End of Year 2009 Meme

Saw this at FizzyThought’s and then traced back to the originator, Savidge Reads. HHI had been working on my spreadsheet and counts and categories and truthfully, got frustrated when nothing added up so if please don’t analyze too closely.       Then I saw this meme and I’m either nuts to add to my already disorganized attempt to manage this summary or…   oh, I don’t know.  I still can’t think straight from those couple of few many glasses of champagne on New Year’s Eve…

How many books read in 2009?

I read 87 books in 2009 and this was the first year I counted pages:  25,036. OOPS!   Found an error of attributing 1000 pages to a book that only had 80 so my total pages read is only 24,186.  (don’t attempt to check my math – I found other errors…)

How many fiction and non fiction?

65 fiction to 22 nonfiction (and oh! what a variety of NF it was!)

Male/Female author ratio?

I read 48 books written by women, 38 by men and one book that was a male-female joint venture (P&P&Z)

Favorite book of 2009?

Either The Book Thief or The Help.     And Proust Was a Neuroscientist for NF.      Nothing But Ghosts for YA, although The Book Thief is YA, too, so – goodness…    I gave the five pie slice rating to 12 books, or almost 14%.      I gave 33 books the four slice rating, and 33 books got three slices, 7 books got two.     Which truly means that only 7 books were of the ‘eh’, just alright no-enthusiasm whatever rating.   Not bad!

Least favourite?

The Jane Austen Book Club (I gave it two slices of pie), The Pillars of the Earth (DNF – didn’t rate), and Lolita – it was extremely frustrating but I still gave it three pie slices.    [Three slices of my infamous avocado lime meringue pie!!]

Any that you simply couldn’t finish and why?

I started Ken Follett’s The Pillars of the Earth during my first attempt to READ during the April Read-A-Thon; I found it very helpful to count page progress this way.   But once the RAT was over and I was not quite half way through with the book,  I started to get irritated with the gratuitous violence and rape scenes and the flat-out (and flatly written?) mean characters.    I tried to skim and finally put it down and I do not regret it.    I think I tried to read the last 30 pages just to see if the darn ol’ cathedral actually was built but realized I didn’t care anymore.

My two other DNFs were books that I just couldn’t get into for either my mood or because the next book I wanted to read was just too tempting.    I hope to get back to Obama’s The Audacity of Hope someday – it was a library book, too.    Foer’s Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close may have to stay in that bucket I call “I WOULD LOVE THIS if I could just finish it.”    I did not put this down because it was bad.    I just couldn’t seem to pick it back up after I set it down.

Oldest book read?

Eςa de Queiroz’s The Mandarin was published in 1889 and you’d never know it was ‘old’!   Kate Chopin’s The Awakening published in 1899 is both a product of its time and yet forward-thinking beyond any expectation.     Third oldest was Anne of Green Gables – I’m very glad I picked this one up.     Only these 3 published before 1950, except one in 1937; then one in 1955, two in the 60s, three in the 70s, three in the 80s, 14 in the 90s, and the rest in the 2000+ years.

Newest?

I think it was 31 Hours by Masha Hamilton?   I do think I blew away any record of reading lots of books published in current year.   This is also the book I read with the shortest title.   See next question.

Longest and shortest book titles?

Winner for longest title:   The Day the World Ended at Little Bighorn:  A Lakota History by Joseph M. Marshall III.

Longest and shortest books?

The shortest books were all kid’s books!     But for adult books, I think it was Helene Hanff’s 84, Charing Cross Road – a book I was excited to finally read and it didn’t disappoint.       The book with the most pages was The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo in paperback for 656.  I read 5 books of over 500 pages:   A Prayer for Owen Meany (543), The Book Thief (552), The Blind Assassin (521), The Restless Sleep (515) and I stopped reading about page 500 in The Pillars of the Earth.

How many books from the library?

Elevenish.      Quite a few from bookmooch.    Most purchased or won or given or borrowed from friends.   Only one book sent from an author…

Any translated books?

I read 4 books translated and almost want to add Lolita here because it was so full of stuff I had no idea what it meant, including French phrases and excessive quantity of cultural obscure-to-me references  – I wore out the annotated version.

The Housekeeper and the Professor (from Japanese), Popular Music from Vittula (Swedish), The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo (also Swedish) and The Mandarin (Portuguese)

Most read author of the year, and how many books by that author?

I read THREE books by Jennie Nash this year and she was a new-to-me author!   I’m looking forward to reading her next novel which is due in 2010!   What the heck, let’s throw in a few more exclamation points, shall we?!!!!!!

Any re-reads?

Yes, I read The Awakening but didn’t realize until 20-30 pages in that it felt familiar.     And I read The Hobbit for the Flashback Challenge even though I don’t think I every really read it but rather listened to it when I was in 5th grade.

Favourite character of the year?

