Five Final Novellas: Adichie, Glück, Jhabvala, Victory for Ukraine, Woodson (#NovNov22)
We’ll wrap up Novellas in November and give some final statistics tomorrow. Today, I have mini reviews of another five novellas I read this month: one short nonfiction reread and then fiction ranging from India in the 1920s to short stories in comics about the war in Ukraine.
Notes on Grief by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (2021)
[85 pages]
This came out in May last year – I pre-ordered it from Waterstones with points I’d saved up, because I’m that much of a fan – and it’s rare for me to reread something so soon, but of course it took on new significance for me this month. Like me, Adichie lived on a different continent from her family and so technology mediated her long-distance relationships. She saw her father on their weekly Sunday Zoom on June 7, 2020 and he appeared briefly on screen the next two days, seeming tired; on June 10, he was gone, her brother’s phone screen showing her his face: “my father looks asleep, his face relaxed, beautiful in repose.”
My experience of my mother’s death was similar: everything was sudden; my sister was the one there at the hospital, while all I could do was wait by the phone/laptop for news. So these details were particularly piercing, but the whole essay resonated with me as she navigates the early days of grief and remembers what she most admires about her father, including his piety, record-keeping and pride in her. (How lucky I am that Covid travel restrictions were no longer a factor; they delayed his memorial service.) My original review is here. Cathy also reviewed it. If you wish, you can read the New Yorker piece it arose from here. 
Marigold and Rose: A Fiction by Louise Glück (2022)
[52 pages]
The first (and so far only) fiction by the poet and 2020 Nobel Prize winner, this is a curious little story that imagines the inner lives of infant twins and closes with their first birthday. Like Ian McEwan’s Nutshell, it ascribes to preverbal beings thoughts and wisdom they could not possibly have. Marigold, the would-be writer of the pair, is spiky and unpredictable, whereas Rose is the archetypal good baby.
Marigold did not like people. She liked Mother and Father; everyone else had not yet been properly inspected. Rose did like people and she intended them to like her. … Everyone understood that Marigold lived in her head and Rose lived in the world.
Now every day was like the days when the twins did not perform well at naptime. Then Mother and Father would begin to look tired and harassed. Mother explained that babies got tired too; often, they cried because they were tired. I don’t cry because I’m tired, Marigold thought. I cry because something has disappointed me.
As a psychological allegory, this tracks personality development and the growing awareness of Mother and Father as separate people with their own characteristics, some of which each girl replicates. But I failed to find much of a point. 
With thanks to Carcanet Press for the free e-copy for review.
Heat and Dust by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala (1975)
[181 pages]
A lesser-known Booker Prize winner that we read for our book club’s women’s classics subgroup. My reading was interrupted by the last-minute trip back to the States, so I ended up finishing the last two-thirds after we’d had the discussion and also watched the movie. I found I was better able to engage with the subtle story and understated writing after I’d seen the sumptuous 1983 Merchant Ivory film: the characters jumped out for me much more than they initially had on the page, and it was no problem having Greta Scacchi in my head.
