, I read my 6th book by Maguire, my 4th by Murakami (and possibly my last, woof), and my 2nd by Le Guin and Hodgman.

By publication date

I read no books that were published this year, but Medallion was the closest at the end of 2019. The oldest book I read was Darkness (1969). The rest were from the eighties (Witches, Norwegian), nineties (Confessions), aughts (Bel Canto, Willful), and teens (Minds, Belgravia, Library, Medallion).

By setting

These books took place largely far from home (NYC). The closest was Medallion, based in Brooklyn but chronicling mostly travel around the country. Library is centered mostly in LA and Willful was mostly non-specific but one assumes the US. The rest were abroad: Belgravia and Witches in the UK, Confessions in the Netherlands, Bel Canto in an unnamed South American country, Norwegian in Japan, Minds off the coast of Australia, and the farthest abroad was Darkness on the planet Winter. All are set in the recent past except Confessions (17th century), Belgravia and Library (19th century), and Darkness (presumably the distant future).

By genre

Fiction (7):

• Fantasy: 2 (Confessions, Witches)
• Science fiction: 1 (Darkness)
• Historical fiction: 1 (Belgravia)
• Short stories: 1 (Willful)
• Plain-old novels: 2 (Norwegian, Bel Canto)

Non-fiction (3):

• History: Library
• Science: Minds
• Memoir: Medallion

Awards

No Pulitzers, Man Bookers, or NBAs among the books I read this year. I don't know the literary awards landscape too well, but the ones that seem notable here are the Hugo Award (Darkness) and the PEN/Faulkner award (Bel Canto).

Movies and book clubs

• After reading Belgravia, I watched the TV miniseries on EPIX (via Amazon Prime)
• I read Witches with the Page & Popcorn Book & Movie Club. We watched both film adaptations of the book (1990, 2020). I also watched Where'd You Go, Bernadette? (which I read last year), and Little Women and The Hate U Give (which I did not read) with P&P.
• After reading Bel Canto, I watched the 2018 film with my friend Sue Ha on Prime.
• After not finishing Outlander, I likewise did not finish the first season of the Starz series on Netflix
• I watched Crazy Rich Asians (which I read last year) on a plane
• I watched a few episodes of the new Tales of the City, but this series isn't based on the one book I read (years ago)
• I watched Unorthodox, a miniseries based on the book by Deborah Feldman, which I read years ago
• There is no movie made of Minds, but I did watch My Octopus Teacher which was a similar story of a diver connecting with an octopus

How the books came to me

• Loaners: Norwegian was loaned to me by Holly, Confessions by Lindsay (or maybe "stolen from" would be more accurate), and Minds by my boss
• Gifts: Library, Belgravia, and Medallion were all gifts from my parents, I believe from three separate birthdays/holidays
• My bookshelf: Bel Canto and Willful have been in my possession for a while, 4 and 14 years respectively
• Purchases: Darkness (Housing Works), Outlander (Community), Overstory (Terrace Books), Witches (Center for Fiction)

Goals old and new

• Library, Darkness, Belgravia, Bel Canto, and Outlander were all goals I set for myself in last year's big book post which I (mostly) achieved.
• The Starless Sea, The Testaments, and A Favourite of the Gods were goals from the last big book post which I'll carry into 2021.
• I'm sure I'll come up with other goals as I dismantle the book tree and see what's hiding in there, but I know I will want to read Dreyer's English (which I got this summer on the same trip to Center for Fiction when I got Witches) and Motherless Brooklyn, which my book club just chose as its next selection.

Happy new year and happy reading!

