2010 in terms of reading
I got this reading meme from bookish, and as I'm bored of having my flist stuffed with best-of-2010 reading lists, I thought this would be a better idea of making a summary of my 2010 reading habits.
The first book you read this year: Complete Stories by Flannery O'Connor. Too much honesty to start a year.
The last book you finished this year: Spring Torrents by Ivan Turgenev. Not a very nice wrap-up book.
The first book you will finish in the new year: The Help by Kathryn Stockett. I'm liking it better than I thought I would.
Your favorite "classic" you read this year: As I don't know whether A Clockwork Orange is a classic, I would say The Rainbow and Women in Love by D.H. Lawrence. Honorable Mention: Fictions by Borges.
The book series you read the most volumes of this year: A Song of Ice and Fire by George R.R. Martin. I read the last two of those mammoth books and my back certainly suffered, but it was definitely worth it. I now live in constant fear of that man dying before finishing the series. If there's any doctor reading this who happens to ever tend to Mr. Martin, please treat him well!
The genre you read the most this year: It was a pretty diverse year, but I read quite a lot of crime novels, for what I usually read at least. And I didn't like it.
The book that disappointed you: A few. It wasn't a good year. The Lovely Bones, The Ice Princess, Frankenstein, The Fire, The Exception, The Prince and the Pauper, Celestial Harmonies, Esther's Inheritance, Jar City, The Man on the Balcony, Spring Torrents.
The book you liked better than you expected to: The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood (I love dystopian novels, I don't know why I hadn't read it before!), The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss (perfect, just perfect) or The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger (I read it when I was fifteen and I totally hated Holden).
The hardest book you read this year (topic or writing style): Celestial Harmonies. It was hard because of the writing style and it wasn't rewarding. I mean, who can write 10 pages with a list of family heirlooms? And who can read it? Then, in terms of topic, the Complete Stories by Flannery O'Connor were really hard to read.
Funniest book you read this year: No funny books this year. I laughed sometimes with Catcher or with 84 Charing Cross Road, but I was also moved while reading them... I wouldn't say they're funny.
The saddest book you read this year: All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque. Sad book about war and soldiers. A classic.
The shortest book you read this year: Anton Chékhov by Natalia Ginzburg (88 pages). Short sketches about the life of Anton Chékhov. Not specially good, just a prelude to a project of reading a series of Chékhov stories that my erratic bookclub abandoned just after reading this book.
The longest book you read this year: The Complete Borges, Vol. 1 by Jorge Luis Borges (1152 pages), don't remember the editor. Great, great book. I'm looking forward to the second volume.
A book that you discovered this year that you will definitely read again: If I had to choose just one, definitely 84 Charing Cross Road.
A book that you never want to read again: Many. Celestial Harmonies or The Lovely Bones or The Fire... I can't understand the high praise that The Lovely Bones received.
And finally, make a New Year's Resolution: Read more books from my tbr list, read 50 books, read as many as possible from the 1001 list. I think that's all. Oh, and complete my 2011 challenges.
Now STATS!
I read 40 out of 50 books, 10 less than last year, but then they were thicker (around 400 pages each), actually I read 106% of the pages I wanted to read. I read 8 books in English (better than last year) but just one single book in French. Awful! 26 of them were written by men. Quite egalitarian, but it wasn't intended.
And that was all for 2010. I hope 2011 is a better year! :)
The first book you read this year: Complete Stories by Flannery O'Connor. Too much honesty to start a year.
The last book you finished this year: Spring Torrents by Ivan Turgenev. Not a very nice wrap-up book.
The first book you will finish in the new year: The Help by Kathryn Stockett. I'm liking it better than I thought I would.
Your favorite "classic" you read this year: As I don't know whether A Clockwork Orange is a classic, I would say The Rainbow and Women in Love by D.H. Lawrence. Honorable Mention: Fictions by Borges.
The book series you read the most volumes of this year: A Song of Ice and Fire by George R.R. Martin. I read the last two of those mammoth books and my back certainly suffered, but it was definitely worth it. I now live in constant fear of that man dying before finishing the series. If there's any doctor reading this who happens to ever tend to Mr. Martin, please treat him well!
The genre you read the most this year: It was a pretty diverse year, but I read quite a lot of crime novels, for what I usually read at least. And I didn't like it.
The book that disappointed you: A few. It wasn't a good year. The Lovely Bones, The Ice Princess, Frankenstein, The Fire, The Exception, The Prince and the Pauper, Celestial Harmonies, Esther's Inheritance, Jar City, The Man on the Balcony, Spring Torrents.
The book you liked better than you expected to: The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood (I love dystopian novels, I don't know why I hadn't read it before!), The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss (perfect, just perfect) or The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger (I read it when I was fifteen and I totally hated Holden).
The hardest book you read this year (topic or writing style): Celestial Harmonies. It was hard because of the writing style and it wasn't rewarding. I mean, who can write 10 pages with a list of family heirlooms? And who can read it? Then, in terms of topic, the Complete Stories by Flannery O'Connor were really hard to read.
Funniest book you read this year: No funny books this year. I laughed sometimes with Catcher or with 84 Charing Cross Road, but I was also moved while reading them... I wouldn't say they're funny.
The saddest book you read this year: All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque. Sad book about war and soldiers. A classic.
The shortest book you read this year: Anton Chékhov by Natalia Ginzburg (88 pages). Short sketches about the life of Anton Chékhov. Not specially good, just a prelude to a project of reading a series of Chékhov stories that my erratic bookclub abandoned just after reading this book.
The longest book you read this year: The Complete Borges, Vol. 1 by Jorge Luis Borges (1152 pages), don't remember the editor. Great, great book. I'm looking forward to the second volume.
A book that you discovered this year that you will definitely read again: If I had to choose just one, definitely 84 Charing Cross Road.
A book that you never want to read again: Many. Celestial Harmonies or The Lovely Bones or The Fire... I can't understand the high praise that The Lovely Bones received.
And finally, make a New Year's Resolution: Read more books from my tbr list, read 50 books, read as many as possible from the 1001 list. I think that's all. Oh, and complete my 2011 challenges.
Now STATS!
I read 40 out of 50 books, 10 less than last year, but then they were thicker (around 400 pages each), actually I read 106% of the pages I wanted to read. I read 8 books in English (better than last year) but just one single book in French. Awful! 26 of them were written by men. Quite egalitarian, but it wasn't intended.
And that was all for 2010. I hope 2011 is a better year! :)