Well, friends, do I have a bookish week ahead for you.  Today, Part I of my traditional look back at last year’s reading, with Part II to follow on Wednesday, and one of my favorite posts of the year – Book Superlatives – on Friday!  I know what you’re thinking: FINALLY, a bookish week!  We were getting so tired of reading about her hikes and holiday recaps and New Year’s resolutions!  Well, I do promise that I am trying my best to kick this reading slump I’ve been in and keep the literary content up around here, but you can expect to see more hiking and family activity posts over the course of the year, too.  I’m hoping for some balanced posting this year, and I swear I’m trying!

As a reading year goes, 2014 was a bit of a mixed bag for me.  I read some really fantastic books last year and had a few months where I just whipped through page after page of excellent writing… but in the second half of the year I hit a major reading slump that’s still going on.  With a rough fall, a few extremely busy times at work, a toddler, and a difficult move to a new house in which it seemed that everything broke all at once, I found that even when I had the time to sit down, I didn’t always have the attention for a big (or even a short) book.  And much as I don’t want to start blaming the baby for stuff before he’s even born, pregnancy didn’t help matters (falling asleep in Peanut’s rocking chair at 8:00 doesn’t make for great evening reading time.)  As a result, my 2014 bookish stats are looking pretty weak.  Still, I managed to read a few books each month and I also learned to go easy on myself, focusing less on numbers and page totals and more on what makes me happy – because life’s too short, right?  So with that, my bookish 2014, by the numbers:

Total books read: 71
Fiction: 54, or 76 %
Nonfiction: 17, or 24 %

My Goodreads stats show 65 books read, but I don’t record re-reads over there, so my actual total is a bit higher.  I’m pretty happy with 71.  It’s not the three digits I’ve come to expect from myself over the past few years, but that just might be the way things are going these days.  Most weekdays see me rushing out the door to work, putting in a full day (no lunchtime reading) at the office, picking Peanut up, rushing home to get dinner on the table, do bath and bedtime routine, and then sit with Peanut until she falls asleep (she’s going through a clingy phase and if I don’t sit there it’s a bad scene) – and I often don’t get a second to unwind until 9:00 or later, at which point I’m pretty much spent and ready to go to sleep myself.  Weekends are a bit looser, but still packed full of caring for Peanut, errands, grocery runs, cleaning the house, meal prep for the week, and trying to squeeze a little family time (and exercise if I’m really lucky) in there; there’s not much time for reading even on days off work.  I’m not trying to “mommy martyr” – I’m just telling it like it is.  I’d love to get a bit more free time to read, but I’m snatching it in periods of a few minutes here and a few minutes there, most of which I’m too tired to open a book anyway.  Until the kids are older and I have more free time, the book totals might be lower, and I’ve got to be okay with that.  And you know what?  I am.

Anyway, the whining being over, let’s get to the detailed breakdown, because who doesn’t love a good pie… errrr, chart?

2014 Fiction Genres

Fiction genres requires something of a judgment call on certain books.  For instance, the Little House books – are they classics or young adult?  As you can probably guess by the fact that I read nineteen classics and only one YA book this year, I considered the Little House series (which I re-read in January) classics.  There’s definitely room for interpretation on genre (I’ve written about this issue before) so please keep in mind that the genres reflected above do include somewhat subjective judgments on my part.

That said, I was pretty pleased with my classics total for the year, but wish I’d read more than six literary fiction titles – something to work on for next year, perhaps?

2014 Settings

The biggest surprise for me here was that, for possibly the first time ever, the USA edged out Great Britain in terms of book settings!  Usually the UK, and England in particular, account for the greatest number of books set in those areas.  Last year the USA was a close second, and this year it was the winner by five books – which is a lot, considering I read about thirty fewer books this year than I usually do.  The other takeaway is that I really need to read more books set in other areas of the world.  I had nothing in Asia or the Pacific region, and only three books set in Africa – all three of which, I have to confess, were Amelia Peabody mysteries.  So I really do need to do better on that front.

2014 Authors’ Sex

Hmmmmm, do you think I have a bit of a bias here?  More than three quarters of the books I read this year (and this chart accounts for both fiction and non-fiction) were written by women – wow.  I guess I need to focus on giving the guys a bit more attention next year, huh?

2014 Book Source

Unsurprisingly, the majority of the books I read this year (34 out of 71) came from the library.  What is surprising, is that my library totals were so few!  A full 29 books from my own shelves – wow, now that’s not something I see every year.  I’m sure re-reads account for that at least a little bit, but I’d like to continue reading from my own collections more into 2015.  I own some wonderful books that deserve attention!

Coming up on Wednesday is Part II: my top ten favorite books read this year.  I did read some great books in 2014, so that ought to be fun.  Stay tuned!

How’d your 2014 reading go?  Were you a machine, or did you drift in and out of a reading slump, like I did?