In 1923, Olivia is a bored young officer’s wife in India who becomes infatuated with the Nawab, an Indian prince involved in some dodgy dealings. In the novel’s present day, Olivia’s step-granddaughter (never named; in the film she’s called Anne, played by Julie Christie and changed to a great-niece for some reason) is also in India, enjoying the hippie freedom and rediscovering Olivia’s life through the letters she wrote to her sister. Both novel and film cut quickly and often between the two time periods to draw increasingly overt parallels between the women’s lives, culminating in unexpected pregnancies and difficult decisions to be made. I enjoyed the atmosphere (see also The Painted Veil and China Room) and would recommend the film, but I doubt I’ll seek out more by Jhabvala. (Public library) 
PEREMOHA: Victory for Ukraine (2022)
[96 pages]
Various writers and artists contributed these graphic shorts, so there are likely to be some stories you enjoy more than others. “The Ghost of Kyiv” is about a mythical hero from the early days of the Russian invasion who shot down six enemy planes in a day. I got Andy Capp vibes from “Looters,” about Russian goons so dumb they don’t even recognize the appliances they haul back to their slum-dwelling families. (Look, this is propaganda. Whether it comes from the right side or not, recognize it for what it is.) In “Zmiinyi Island 13,” Ukrainian missiles destroy a Russian missile cruiser. Though hospitalized, the Ukrainian soldiers involved – including a woman – can rejoice in the win. “A pure heart is one that overcomes fear” is the lesson they quote from a legend. “Brave Little Tractor” is an adorable Thomas the Tank Engine-like story-within-a-story about farm machinery that joins the war effort. A bit too much of the superhero, shoot-’em-up stylings (including perfectly put-together females with pneumatic bosoms) for me here, but how could any graphic novel reader resist this Tokyopop compilation when a portion of proceeds go to RAZOM, a nonprofit Ukrainian-American human rights organization? (Read via Edelweiss)
Another Brooklyn by Jacqueline Woodson (2016)
[175 pages]
August looks back on her coming of age in 1970s Bushwick, Brooklyn. She lived with her father and brother in a shabby apartment, but friendship with Angela, Gigi and Sylvia lightened a gloomy existence: “as we stood half circle in the bright school yard, we saw the lost and beautiful and hungry in each of us. We saw home.” As in Very Cold People, though, this is not an untroubled girlhood. Male threat is everywhere, and if boyfriends bring sexual awakening they are also a constant goad to do more than girls are ready for. In short, flitting paragraphs, Woodson explores August’s past – a childhood in Tennessee, her uncle who died in the Vietnam War, her father’s growing involvement with the Nation of Islam. What struck me most, though, was August’s coming to terms with her mother’s death, a fact she doesn’t even acknowledge at first, and the anthropological asides about other cultures’ death rituals. This was my second from Woodson after the Women’s Prize-longlisted Red at the Bone, and I liked them about the same. A problem for me was that Brown Girls, which, with its New York City setting and focus on friendships between girls of colour, must have at least partially been inspired by Another Brooklyn, was better. (Public library) 
In total, I read 17 novellas this November, though if you add in the ones I’d read in advance and then reviewed over the course of the month, I managed 24. All things considered, I think that’s a great showing. The 5-star stand-outs for me were The Hero of This Book and Body Kintsugi, but Up at the Villa was also a great read.
Short Stories in September, Part III/Roundup: Ausubel, Bynum, Roberts
A rare second post in a day from me – there’s just too much to try to fit in at the end of a month! This year I read a total of 11.5 short story collections in September, nearly matching last year’s 12. I’ve already written about the first three and the next four. I’ll give details on a few more below, but the final 1.5 are going to be part of a later Three on a Theme post on “Birds” story collections. The highlight of the month was one of those: Birds of a Lesser Paradise by Megan Mayhew Bergman. However, I read lots of winners, including Brown Girls, The Secret Lives of Church Ladies and the three below. Just shorthand responses this time; all were .
Awayland by Ramona Ausubel (2018)
Basics: 11 stories, grouped under 4 mythical locales
Settings: California, Beirut, Africa, Turkey, a museum, an unnamed island
Themes: motherhood, loss, travel
Links: Greek myths (opener “You Can Find Love Now” is the Cyclops’ online dating profile); the sister in #2 is the main character in #4
Stand-out: “Template for a Proclamation to Save the Species” (the mayor of a Minnesota town, concerned about underpopulation, offers a car to the first mother to give birth on a date 9 months in the future)
Similar authors: Aimee Bender, Lydia Millet
Aside: I’d want to read her novels just for the titles: No One Is Here Except All of Us and Sons and Daughters of Ease and Plenty
(New/remainder purchase from Dollar Tree on a recent USA trip)
Ms. Hempel Chronicles by Sarah Shun-Lien Bynum (2008)
Basics: 8 linked stories following 7th-grade teacher Beatrice Hempel through her twenties and thirties
Setting: Massachusetts
Themes: love, loss, motherhood, adventure vs. overprotectiveness, idealism vs. being jaded
Stand-outs: “Crossing” (Ms. Hempel, previously an English teacher, is asked to cover history, and takes her students to Plimoth Plantation; meanwhile, her department chair wishes she’d hyphenate her name to make it more clear she’s half-Chinese); “Satellite” (after her father’s death, Beatrice’s mother and younger sister decide to turn the family home into a B&B)
A similar read: Olive Kitteridge, though that takes more of an interest in the town and its other residents than this – it’s ironic that this came out in the same year, and even got lots of positive and high-profile reviews based on the quotes in my paperback copy, yet I doubt it’s been remembered as Strout’s book has. Such is the power of the Pulitzer.