The Big Book Post 2019

The books I read in 2019, in order:

Jan: Vita Nostra by Marina & Sergey Dyachenko
Jan-Feb: Pachinko by Min Jin Lee
Feb-Mar: Grunt: The Curious Science of Humans at War by Mary Roach
Mar: Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI by David Grann
Mar-Apr: Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan
Apr: My Brother by Jamaica Kincaid
May: The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck by Mark Manson (didn't give the titular f*ck about this book and therefore didn't finish it)
May-Jun: Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari
May-Jul: Birds of America by Lorrie Moore
Jul-Aug: How to Write an Autobiographical Novel by Alexander Chee
Aug: Where'd You Go, Bernadette? by Maria Semple
Sep-Oct: The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt
Nov: The Lathe of Heaven by Ursula K. Le Guin
Nov: Hiddensee: A Tale of the Once and Future Nutcracker by Gregory Maguire
Dec: Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami (still reading)

It was a lighter year than most, falling 5 books short of my goal of 18. I credit the low count to a lot of time spent reading Sapiens (nearly two months). Goldfinch also took a long time (or at least it felt like it), and I spent the last month of the year reading a book I didn't end up finishing (Norwegian). My favorites all fell in the second half of the year: Hiddensee, Lathe, and Bernadette. I rated Vita slightly lower than them, but in retrospect I'd like to bump that up to a favorite as well, and it was certainly the most interesting book I read last year. Of the books I finished, I liked Brother the least, but will try Kincaid again. Subtle is not worth talking about, and I will discuss Norwegian next year.

Goodreads would like you to know that Goldfinch was the most read on Goodreads of all the books I read in 2019, and it was also the longest book I read (although it took longer to read Sapiens). Lathe was the shortest, Brother was the least read, and Sapiens was the most highly rated (on Goodreads).

By the authors:
I finished books by 8 female authors and 6 male authors. Eight of them are American and the rest are Ukrainian, Korean, Singaporean, Antiguan, and Israeli. All of the authors whose books I finished are older than me, the youngest being Harari (b. 1976) and the oldest being Le Guin (1929-2018). This was my 6th read of Roach's, my 5th of Maguire's, and my 2nd of Tartt's. All other authors I was reading for the first time, but not the last for Le Guin and Kincaid, and I eagerly await the translations of more books by the Dyachenkos.

By publication date:
The oldest book I read was Lathe (1971), separated by a nearly 30-year gap from the 2nd-and 3rd-oldest books, Brother (1997) and Birds (1998). The rest of the books I finished were published in the 2010s, the freshest being Autobiographical in 2018. Two of the books I read were galleys, although in both cases the books had long since been published.

By setting:
The books took place in various locations around the US including New York, Seattle, Portland, Las Vegas, San Francisco, Oklahoma, New Hampshire, and Maine, and also in Russia, Korea, Japan, China, Southeast Asia, the Netherlands, Bavaria, Mexico, Antigua, and Antarctica.

By genre:
Fiction: 8

• Fantasy: Vita, Hiddensee
• Humorous: Crazy, Bernadette
• Sci-fi: Lathe
• Historical: Pachinko
• Short stories: Birds
• Plain old novel: Goldfinch

Non-Fiction: 5

• Science: Grunt, Sapiens
• Memoir/Essays: Brother, Autobiographical
• History/True Crime: Killers

Vita and Crazy are both first books in a series and I will probably continue them both, but the former is more likely (contingent upon more books in the series being translated).

Major awards:

Pachinko, Killers, and Brother were finalists for the National Book Award.

Goldfinch won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.

Movies and book clubs:

• Page & Popcorn: I read Bernadette and Goldfinch with the Page & Popcorn Book & Movie Club, but did not attend either gathering (there wasn't one for the former). I watched the latter on Prime.  I watched The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society with Page & Popcorn this year, which I read in 2009. I started the HBO series adaptation of His Dark Materials (I read the Golden Compass with Page & Popcorn in 2008 and saw the movie, and I read the Subtle Knife in 2009).
• I read Crazy intending to watch the movie but haven't yet. 
• This year I watched the miniseries adaptation of Good Omens (which I read in 2015). 
• I read Sapiens and Subtle with an Astoria gay boys book club, and also discussed Less with them which I read in 2018.