The narrator of The Art of Racing in the Rain, most everyone in The Help, Olive Kitteridge, Liesel and even more so, Rudy, in The Book Thief, and I might have a place in my heart for lil’ Owen Meany.    Anne of Green Gables – of course, and maybe ol Mister Pip.   I rooted for Annie and her uncle in Through Black Spruce and I enjoyed getting to know Arnold Spirit, Jr in his (The) Absolutely True Diary…

Which countries did you go to through the page in your year of reading?

A lot!    Sweden a few times, Iran, France a few times more, lots in Canada – Alberta and Ontario and Nova Scotia (in fiction and non), England and the Channel Isles, Nazi Germany, Japan, Jewish Iraq and a bit of Israel,  Borneo and Papau New Guinea, Portugal and China, Vietnam, I keep seeing books set in France! (5), South Africa, one book in the future “somewhere” and one in the ‘Shire.

As for American States I traveled to:  Maine (twice), Massachusetts (5?), Washington (twice), Texas, Illinois, Louisiana (twice), Virginia, South Dakota, Wisconsin, Wyoming, alloverUSandWithinNewEngland in Lolita, California (at least twice), upstate New York and 3 in NYC.

Which book wouldn’t you have read without someone’s specific recommendation?

Maree – for all the New Zealand books!   Fizzythoughts is blamed for Through Black Spruce (and probably Lolita and A Prayer for Owen Meany and …), Nymeth for The Mandarin, Lisa at Books on the Brain for introducing me to Jennie Nash by way of a comment and also for Sarah’s Key (sort of – my Bookclub chose it really), Violet for Last Night in Montreal, My Friend Amy encouraged me to buy Kephart’s Nothing But Ghosts, KB got me to read Kristin Hannah but physically putting them into my bookbag and also for Green Grass Running Water, Citizen Reader for half of my nonfic choices, Dewey for John Green books, Ali at Worducopia for inspiring me to read more books by authors of color, and…    TOO MANY!    It would be much easier to list the books that somehow ended up on my list entirely by forces of my own devices, and the best examples:  The Woman’s Guide to Boating because we bought a boat in 2009 and Math Curse by  Jon Scieszka because it was on the teacher’s desk when I substitute taught one day.

Which author was new to you in 2009 that you now want to read the entire works of?

Jennie Nash.    John Green.    Kathryn Stockett.     Lisa Genova.     (You might notice that a few of these are ‘new’ authors and thus don’t have a lot of books, yet.)

In my book tracking, I have  a column for a number of times I have read the author and SEVENTY SEVEN books have a ONE by them.    Seventy seven!      Two of the ten books that had a higher number next to it were repeat authors from this year and one of the books was a re-read so she doesn’t really count.   Since I read two books by an author (Ray Bradbury) that I had previously read in high school, only SIX authors were repeats – 7% – from a prior reading year.    (is this making sense?)      Kazuo Ishiguro, Margart Atwood, Tracy Chevalier, J.R.R.Tolkein, and Audrey Niffenegger.     Honestly, the only one of this small group I care to read more of is Atwood.

Which books are you annoyed you didn’t read?

I am sad that I didn’t get to any Neil Gaiman.    I must MUST read The Bell Jar!      and I really didn’t read any of my fave author Tracy Kidder but I did purchase a few so they are ready for 2010.

Did you read any books you have always been meaning to read?

Yes!    Their Eyes Were Watching God and A Lesson Before Dying.    I had been wanting to read anything by John Irving.    Lolita had always been a curiosity.

Thank you to all my readers/book-blogger-buds!

2009 TOP TEN Events in Care’s Book Life:

10.   The Owen Meany Read-Along was awesome and would love to blog-twit-chat another book this year.

9.  I had the pleasure of meeting two of you in real life:   Beastmomma and Dawn of She is Two Fond of Books.

8.  As much as I scowl about Lolita, I am glad I attempted it and still might someday write a review.     Or read it again.   (What!?)

7.   I had avoided goodreads.com but finally succumbed and now LOVE IT now as the go to place for wishlisting and tbr-ing all the books I want to read someday.

6.   BOSTON BOOK FEST!     So fun.   Good times.    Looking forward to the next.

5.   Twittering the brainstorming session for the Women Unbound Challenge was so terrific and I am so glad I was in on it!    Twitter is a fun place for spontaneous book chats and other silliness.

4.    I love Read-A-Thons!   and BBAW is so cool.

3.   One of my favorite of the challenges I participated in has be Just Add Book‘s New Zealand one in October – it came on quick and only lasted a month;   I did well to read two books Mister Pip and The Vintner’s Luck that I don’t think I ever would have gotten to without this little push and I enjoyed them both immensely.   And I will soon be rewarded with chocolate as a prize for participating.    AWESOME!      Maree!   Got that package shipped yet?!

2.  I can truly say I’m overjoyed and so happy with my new In Real Life Book Club (The Bookies) who are busy influencing my reading choices considerably.      We read 8 books together and I look forward to much more fun in the future.    Very excited about our next choice:   Same Kind of Different As Me by Ron Hall and Denver Moore

1.   The evolving world of book blogging and the wonderful friends I have met continue to amaze and inspire me.   Thank you.