I love doing book stats posts. Nerdy, I know, but it’s just so oddly satisfying. There’s something fun about quantifying books and writing that I can’t quite explain.
Anyway, this year I did stats posts at 20 books, six months, and again at nine months. Since it’s finally the end of 2010, here’s a year in review of book stats.
Books and Pages Read Per Month
I graduated from my master’s program in May, and my reading since then has reflected having a lot more time to read what I want. I read a little bit less in October, November, and December, but still quite a few books. I think between 8 and 10 books a month is a good number for me to both read and review without feeling overwhelmed.
And 108 books in an entire year? That’s amazing, considering that I only read like 84 books, I think, in 2009.
| Month | Books Read | Pages Read |
| January | 5 | 1,751 |
| February | 4 | 1,324 |
| March | 8 | 2,864 |
| April | 6 | 1,729 |
| May | 9 | 2,395 |
| June | 13 | 3,079 |
| July | 13 | 2,605 |
| August | 14 | 4,551 |
| September | 8 | 2,224 |
| October | 11 | 3,030 |
| November | 10 | 2,890 |
| December | 7 | 2,418 |
| TOTAL | 108 | 31,210 |
Books by Year
A new chart this time – a graph of what year the books I read were published. It’s pretty heavily weighted towards books after the year 2000, so maybe next year I’ll try to read a few more older books to balance things out.
Breakdown by Genre
I find this really interesting — I love that my single biggest type of book is fiction. That number went up a lot since my nine month review, I think because of reading all my borrowed books in November and December.
| Genre | Books | Percent |
| Fiction | 37 | 34% |
| YA Fiction | 8 | 7% |
| Nonfiction | 25 | 23% |
| Literary Journalism | 20 | 19% |
| Memoir | 18 | 17% |
Breakdown of Fiction versus Nonfiction
But then when you just go straight nonfiction/fiction, you can see where the percentages go. I like the about 60-40 ratio for genres — that seems well-balanced for what I love to read.
| Genre | Books | Percent |
| Fiction | 45 | 42% |
| Nonfiction | 63 | 58% |
Books by Acquisition Type
I’m just a little bit disappointed by this one. I was hoping to read 50 percent my books, then split the rest up. But it ended up being a little bit more even split then that, which isn’t bad, just not what I expected. I’m not sure what breakdown I’m hoping for in 2011.
| Book Type | Books | Percent |
| Owned | 35 | 32% |
| Review Copy | 35 | 32% |
| Borrowed | 38 | 35% |
Books by Author
I don’t really think a lot about male versus female authors when I choose my book, so calculating this percentage is always a surprise for me. These percentages are almost exactly the same as they were at my nine month review, so I must have pretty evenly read males and females the last few months.
| Male Author | 57 | 53% |
| Female Author | 50 | 46% |
| Both | 1 | 1% |
Randoms
- 3 ebook — I still need to read more on my nook! I stopped going to the gym after I sprained my ankle and haven’t really gotten back into the habit, which is where I was reading ebooks. I’m hoping to get to the gym more in 2011 and get back to read more on my nook.
- 9 audio books — I listen to these mostly on long car rides and I’ve been driving less the last several months, so not as many new audio books.
- 94 books reviewed, with 5 that I’d still like to actually review and 2 that have reviews scheduled for 2011. Not bad, not bad at all.
Comments on this entry are closed.
I geek out over book stats too! My male v. female stats are always pretty equal as well, and I don’t do anything to make it so. I find it strange that it naturally works out that way.
Here’s to a great year of reading with no DNFs in 2011!
Trisha: Yeah, it is odd the way those seem even without trying. And yes, to no DNFs in 2011 🙂
I never pay attention when I’m picking books to the author’s gender either. So it’s always interesting at the end of the year to see what those numbers actually were.
Jeane: It’s just not something that I usually think about. I bet the male number is a little higher because more men write nonfiction, at least the sorts of nonfiction I end up reading.
Ooh, I love the stats, particularly the publication year one. I think mine would probably look similar, but I have no real idea…
Good summer reading months for you!
Aarti: That one was odd to me — I thought I read more older books, but I guess with all the review copies it would skew to this year.
I love stats too! Thanks for sharing them all. You really had a fantastic year and managed to cover a lot! Here’s to an even better 2011 🙂
Amy: I did get to cover a lot of types of books, that’s always exciting. I hope 2011 goes even better, too 🙂
I like looking at other people’s stats and calculating my own too. I don’t pay attention to author’s sex when selecting a book, either, but I always seem to read more books by females than males. I like your publication chart. I’ve thought about doing one of my own, but I always forget to write down the year the book is first published so it would be heavily skewed.
Christina: I had to go back and check a few original publication dates because I forgot to write them down, but I do a pretty good job keeping stats as I finish books.
I need to read more ebooks, too! The thing is, I normally bring my Kindle out with me when I’m commuting to school, and since I’m not going to school any longer (and I’m hoping to get a job closer to home, so no commuting), er, I don’t have an excuse to read on it? I’m just going to have to change my thinking from “ebooks = travel” to “ebooks = everywhere,” I guess. 😀
Anastasia: I have to do the exact same thing. It’s just hard for me to think about reading ebooks when there is an entire shelf of other books staring at me. The nook seems to be out of sight, out of mind, most of the time.
You and Amy from Amy Reads just rock my world with your spreadsheet tracking magic! Seriously, I bow down to you both. I am going to try to design one for myself, but I am challenged in that area.
What really is a record is just how many of the books you have read that you have reviewed. I would hate to figure my stats on that, I only posted one review this month!
Happy New Year, and maybe just maybe, I will get off my duff and review The Wild Vine. I liked it, so thank you!
Gwen: I love doing the book stats. I have a spreadsheet that I just put everything in, but it’s not really automated yet, so I end up having to do a lot more counting than I might otherwise want to.
I wish I’d reviewed all the books I read, but I just didn’t have stuff to say about a few of them. I’m glad you liked The Wild Vine!
I’m impressed by you stats people with your pretty charts. I’m too lazy. 😀 And I’m surprised by your fiction numbers, since I associate you so much with non-fiction. Good non-fiction.
softdrink: I was surprised about that too. I think the number got bumped because of all the fiction I read at the end of the year, but I still got in a bunch earlier in the year.
AMAZING stats ! Well done !
Maphead: Thank you!
You are too too funny with these stats. I only kept track of books read and even that I know that I did not keep track of everyone.
Esme: I didn’t do a good job with stats in 2009, so I wanted to be more diligent about it in 2010. I just try to record everything as soon as I finish a book and that seems to work for me.
I love that you do this! It is so cool to look back on your reading like this. I might have to take something like this up in the future.
Jennifer: I think it’s fun to look back on stats and see how the year went. As long as you keep up with it regularly, it’s not too hard to calculate at the end of the year.
I love all the stat posts! Your graphics are quite lovely, especially that graph. I’m too lazy to track publication years, though I might try to start for 2011. It was too much work to go back and fill everything in! My male/female ratio was a surprise, too. Actually, most of them were — I wasn’t trying for any particular numbers, so it was really fun to look at my stats for last year!
Erin: Microsoft Excel makes some pretty sweet charts, and it’s really easy. I had to go back and fill in a few years and it was pretty annoying — this year I’m going to try to be on top of it.