Where the books came from, and why I read them:

• Gifts: Vita, Pachinko, and Grunt were 2018 holiday gifts from my parents. Vita came recommended from Bethany and Pachinko from Mary.
• Bought them in a store: Bernadette and Sapiens were intentional bookstore purchases (meaning I specifically set out to buy them) for reading with book clubs. Lathe, Hiddensee, and Brother were thrifts store finds. I had been wanting to try Le Guin and Kincaid.
• Loans from friends: Goldfinch was loaned to me by Josh and I'm holding it hostage until he visits NYC. I borrowed Killers from my brother-in-law by way of my mom, both of whom read it and loved it. A coworker recommended and loaned me her copy of Autobiographical.
• I found Crazy in a giveaway box in Kathryn's apartment building.
• Birds had been on my bookshelf since David Sedaris recommended it on a speaking tour in 2003. I bought it when I was working at Borders and it still has the yellow personal property sticker on the cover.

To 2020!

• Recently acquired: I got Susan Orlean's The Library Book and Randall Munroe's latest How To from my parents for Chanukah. Le Guin's The Left Hand of Darkness and Emma Donoghue's The Wonder are recent purchases from the Housing Works bookstore. The Island of Lost Maps jumped off of the shelf of Green Hand in Portland (ME) and into my green hands. Lastly, I nicked How Paris Became Paris (DeJean), The Last Girlfriend on Earth (Rich), and How to Talk About Places You've Never Been (Bayard) from Josh's collection before he left.
• From the bookshelf: 2019 was the rare year in which I took a book that's been cluttering up my collection for over a decade and read it (Birds). I don't think I'll go as far back as 2003 this year, but here are the books I've pulled off of my bookshelf for consideration in 2020: Mother Night (Vonnegut), Nocturnes (Ishiguro), Bel Canto (Patchett), A Favourite of the Gods (Bedford), Bean Trees (Kingsolver), Belgravia (Fellowes), The Edible Woman (Atwood), A People's History of the United States (Zinn, which belongs to my brother-in-law and I really should return it eventually)
• In the great beyond: I'm going to try and make time for Dreyer's English this year. I may seek out The Little Friend and finish the Tartt canon. I m hungry for Niffenegger's The Starless Sea and Atwood's The Testaments, but possibly not hungry enough to buy them in hardcover. Although I'll finish Norwegian Wood this year (this month, hopefully), I may want another Murakami. I might read the first books in the Outlander and Song of Fire and Ice series so I can finally start watching those TV shows.
• Still on my list of movies to watch for which I've already read the books are The Namesake and Remains of the Day, along with the previously mentioned Crazy and Bernadette.

The Big Book Post 2018: Addendum

For many years, I kept a spreadsheet of all the books I read so I could do fun things like track how many times I read the same author, keep a running to-read list, etc. When Goodreads came along, I continued to update the spreadsheet, but when my computer died and I moved all my stuff on to a portable hard drive, I stopped bothering with the spreadsheet because Goodreads does most of the stuff that it did without my even having to do much work. Granted, Goodreads doesn't get as nerdy as my spreadsheet got. There was one data-driven detail I wanted to put into my 2018 Big Book Post which would have required digging out the spreadsheet, but when I explored Goodreads a little more I found that the website does have the functionality I thought it lacked. So, I give you:

My 5 Most-Read Authors

• Jasper Fforde (9 books): Although I haven't read him since the most recent Thursday Next book in 2012, Fforde is the author I've read the most, thanks in no small part to the aforementioned 7-book series. I've also read Shades of Gray and The Big Over Easy.
• David Sedaris (8 books): Sedaris is the author by whom I've read the most standalone books, although one could consider his story collections a long series jumping back and forth through time. Reading Calypso last year bounced him out of a tie and now he stands firmly in second place.
• J.K. Rowling (7 books): You know the ones. I haven't read her in 12 years yet here she sits at #3.
• Sarah Vowell (6 books): My last Vowell was Lafayette in the Somewhat United States which I read in 2016. The only book of hers I haven't read (not counting books she only edited or contributed to) is Radio On.
• Margaret Atwood (6 books): I knew Atwood's name before I read her because of the Moxy Früvous song "My Baby Loves a Bunch of Authors." The first book of hers I read was The Handmaid's Tale in 2007, now enjoying a resurgence in popularity thanks to Hulu TV series. My reading of Alias Grace last year bumped her up to a tie with Sarah Vowell.

