we are all clocks
End of the year book meme! Stolen from extemporally. I wish I had the time to write super detailed answers, but I should be getting ready for dinner.Happy new year everyone.
How many books read in 2011?
Eighty Nine (ninety if I finish David Ferry’s Bewilderment in the next six hours. My goal at the beginning of the year was to read at least fifty books, and once I met that goal I changed it up to seventy five, and then a hundred. Unfortunately, work had me in its grip and I wasn’t able to make it to that final goal. Next year, though…next year.
Fiction/Non-Fiction ratio?
76: 14
Male/Female authors?
31: 58
White/POC authors?
52: 37
Favorite books read?
Fiction: We the Animals by Justin Torres. In love - LOVE - with this book.
Poetry: Life on Mars by Tracy K. Smith
Non-fiction: Drinking: A Love Story by Caroline Knapp.
Least favourite?
The first two Fifty Shades of Gray books. Terrible writing, plot, characters, everything. Don’t even know why I even a)finished the first one and b)read the second.
Oh, and St. Mawr by DH Lawrence.
Oldest book?
Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf
Newest book?
This is How you Lose Her by Junot Diaz
Longest book title?
The Chicken Chronicles: Sitting with the Angels Who Have Returned with My Memories: Glorious, Rufus, Gertrude Stein, Splendor, Hortensia, Agnes of God, The Gladyses, & Babe: A Memoir
Shortest?
I read too many books with one-word titles!
Most books read by one author this year?
Rita Dove - 6
Junot Diaz/Mary Gaitskill/Stieg Larsson - 3
Any in translation?
The Yacoubian Building by Alaa Al Aswany
The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo/The Girl Who Played With Fire/The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest by Stieg Larsson
Women Without Men by Shahrnush Parsipur
Please Look After Mom by Kyung-Sook Shin
Book that most changed my perspective:
The Wedding Dress by Fanny Howe
Favourite character:
Della from Zazen.
Favourite scene:
From We the Animals. When the little boy breaks a tender moment and grips his mother’s swollen face: “She cussed me and Jesus and the tears dropped and I was seven."
Favourite quote:
From Zazen by Vanessa Veselka: “I wake up sometimes and feel the nearness of something but then it’s gone and I’ve started to wonder if it was ever there. Lately, I’ve become afraid that the feeling I used to feel, like something good was waiting, is what people mean when they say “young” and that it is nothing more than a chemical associated with a metabolic process and not anything real at all.”
What do you want to read in 2013?
Everything in my to-read list on Goodreads. The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath. Tchaikovsky’s letters. Everything by Mary Gaitskill, that goddess. Mercury by Ariana Reines. War and Peace. The Labyrinth of Solitude. More books in Spanish. 100 books.
How many books read in 2011?
Eighty Nine (ninety if I finish David Ferry’s Bewilderment in the next six hours. My goal at the beginning of the year was to read at least fifty books, and once I met that goal I changed it up to seventy five, and then a hundred. Unfortunately, work had me in its grip and I wasn’t able to make it to that final goal. Next year, though…next year.
Fiction/Non-Fiction ratio?
76: 14
Male/Female authors?
31: 58
White/POC authors?
52: 37
Favorite books read?
Fiction: We the Animals by Justin Torres. In love - LOVE - with this book.
Poetry: Life on Mars by Tracy K. Smith
Non-fiction: Drinking: A Love Story by Caroline Knapp.
Least favourite?
The first two Fifty Shades of Gray books. Terrible writing, plot, characters, everything. Don’t even know why I even a)finished the first one and b)read the second.
Oh, and St. Mawr by DH Lawrence.
Oldest book?
Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf
Newest book?
This is How you Lose Her by Junot Diaz
Longest book title?
The Chicken Chronicles: Sitting with the Angels Who Have Returned with My Memories: Glorious, Rufus, Gertrude Stein, Splendor, Hortensia, Agnes of God, The Gladyses, & Babe: A Memoir
Shortest?
I read too many books with one-word titles!
Most books read by one author this year?
Rita Dove - 6
Junot Diaz/Mary Gaitskill/Stieg Larsson - 3
Any in translation?
The Yacoubian Building by Alaa Al Aswany
The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo/The Girl Who Played With Fire/The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest by Stieg Larsson
Women Without Men by Shahrnush Parsipur
Please Look After Mom by Kyung-Sook Shin
Book that most changed my perspective:
The Wedding Dress by Fanny Howe
Favourite character:
Della from Zazen.
Favourite scene:
From We the Animals. When the little boy breaks a tender moment and grips his mother’s swollen face: “She cussed me and Jesus and the tears dropped and I was seven."
Favourite quote:
From Zazen by Vanessa Veselka: “I wake up sometimes and feel the nearness of something but then it’s gone and I’ve started to wonder if it was ever there. Lately, I’ve become afraid that the feeling I used to feel, like something good was waiting, is what people mean when they say “young” and that it is nothing more than a chemical associated with a metabolic process and not anything real at all.”
What do you want to read in 2013?
Everything in my to-read list on Goodreads. The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath. Tchaikovsky’s letters. Everything by Mary Gaitskill, that goddess. Mercury by Ariana Reines. War and Peace. The Labyrinth of Solitude. More books in Spanish. 100 books.