Wednesday, January 4, 2012

Review of 2011 Reading

2011 was my first full year of blogging and keeping track of my reading on goodreads.com. I don't know how many books I normally read in a year, but I'm quite proud of the 70 books I read this year. According to goodreads, I read 29,074 pages! I don't know about anyone else, but that seems like a lot of pages!!

I've enjoyed blogging about the books I read this year, although I have fell incredibly behind in my reviews. The end of the semester and the holidays caught up to me and I broke out of the routine of posting about my books shortly after finishing. I want to start up again and finish up reviewing all the books I have left from 2011 and stay on track for 2012.

In terms of my 2011 book challenges, I succeeded rather well! I completed 4 book challenges. From goodreads, I originally challenged myself to read 50 books, but I read 70! Here are my other challenges along with the books I used to complete them:


2011 Chunkster Reading Challenge

I chose the highest level for this challenge- Mor-book-ly Obese - 8 books of 450 pages or more, 3 of which have to be over 750 pages.
 

Books Completed:
1. Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand - 1088 pages
2. The Swan Thieves by Elizabeth Kostova - 592 pages
3. Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell - 1037 pages
4. The Book Thief by Markus Zusak - 552 pages
5. Alias Grace by Margaret Atwood - 460 pages
6. The Iliad by Homer - 704 pages
7. The American Heiress by Daisy Goodwin - 465 pages
8. The Gargoyle by Andrew Davidson - 515 pages
9. Madame Tussaud by Michelle Moran - 464 pages
10. The Idiot by Fyodor Dostoevsky - 667 pages
11. Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray - 680 pages
12. The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson - 464 pages
13. Elizabeth I by Margaret George - 671 pages
14. Decision Points by George W. Bush - 497 pages
15. The Help by Kathryn Stockett - 544 pages
16. Uncle Silas by Sheridan Le Fanu - 528 pages
17. The Blind Assassin by Margaret Atwood - 521 pages
18. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson - 465 pages
19. The Girl who Played with Fire by Stieg Larsson - 503 pages
20. The Girl who Kicked the Hornet's Nest by Stieg Larsson - 563 pages
21. The Complete Sherlock Holmes, Volume 1 by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle - 752 pages
22. The Distant Hours by Kate Morton - 562 pages
23. Catherine the Great: Portrait of a Woman by


 

 

Off the Shelf Challenge

 
I entered at the Trying level, which was to read 15 TBR books on my book shelves.
Books Completed:

 



 
I entered the first level of this challenge- Master of Trivial Pursuit- which meant I had to read 1 to 3 non-fiction books, each from a different category.
 
Books Completed:
1. Human by Michael Gazzaniga - Science
2. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot - Science/Cultural Studies
3. The Tigress of Forli by Elizabeth Lev - History
4. Traveling with Pomegranates by Sue Monk Kidd and Ann Kidd Taylor - Travel/Memoir
5. Blood Work: A Tale of Medicine and Murder in the Scientific Revolution by Holly Tucker - Medical/History
6. Blink by Malcolm Gladwell - Science
7. Bossypants by Tina Fey - Memoir
8. You Are Not Your Brain by Jeffrey Schwartz and Rebecca Gladding - Science/Self-Help
9. The Man Who Loved Books Too Much by Allison Hoover Barlett - Art
10. The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson - History
11. Decision Points by George W. Bush - Memoir/Politics
12. Tolstoy and the Purple Chair by Nina Sankovitch - Memoir
13. Blood, Bones & Butter by Gabrielle Hamilton - Memoir
14. Killing Lincoln: The Shocking Assassination that Changed America Forever by

 I exceeded my expectations in all of the challenges. Which means that I now have baseline to judge how I want to handle my book challenges for 2012 :)

1 comment:

  1. Sounds like you did a great job with the challenges, congrats. Good luck for this year!

    ReplyDelete