Other authors I've read more than once:

• 5 books: Alison Weir, Augusten Burroughs, Mary Roach
• 4 books: Gregory Maguire, Neil Gaiman, Philippa Gregory
• 3 books: Suzanne Collins (The Hunger Games trilogy), Dan Brown, Kazuo Ishiguro, James Hamilton-Paterson (Gerald Samper trilogy), Audrey Niffenegger, Piers Anthony (books 1-3 of the Incarnations of Immortality series), Haruki Murakami
• 2 books: Douglas Adams (books 1 and 2 of the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series), George Saunders, Jodi Picoult, Lemony Snicket (books 1 and 2 of the Series of Unfortunate Events), Ellen DeGeneres, David Rakoff, Philip Pullman (books 1 and 2 of the His Dark Materials series), Michael Chabon, Mitch Albom, Kurt Vonnegut, Jenny Lawson

The Big Book Post 2018

The books I have read them.

Books read this year, in order:

Jan: It's All Relative by A.J. Jacobs
Feb: The Lady in the Tower by Alison Weir
Mar: The Uncollected David Rakoff by David Rakoff, sort of
Mar: A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle
Apr: The Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan (took a break to read the Martian, finished in May)
May: The Martian by Andy Weir
Jun: Calypso by David Sedaris
Jun: The Professor and the Madman by Simon Winchester
Jul: Lincoln in the Bardo by George Saunders
Jul: The Secret History by Donna Tartt
Aug: Call Me By Your Name by André Aciman
Sep: The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot
Sep: Less by Andrew Sean Greer
Oct: A Legacy by Sybille Bedford
Nov: On Tyranny by Timothy Snyder
Nov: New Erotica for Feminists by my friend Caitlin Kunkel, Brooke Preston, my friend Fiona Taylor, and Carrie Wittmer
Dec: Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood
Dec: Some Very Interesting Cats Perhaps You Weren't Aware of by Doogie Horner

I achieved my 2018 reading goal of 18 books, and right in the nick of time. You'll perhaps notice (and forgive) that three of the last four books I read this year were very short. As the ceiling begins to come down you grab what you can and get out of there.

Goodreads would like you to know these facts about the books I read this year:

• On Tyranny was the shortest book (128 pages) and The Secret History was the longest (559)
• Of the books I read this year, The Martian was read by the most other Goodreads users (over 700,000) and also received the highest average rating (4.39 stars). The Uncollected David Rackoff was read by the fewest Goodreads users (277)

Less was by far my favorite book of the year. Lincoln in the Bardo was a close second, and definitely the most intriguing. I enjoyed A Wrinkle in Time the least, and that goes double for the film.

About the authors:

Of the 18 books I read this year, only 7 were written by women, but one of them was written by FOUR WOMEN (New Erotica for Feminists), making the author tally almost even (10 women, 11 men).

I read three books by authors who are deceased (Uncollected, A Wrinkle in Time, A Legacy). Of the living authors, Margaret Atwood (Alias Grace) is the oldest, as she usually is. I read no books by authors who are younger than I am (with the very possible exceptions of the youthful and timeless authors of New Erotica for Feminists, whose ages I did not deign to research). The youngest author whose age I was able to estimate (by looking up his high school graduation year on Facebook) is Doogie Horner (Some Very Interesting Cats Perhaps You Weren't Aware of), who is ostensibly one year older than me.

David Rakoff (Uncollected) and Margaret Atwood (Alias) were both born in Canada, Alison Weir (The Lady in the Tower) and Simon Winchester (The Professor and the Madman) are British, Sybille Bedford (A Legacy) was born in Germany, and André Aciman (Call Me by Your Name) was born in Egypt. 

This year I read my eighth book by David Sedaris (Calypso), my sixth by Margaret Atwood (Alias), my fifth by Alison Weir (Lady), my second by George Saunders (Lincoln), and my second by David Rakoff (Uncollected). This was the second time I picked up a book by A.J. Jacobs (It's All Relative), but the first time I finished it.

