Reading Review – 2022

I like to look back over the previous year’s reading to see if any patterns have emerged. As ever, one or two, generally do….

Pattern no 1

There’s been a continuation in the slow down of the number of books read each year, with only 50 read out of the 52 I’ve aimed at for the past five years. Up till three years ago, I not only achieved that number, but easily outstripped it. Calls on my spare time have clearly increased – not entirely surprising, as I’ve been building a new business alongside my day job!

Nevertheless, reading is my retreat, my happy place and my joy – so it’ll always play a significant part in my life.

Pattern no 2

Out of a total of 19,254 pages read during the year, the shortest book read was 113 pages long (Santa Grint from Jodi Taylor – a regular provider of easy reading in the lighthearted history/time travel genre) with the longest coming in at a whopping 1,408 (The Ink Black Heart from Robert Galbraith – a guilty pleasure in the crime fiction genre).

I’m generally drawn to chunky big books, but see that I’ve read more shorter books this year. Mostly they come from the sorbet or palate cleansing category but, this year, a number of Booker longlisted books were also shorter than the norm. This resulted in my average book length coming in at 385 pages.

Pattern no 3

Of the 50 books read this year, The 7½ deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle from Stuart Turton was the most popular among readers using Goodreads (although was a long way from my favourite), having been selected by almost 850,000 others, with only under 80 others selecting Barra Boy from Iain Kelly. Despite those numbers, I commend the latter from friend and indie author, Iain, who has written a beautifully observed book.

What did surprise me was that the aforementioned shortest (easy reading) festive offering ended up as the highest rated by my fellow Goodreads users out of every book I read during 2022. As my reading contained all but one contender from this year’s Booker Prize longlist, clearly Goodreads users are more appreciative of easy reading than potential Bookers 🙂 This pattern has probably long been present, but I’ve only noticed it by actually reading that annual email I receive from Goodreads containing my detailed stats 😀

Pattern no 4

I read more 4-star reads this year than any other category which was downright unusual, as I’m usually awash in 3-star reads. The fact that I read most of the Booker longlist almost certainly boosted the top categories, and the fact that there were only three 5-star reads during the year, meant most got squeezed into the 4-star box.

The remainder of the Booker longlist contained three books to which I awarded only 3-stars, and one to which I gave an unusual 2. If I tell you I feared that 2-star book had a strong chance of becoming the eventual winner, you’ll understand that see I found it an unusual year.

Pattern no 5

I read three books from Robert Galbraith (JK Rowling, under a pen name) in the Cormoran Strike series this year. As each were over 1,000 pages long, they may well have contributed to my not quite making my aimed for annual total of 52 books 😉

Although somewhat late, I want to wish you all a healthy, happy and successful 2023. Finally, I apologise for boring the pants off the non-readers among you 😀

How do you select books to read? Have you any particular reading patterns – unexpected or otherwise?