Opinions of a Wolf

It’s the last day of 2011, so it’s time to compile and post my reading stats!  It’s so fun and interesting to see how my reading progresses and changes over time.  This year was especially interesting, since it was my first year out of school in…um….forever?  Seeing what I read when all of my reading is for fun was fascinating.  Also, this was the first year I owned an ereader, my kindle, which definitely impacted my reading style.  Anyway, onward with the stats!

Last year, I read a grand total of 70 books, and the year before that 52. This year? That number skyrocketed.

Total books read: 107
Average books read per month: 8.9
Month most read: Tie between August and December with 14 (Interestingly, these were the months I mostly read on my kindle. I’ve discovered I read faster on it than in print).
Month least read: Tie between January and April with 6 each (January was my first month out of grad school, so I was burned out.  I honestly don’t know what happened in April).
Longest book read: It by Stephen King with 1,090 pages
Fiction: 89 (83%)
Nonfiction: 17 (16%) (I really expected this to be higher!)
Formats:
–traditional print: 44 (41%)
–ebook: 46 (43%) (ebooks have officially taken over!)
–graphic novel: 11 (10%)
–audiobook: 6 (6%)
Genres:
–scifi: 16 (Winner for the third year running)
–horror: 13
–dystopian: 11
–humorous: 11
–black lit: 10 (Courtesy of getting to know Amy and Kinna and The Real Help project).
–fantasy: 10
–nonfiction memoir: 10
–YA: 10
–thriller: 9
–contemporary fiction: 8 (This came out of nowhere).
–mental illness: 7 (Kind of embarrassing how low this is, given that I host the MIA Reading Challenge, heh).
–mystery: 7
–nonfiction history: 7 (I want this to be higher next year!)
–european classics: 5
–historic fiction: 5
–postapocalyptic: 5
–american classics: 4
–feminist lit: 4
–paranormal romance: 4 (Way down from the previous two years).
–japanese lit: 3
–short-story collection: 3 (A new genre, yay!)
–alternate history: 2
–chinese lit: 2
–erotica: 2
–nonfiction environmentalism: 2
–poetry: 2
–romance: 2
–urban fantasy: 2
–vegetarianism/veganism: 2
–cozy: 1
–cyberpunk: 1
–nonfiction diet: 1
–nonfiction fitness: 1
–nonfiction lifestyle: 1
–steampunk: 1
Vampires vs. Zombies vs. Aliens vs. Demons:
–zombies: 7 (Success! I wanted them to win this year 😉 )
–vampires: 4
–aliens: 3
–demons: 2 (Poor, poor demons).
Numbers of stars:
–5 star reads: 20 (19%)
–4 star reads: 48 (45%)
–3 star reads: 29  (27%)
–2 star reads: 7 (6%)
–1 star reads: 3 (3%)

What I found most fascinating in assembling these stats was that I apparently read much faster on a kindle than in print.  Why is this?  Maybe the screen makes my brain remember its speed-reading lessons from middle school that I did on a screen?  Maybe the lack of physical knowledge of how much is left keeps my enthusiasm up?  I’m not sure.

I’m really pleased to see that my serious reading went up.  Now that I’m out of school, I can read up on the topics that I myself want to know more about, and I did!  I hope that my environmental and veg reading will increase next year.  I also hope to continue to see a strong showing in black lit and an increased showing in Chinese and Japanese lit.

Overall, this was a great reading year.  My first year getting over 100 books!  Stay tuned for my reading goals 2012 post.  Any suggestions?