About the books:

Fiction: 11

3 historical novels (Lincoln, Legacy, Alias)

2 works of LGBT fiction (Call, Less)

2 humor books (Erotica, Cats)

1 plain old novel (The Secret History)

1 fantasy novel (Wrinkle)

1 sci-fi novel (The Martian)

1 novel in verse (Love, Dishonor, Marry Die, Cherish, Perish, in Uncollected)

Nonfiction: 8

5 memoirs/biographies (Relative, Lady, Uncollected, Calypso, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks)

3 books about history/politics (Lady, Madman, On Tyranny)

2 books about the life sciences (Henrietta, The Omnivore's Dilemma)

1 book about genealogy (Relative)

A Legacy and A Wrinkle in Time were the oldest books I read this year (published in 1956 and 1962 respectively). The oldest book I read by a living author was The Secret History (1992), followed by Alias Grace (1996) and The Professor and the Madman (1998). Everything else is from the new millennium, including two books published this year (Calypso, Erotica).

The books I read this year cover a lot of ground and also a lot of space. Less takes us from the Americas to Europe to Asia and back again. The Secret History is bicoastal but mostly in New England and The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks drives around the Mid-Atlantic and the 20th century a bit. Lincoln in the Bardo is as grounded in mid-19th century Washington, DC as The Lady in the Tower and The Professor and the Madman are in London (16th and 19th centuries respectively). Call Me by Your Name lives in 1980s Italy until the epilogue. A Legacy travels around western Europe and Alias Grace goes from Belfast to several points on Lake Ontario., both in the 19th century. The Martian spends most of its time on Mars, predictably, in the near future, and A Wrinkle in Time goes wherever and whenever the hell Oprah wants.

A Wrinkle in Time is the only book I read this year that is part of a series, and I will not continue it.

Award Winners:

A Wrinkle in Time (Newbery Medal 1963)

The Omnivore's Dilemma (California Book Award for Nonfiction Gold 2006)

Lincoln in the Bardo (Man Booker Prize 2017)

Less (Pulitzer Prize for Fiction 2018)

Movies and Book Clubs:

I read A Wrinkle in Time, The Martian, and The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, and watched the film adaptations, with the Page & Popcorn Book & Movie Club. I also went to see the movie of Ready Player One with them, having read the book in 2015. We will watch The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society this month, which I read in 2009. On my own, I read Call Me by Your Name and watched the movie with my friend Kate, and read Alias Grace and watched the Netflix six-part mini-series. I also watched the movie adaptation of The Glass Castle, which I read in 2005.

Where the books came from, and why I read them:

It was a gift: Relative and Lincoln (from my parents), Cats (from Holly, for no reason other than she knew I wanted it)

Bought it for book club: Wrinkle, Martian, Henrietta (I don't remember where I got these, but let's go ahead and say it was some combination of Books Are Magic and Community Bookstore since I know I shopped there this year)

Bought it in a bookstore, just because: Uncollected (Astoria Bookshop), Calypso (The Strand), Less (Three Lives & Company, on Mary's recommendation), Legacy (McNally Jackson, on Nicholas' recommendation), Alias (McNally Jackson)

Found at a church book sale: Madman

A friend loaned it to me ages ago and I finally decided to read it: Lady (Sara)

A friend loaned it to me recently and I read it in a timely fashion: Omnivore and Tyranny (Cricket), Call (Álvaro)

Took it from a coworker's giveaway pile: Secret

In support of my friend Fiona's book launch! Erotica (Wildfang)

Books that didn't:

I am careful not to admit on Goodreads that I'm reading a book until I know it's going to stick, so you won't find any evidence on the internet (except this blog post) of my having tried to read these books. Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann came highly recommended from various sources, but it just wasn't happening for me (I gave it a generous 100 pages before quitting). My friend Cricket was shocked when she met me at a restaurant and saw Ulysses by James Joyce sitting in front of me on the table. "Andrew, friends tell each other these things," she said to me. I knew it wasn't going to be my kind of book, but the plan was to read it very slowly with a group of coworkers (two of whom are Joyce scholars), meeting at various intervals to discuss and drink Irish beer and whiskey. I studiously read the first two chapters and joined them for the first meeting, but I didn't pick it back up after that and am now behind and will probably not catch up, alas.

