The last day of 2010 is upon us; that means I have ahead of me the very difficult task of choosing my favorite books for the year. I’ve seen others’ lists going up since at least late November, but I hesitated, because for me that next gem could always be around the corner. I didn’t want to post my list before the year was nearly up. And while I may finish another book before midnight tonight, I doubt it will be as worthy as the ones that follow. I’ve chosen ten fiction and five non-fiction, which I think works for the proportions I read them in. There is no way I could whittle the fiction list down to five!
Fiction
- The Children’s Book, A.S. Byatt
- Speak, Laurie Halse Anderson
- The Kate Daniels series by Ilona Andrews; this year I read Magic Burns, Magic Strikes, and Magic Bleeds.
- The Sparrow, Mary Doria Russell
- Under Heaven, Guy Gavriel Kay
- Brooklyn, Colm Toibin
- Monsters of Men, Patrick Ness
- Mistress of the Art of Death, Ariana Franklin
- The Tiffany Aching quartet by Terry Pratchett (The Wee Free Men, A Hat Full of Sky, Wintersmith, and I Shall Wear Midnight)
- Delirium, Lauren Oliver
Non-fiction
- The Decisive Moment, Jonah Lehrer
- The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, Rebecca Skloot
- The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid, Bill Bryson
- Bess of Hardwick, Mary S. Lovell
- Cleopatra, Stacy Schiff
I wholeheartedly recommend each and every one of these books to you; they are simply incredible each in their own way.
In terms of statistics, I read:
- 253 books in total by 198 different authors
- 89,895 pages (may be inaccurate – some were ebooks)
- 101 books for review, 98 books of my own, and 54 library books
- 43 non-fiction books (17%)
- 170 books by women (67%)
- 19 were ebooks (7.5%)
The authors I read the most by this year were Anchee Min and Ilona Andrews with 5 books each.
Overall, I think it’s been a good year. I aimed to read deliberately and for the most part, I feel I truly did. Tomorrow, I’ll be back with a few of my goals for 2011. I’ll still be reading deliberately, I can tell you that.
How was your reading year in 2010?
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