In 2018, according to my Goodreads stats, I read 52 books - an average of 1 a week, and a tally not reached since 2013 (where admittedly, I had a government shut-down and international travel to aid that number).  I did have a number of vacations this year, notably to Palm Springs, Seattle, and Denver, and that probably helped.

While not actually ( Read more... )

According to my Goodreads account, this year, I read 46 books, which is my highest total since 2013 (when I read 52) and my second-highest total since I began using Goodreads to track in 2010. There was definitely a mix of fiction and non-fiction. Early 2017 did indeed trend heavily towards the works of the recently-deceased Carrie Fisher. I did ( Read more... )

Per Goodreads, in 2016 I read 33 books (right now, it's 32, but I'm optimistic that my current read will be finished before midnight on 12/31!) I'm going to have to pick up the pace to bring my average back up to 35-40 ( Read more... )

In 2015, I read 35 books - which is just under average for me. Per my stats at Goodreads, since I started keeping track on the site in 2010, I've read between 30 and 52 books in a given year (30 + 37 + 30 + 52 + 41 + 35 = 37.5 ( Read more... )

In 2014, I read 41 books - a respectable pace, given that this year was pretty big on life transitions. Only one book on the list made the "dislike" category - Gary Shteyngart's memoir, which was a book club pick - I found him to be very unsympathetic. I did find a number of "I LOVE THIS BOOK!" books, including two that cynic51 procured for me for ( Read more... )

In 2013, I came in at 52 books - one for each week of the year. I hope to keep the pace in 2014! While I did manage to read many books for book club, I only made it to three meetings due to travels. I had a few favorites (Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk and The Round House) and only one book that I couldn't stand, only finishing it because, well ( Read more... )

2012 was a down year for the reading, despite joining a book club. 30 books? Must do better in 2013. Despite the low turn-out, I still made some quality discoveries. For example, Daniel Woodrell. I read three books by him this year, and greatly enjoyed his writing. Highly recommended. I also breezed through the Hunger Games series, which was ( Read more... )

2011 saw the return to reading volume, with 38 books tallied for the year. The amount of time spent on airplanes definitely helped boost that number, with a late surge with a week of family time. Yes, when my family gets together, we sit around and read books. We're exciting ( Read more... )

One of my favorite podcasts is something called The Moth Radio Hour, which bills itself as "true stories told live." The storytellers are sometimes known, sometimes not, but they all have a knack (or at least very good instruction) for telling a good story. My particular favorites from the achieves include, in no particular order: Jessi Klein ( ( Read more... )

This evening, I engaged in an activity that I haven't done since taking ENGL 365: African-American Literature my sophomore year at CWRU ( Read more... )