2019:

Currently gleaming at me from my bookshelf are Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan which I picked out of a giveaway box in a friend's building, A Favourite of the Gods by Sybille Bedford which I got from McNally Jackson after finishing A Legacy also by Bedford, and three books I just got for Chanukah from my parents: Belgravia by Julian Fellowes, Pachinko by Min Jin Lee, and Vita Nostra by Marina and Sergey Dyachenko, the last of which I am currently reading. Calling to me from the basement, where I had to store most of my books due to a pest control issue earlier this year and haven't yet had the strength to go retrieve them, are Grunt by Mary Roach, Six Wakes by Mur Lafferty, American Nations by Colin Woodard, and many more sad, mistreated books that deserve to see the light of day.

Inspired by 2018's reads, I will probably read more Donna Tartt, and continue my path through the works of Margaret Atwood. I've taken a year off from Haruki Murakami, and two off from Kurt Vonnegut, so 2019 may be a return to them. Also, my 2017 reads were culturally and geographically varied in a way my 2018 reading year was not. I hope 2019 takes me outside my literary comfort zone (North America and the UK) more often.

Thanks for reading!

The Big Book Post

Let's do this.

Books read this year, in order:

Jan: Furiously Happy, by Jenny Lawson
Jan: Prisoners of Geography, by Tim Marshall
Feb: Tales of the City, by Armistead Maupin
Feb: MaddAddam, by Margaret Atwood
Mar-Apr: The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, by Michael Chabon
May: Lafayette in the Somewhat United States, by Sarah Vowell
Jun-Jul: The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, by Oliver Sacks
Aug: The Buried Giant, by Kazuo Ishiguro
Sep: Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, by Ransom Riggs
Sep: Between You & Me, by Mary Norris
Oct: Don't Get Too Comfortable, by David Rakoff
Oct: Cat's Cradle, by Kurt Vonnegut
Nov: What If? by Randall Munroe
Nov: The Refugees, by Viet Thanh Nguyen
Dec: A Natural History of the Senses, by Diane Ackerman (haven't finished, will count for 2017)

I finished 14 books toward my reading goal of 17. Goodreads also reports these interesting bits:

• My 14 books amounted to 4,567 pages (which is a lovely number, but probably inaccurate)
• My shortest book was Comfortable and my longest was Kavalier
• Peculiar is the most read book on my list this year; Refugees is the least (because it's not out yet). Prisoners is the highest rated.

Ratings:

It was a good year for actually enjoying the books I read. I gave five of them five stars: Prisoners, MaddAddam, Kavalier, Between, and What. The lowest rating I gave a book this year was two stars, and I gave that rating to Mistook and Buried. It was a weak summer.

About the authors:

I read a startlingly low four books by women this year (Senses would have made it five).

I read three books by authors who are deceased (Vonnegut, Sacks, and Rakoff). Vonnegut and Sacks would have been the oldest and second oldest authors this year if they were alive, but of the living authors, Atwood is the oldest (b. 1939) as she was last year. The youngest author is younger than I am (Munroe, b. 1984).

Eight were born in the USA (Lawson, Maupin, Chabon, Vowell, Riggs, Norris, Vonnegut, Munroe), two are/were Canadian-born (Atwood, Rakoff), two are/were from the UK (Marshall, Sacks), Ishiguro is from Japan but lives in the UK, and Nguyen is from Vietnam but lives in the US.

This year I read my second Lawson, my fifth Atwood, my sixth Vowell, my third Ishiguro, and my second Vonnegut. The other nine authors were new to me. I will certainly read Chabon and Rakoff again.

About the books:

It was an even split between fiction and non-fiction.

Fiction: 7

2 Sci-fi (MaddAddam, Cradle)

2 Fantasy (Buried, Peculiar)

1 Historical (Kavalier)

1 Short Stories (Refugees)

1 Plain Ol' Fiction (Tales)

Non-Fiction: 7

2 Memoir (Furiously, Between)

2 Science (Mistook, What)

1 History (Lafayette)

1 Geopolitics (Prisoners)

1 Essays (Comfortable)

The oldest book I read was Cradle (1963), followed by Tales (1978) and then Mistook (1985). All the rest were published in or after 2000, including five in 2015 (Furiously, Prisoners, Lafayette, Buried, Between). The newest book I read was a galley of Refugees, to be released in 2017.

