As a first timer last year in the 52 Books in 52 Weeks Challenge, I did not realize that there was a end-of-the-year wrap up until I saw a friend's post. Now that I know, here is mine (complete with a picture of my many bookmarks and a gift mug from a friend)!
Did you reach your reading goal or did you decide to just meander about and follow rabbit trails and end up getting lost in the enjoyment of reading?
I didn't have any goal other than to reach 52 books in the year. It turns out that I easily read 52 books in less than 52 weeks; however, reviewing them and writing about them was more challenging. It was also disheartening when Google changed up their algorithms in October so that I had less folks reading the blog. Not that I write to gain lots of readers, but it helps to have some readers. I was encouraged and content to have 70-100 and did not need more. A change of algorithms meant less exposure, and I'm not interested in adding ads. So, there you have it: if you read my blog minus the ads, thank you!
Where did your armchair travels take you? Which countries and time periods did you journey through?
France, Burundi, South Africa (twice), UK (twice), Mexico, and Russia were the countries I "traveled" to outside of my own which made up the majority of the rest of the books when they were not non-fiction or fantasy.
Which books stayed with you the longest? Did you set any aside to read again at some point and savor the story all over again?
I'll be dipping back into a number of non-fiction books: Joyful Journey; the Barefoot/Shoes series by Sharon Garlough Brown (actually fiction involving non-fiction...hard to explain); The End of Alzheimer's; Braving the Wilderness; Becoming Dallas Willard; The Crossroads of Should and Must; Blue Zones Solution; The Plant Paradox; Spiritual Direction; 13 Things Mentally Strong People Don't Do; The World According to Mr. Rogers; The Art of Listening in a Healing Way; Leadership and Self-Deception; Donald Hall's two books; maybe Soul Keeping. So, that looks like about all of my non-fiction books.
This made me realize I read a LOT of non-fiction this past year, and I never used to read any non-fiction (except textbooks forced upon me by teachers). The one fiction book I would re-read would be The Gentleman in Moscow. Surprisingly, a book that I only gave 3 stars to kept coming back to mind: Calypso (also non-fiction). I was mad at Sedaris over the turtles. I probably needed to give his book 4 stars if it was going to keep coming back to my mind like that (and not because of the turtles). The non-fiction books definitely made an impact and bits and pieces have stayed with me. Goodness, only 16 of my 54 books were true fiction. Add 6 more that were fictionalized true stories, and that is still less than half.
Did you discover any new to you authors or genres?
Let's look at this in a different way: the only author I was familiar with was Gary Moon who wrote Becoming Dallas Willard. Every single other author was new to me! Wow.
Which books intrigued or entertained, made you laugh, cry, dance or sing?
Again, I need to look at that question in the opposite direction. Which book did NOT make me feel any of those things listed? I can't recall what Evensong was about, and the Shelf Life I recall as mostly feeling like authors being forced to write a story which included a book he or she had read and I didn't like any of the stories until a couple at the end.
Share your favorite titles, covers, quotes and of course, your reading lists.
Forgive me if I don't list all the books here. Scroll down through my blog list on the right and all the book titles are listed in the titles of each blog post reviewing each book.
Did you reach your reading goal or did you decide to just meander about and follow rabbit trails and end up getting lost in the enjoyment of reading?
I didn't have any goal other than to reach 52 books in the year. It turns out that I easily read 52 books in less than 52 weeks; however, reviewing them and writing about them was more challenging. It was also disheartening when Google changed up their algorithms in October so that I had less folks reading the blog. Not that I write to gain lots of readers, but it helps to have some readers. I was encouraged and content to have 70-100 and did not need more. A change of algorithms meant less exposure, and I'm not interested in adding ads. So, there you have it: if you read my blog minus the ads, thank you!
Where did your armchair travels take you? Which countries and time periods did you journey through?
France, Burundi, South Africa (twice), UK (twice), Mexico, and Russia were the countries I "traveled" to outside of my own which made up the majority of the rest of the books when they were not non-fiction or fantasy.
Which books stayed with you the longest? Did you set any aside to read again at some point and savor the story all over again?
I'll be dipping back into a number of non-fiction books: Joyful Journey; the Barefoot/Shoes series by Sharon Garlough Brown (actually fiction involving non-fiction...hard to explain); The End of Alzheimer's; Braving the Wilderness; Becoming Dallas Willard; The Crossroads of Should and Must; Blue Zones Solution; The Plant Paradox; Spiritual Direction; 13 Things Mentally Strong People Don't Do; The World According to Mr. Rogers; The Art of Listening in a Healing Way; Leadership and Self-Deception; Donald Hall's two books; maybe Soul Keeping. So, that looks like about all of my non-fiction books.
This made me realize I read a LOT of non-fiction this past year, and I never used to read any non-fiction (except textbooks forced upon me by teachers). The one fiction book I would re-read would be The Gentleman in Moscow. Surprisingly, a book that I only gave 3 stars to kept coming back to mind: Calypso (also non-fiction). I was mad at Sedaris over the turtles. I probably needed to give his book 4 stars if it was going to keep coming back to my mind like that (and not because of the turtles). The non-fiction books definitely made an impact and bits and pieces have stayed with me. Goodness, only 16 of my 54 books were true fiction. Add 6 more that were fictionalized true stories, and that is still less than half.
Did you discover any new to you authors or genres?
Let's look at this in a different way: the only author I was familiar with was Gary Moon who wrote Becoming Dallas Willard. Every single other author was new to me! Wow.
Which books intrigued or entertained, made you laugh, cry, dance or sing?
Again, I need to look at that question in the opposite direction. Which book did NOT make me feel any of those things listed? I can't recall what Evensong was about, and the Shelf Life I recall as mostly feeling like authors being forced to write a story which included a book he or she had read and I didn't like any of the stories until a couple at the end.
Share your favorite titles, covers, quotes and of course, your reading lists.
Forgive me if I don't list all the books here. Scroll down through my blog list on the right and all the book titles are listed in the titles of each blog post reviewing each book.
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