2016 in Reading: Part 1

I am currently in the middle of a fairly lengthy holiday journey across the country to visit with family, so my usual round-up of my year in reading is late and will be quick. But I want to crunch all the numbers as usual, so here we go!

• Books read: 85.
• Audiobooks: 6. I focused more on podcasts than audiobooks this year, which has been great, as I love podcasts … but I love audiobooks too. I wrote about this dilemma here.
• eBooks: 23. This is almost twice last year’s number. I read many more e-galleys from Edelweiss this year, which explains the change.
• From library: 9.
• Fiction: 40. This is way down from last year! Last year my reading was 68% fiction, and this year it’s 47%. This change reflects my love of essays and memoirs and my desire to read and write about more of them. I’ll never stop reading novels, though.
• Nonfiction: 42. Last year my nonfiction reading was 30%; this year it’s 47%.
• Poetry: 3. One of these had some essays in it too, so I’m counting it in nonfiction as well.
• Plays: 1.
• Essay collections: 11. Five more than last year.
• Biography/autobiography: 25. 12 more than last year.
• Mysteries: 7
• Graphic Novels: 1
• Books in translation: 7. This is down by two from last year, which I’m not happy about.
• Books by writers of color: 30. This is the same number as last year, but a slightly higher percentage.

Gender breakdown:

• Women: 62
• Men: 21
• Collections with men and women: 2

Nationalities:

• Americans: 57
• British: 12
• French: 2
• Canadian: 2
• Indian: 2
• Nigerian: 2
• One each by authors from Algeria, Australia, Chile, Ireland, Mexico, Malaysia, Sudan, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Year of publication:

• 19th century: 2
• First half of 20th century: 3
• Second half of 20th century: 4
• 2000-2009: 4
• 2010-2016: 72

I’ll be back before too long with a list of my favorite books of the year. I hope your 2017 has started of well!