Time periods range from that of Arthurian legend (Buried) to the American Revolution (Lafayette) to WWII (Kavalier, Peculiar) and slightly after (Cradle) to the seventies (Tales, Refugees) to the distressingly near future (MaddAddam). Locales include NYC, Valley Forge (and other Revolutionary War sites), Vermont, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Texas, Florida, the Canadian Rockies, San Lorenzo (fictional island in the Caribbean), Cairnholm (fictional island in the Irish Sea), Prague, Vietnam, Antarctica, all of Earth (as explored in Prisoners), and the various places on Earth and in space imagined in What.

Tales is the first in a series I hope to continue.

MaddAddam is the last in a series.

Peculiar is the first in a series I probably will not continue.

Kavalier won the Pulitzer in 2001.

Adaptations:

I watched the TV miniseries of Tales with Laura Linney.

I read Peculiar with the intention of seeing the movie, but did not.

I anxiously await the TV adaptation of MaddAddam, and I pine for a movie of Kavalier.

Book Clubs:

I read Peculiar as part of a book club, but no one else read it (which is fair, because I hardly ever read the books we choose). I encouraged my fellow editors at work to read Between, but no takers yet. I'm currently reading Senses as part of an impromptu book club with two friends.

Why these books?

Prisoners: saw it at Community Bookshop

Tales: swiped it from a friend who was purging for a move

Kavalier: saw it at Housing Works for $3

Mistook: swiped it from a friend's coffee table

Peculiar: book club

Between: received it as a gift

Comfortable: public radio demanded I read Rakoff

What: received it s a gift

Refugees: a former Borders coworker gave me a galley

The others: I'd read the authors before

For 2017:

• Finish Senses
• Something from the ambitious pile: Guns, Germs, and Steel; Game of Thrones; A People's History of the United States
• More Rakoff, Murakami, Vonnegut, Chabon
• Belgravia (Fellowes), Life and Death Are Wearing Me Out (Yan), the new Mary Roach
• How I Paid for College (Acito), which two people independently of each other told me I should read, one day apart (granted, they saw it on my shelf)
• The Elements of Style (Strunk/White/Kalman) and Remembrance of Things I Forgot (Smith), which I received as holiday gifts

Thanks for reading, nobody!

The Big Book Post

It's the most wonderful time of the year: time to reflect on the books I've read in 2015! I always end the year with a Big Book Post (see previous Big Book Posts).

I finished my reading challenge, completing my sixteenth of sixteen books yesterday, and just in the nick of time.

Books read, in order
Dec-Jan: The Mathematician's Shiva, by Stuart Rojstaczer
Jan: Yes, Please, by Amy Poehler
Feb: Ender's Game, by Orson Scott Card
Feb: The Year of the Flood, by Margaret Atwood
Mar: Good Omens, by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett
2013-Apr: Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality (HPMOR), by Eliezer Yudkowsky
Apr: Gulp, by Mary Roach
Apr: Gone Girl, by Gillian Flynn
May: Rats, by Robert Sullivan
Jun: The Poisonwood Bible, by Barbara Kingsolver
Jul-Aug: Neverwhere, by Neil Gaiman
Sep: Ready Player One, by Ernest Cline
Oct: The Namesake, by Jhumpa Lahiri
Nov: Welcome to Night Vale, by Joseph Fink and Jeffrey Cranor
Dec: Paper Towns, by John Green
Dec: The Sirens of Titan, by Kurt Vonnegut

The best and the worst
I read a bunch of books I really loved this year, but it's not hard to choose a favorite. Poisonwood stands out above the rest. It was a fascinating story and well-told. A close second was HPMOR, which I've been reading since 2013 but the final 21 chapters were only published this year, so I'm counting it as a 2015 book. It's brilliant what Yudkowsky's done with the Harry Potter story, and if you can bear the length (over 2,000 pages) and the stigma of fan fiction, I highly recommend it.

It pains me to say it, but Rats was the book I liked the least this year. The topic was interesting, but the writing wasn't really flowing smoothly into my brain. Interestingly, Poisonwood and Rats were loaned to me by the same friend.

By the authors
I read ten books by men and six by women.
I read three Brits (Lahiri, Gaiman, and Pratchett) and one Canadian (Atwood). Everyone else was born in the USA.
The oldest (and deadest) author I read was Vonnegut (b. 1922), followed by Atwood (b. 1939, and very much alive), and then Pratchett (b. 1948) who died WHILE I was reading Good Omens. Sorry guys. All other authors are younger, and living. I couldn't find ages for the authors of Welcome to Night Vale, which I suppose is appropriate, since time is weird there. I am assuming they are the youngest of the authors I read this year.
This was my fourth time reading Atwood, my third and fourth times reading Gaiman, and my fifth time reading Roach. The rest were new to me.

By genre
1 memoir
2 non-fiction (biology and nature)
13 fiction
 - 3 YA
 - 4 Sci-fi
 - 4 Fantasy

Ender's Game is the first in a series I will probably not continue.
The Year of the Flood is the second in a trilogy I probably will finish.

By publication date
The oldest book I read was Sirens of Titan, published in 1959. Everything else was published in the 90s or later, including two books published this year: Welcome to Night Vale and HPMOR (sort of).

By setting
Settings include New York, Newport (RI), Boston, Columbus, Chicago, Orlando, Oklahoma, Missouri, Wisconsin, Georgia, Night Vale (California?), Atwood's vague concept of the future North America, London and the English countryside, Yudowsky's alternate Hogwarts, the Belgian Congo, USSR, Calcutta, Mars, Mercury, Titan (moon of Saturn), elsewhere in space, and the human digestive tract. Specific time settings range from WWII to 2044, but Ender's Game certainly goes beyond that (if it takes place in our reality), and as was previously mentioned, time is meaningless in Night Vale (and out of it).

Films
I watched the movie of Gone Girl. I started watching the movie of Ender's Game but didn't finish it, and I have yet to see The Namesake movie. I'm very much looking forward to the movie of Ready Player One and the HBO miniseries being made of Atwood's MaddAddam series (of which Flood is a part).

Book clubs
I didn't read any of these as part of a book club, but I was inspired to read The Namesake because my college fraternity chapter selected it for their book club. I tried to read along with them and participate, but I ended up zipping through it. Plus, I'm sure I read Welcome to Night Vale at the same time as many (tens of? hundreds of?) thousands of fellow fans worldwide.

Reading in interesting places
I read Ender's Game on a cruise ship.
I saw many subway rats while reading Rats (although the book focuses on rats in alleys).
I read The Sirens of Titan on Titan.

Where I got them
Borrowed: Yes Please and Paper Towns (Sara), Neverwhere (Scott), Ender's Game (dyAnne), Gone Girl (Talia), Rats and Poisonwood Bible (Charlene), Ready Player One (Matthew)
Gifts: Mathematician's Shiva (Bethany), Sirens of Titan (Sara)
Bought: Flood (The Word in Greenpoint), Good Omens (The Word in Jersey City), Gulp (Strand), Night Vale (Amazon)
Read online for free: HPMOR
Just had it: Namesake

Looking ahead

• My first priority for 2016 is to tackle the pile of books I got for the holidays, which will achieve several goals: reading books within a year of being given them, feeding my Sarah Vowell obsession (Lafayette in the Somewhat United States), and reading more non-fiction (the stack is almost entirely non-fiction).
• Reading the books Lindsay got me for my birthday will intersect with the gift goal, the non-fiction goal (David Byrne's How Music Works) and the Neil Gaiman obsession (Trigger Warning).
• I would like to complete the MaddAddam trilogy by reading Margaret Atwood's MaddAddam.
• I've recently discovered Vonnegut and I've taken a year off from Murakami which is too long.
• I have a shopping bag full of books from the shelves of a friend who was purging before a move, and I plan to delve into it starting with Armistead Maupin's Tales of the City series.
• The first two bullets in this list contain plenty of non-fiction to choose from, but in case I need more, I'd like to prioritize Guns, Germs, and Steel and A People's History of the United States.

Happy new reading year!