Aside: I’d read Bynum’s other story collection, Likes (2020), and didn’t care much for it, but I’m glad I tried her again.
(Secondhand purchase from 2nd & Charles on a recent USA trip)
Playing Sardines by Michèle Roberts (2001)
Basics: 18 stories, some of flash fiction length
Settings: France, England, Italy
Themes: reinvention, love affairs, obsession, food, literature
Stand-outs: The ones with funny twists/shock endings: “The Sheets” (French maid beds visiting English author), “The Cookery Lesson” (woman stalks celebrity chef), “Lists” (pillar of the community prepares for Christmas, starting months ahead), “Blathering Frights” (a Wuthering Heights spoof)
Similar authors: Julian Barnes (one story is indeed dedicated to him!), A.S. Byatt, John Lanchester, Helen Simpson
Aside: I own two unread novels by Roberts and need to prioritize them.
(Secondhand purchase from local charity shop)
Alas, I also had some DNFs for the month. I read one or two stories in each of these and didn’t take to the style and/or contents:
- The Quarry by Ben Halls
- One Good Story, That One by Thomas King
- Speak Gigantular by Irenosen Okojie
- What Is Not Yours Is Not Yours by Helen Oyeyemi
Bookish Bits and Bobs
It’s felt like a BIG week for prize news. First we had the Booker Prize longlist, about which I’ve already shared some thoughts. My next selection from it is Trust by Hernan Diaz, which I started reading last night. The shortlist comes out on 6 September. We have our book club shadowing application nearly ready to send off – have your fingers crossed for us!
Then on Friday the three Wainwright Prize shortlists (I gave my reaction to the longlists last month) were announced: one for nature writing, one for conservation writing, and – new this year – one for children’s books on either.
I’m delighted that my top two overall picks, On Gallows Down by Nicola Chester and Silent Earth by Dave Goulson, are still in the running. I’ve read half of the nature list and still intend to read Shadowlands, which is awaiting me at the library. I’d happily read any of the remaining books on the conservation list and have requested the few that my library system owns. Of the children’s nominees, I’m currently a third of the way through Julia and the Shark and also have the Davies out from the library to read.
As if to make up for the recent demise of the Costa Awards, the Folio Prize has decided to split into three categories: fiction, nonfiction and poetry; the three finalists will then go head-to-head to compete for the overall prize. I’ve always wondered how the Folio judges pit such different books against each other. This makes theirs an easier job, I guess?
Speaking of prize judging, I’ve been asked to return as a manuscript judge for the 2023 McKitterick Prize administered by the Society of Authors, the UK trade union for writers. (Since 1990, the McKitterick Prize has been awarded to a debut novelist aged 40+. It’s unique in that it considers unpublished manuscripts as well as published novels – Political Quarterly editor Tom McKitterick, who endowed the Prize, had an unpublished novel at the time of his death.) Although I’d prefer to be assessing ‘real’ books, the fee is welcome. Submissions close in October, and I’ll spend much of November–December on the reading.
Somehow, it’s August. Which means:
- Less than a month left for the remaining 10 of my 20 Books of Summer. I’m actually partway through another 12 books that would be relevant to my flora theme, so I just have to make myself finish and review 10 of them.
- It’s Women in Translation month! I’m currently reading The Last Wild Horses by Maja Lunde and have The Summer Book by Tove Jansson out from the library. I also have review copies of two short novels from Héloïse Press, and have placed a library hold on The Disaster Tourist by Yun Ko-eun. We’ll see how many of these I get to.
Marcie (Buried in Print) and I have embarked on a buddy read of Cloudstreet by Tim Winton. I’ve never read any of his major works and I’m enjoying this so far.
Goodreads, ever so helpfully, tells me I’m currently 37 books behind schedule on my year’s reading challenge. What the website doesn’t know is that, across my shelves and e-readers, I am partway through – literally – about 90 books. So if I could just get my act together to sit down and finish things instead of constantly grabbing for something new, my numbers would look a lot better. Nonetheless, I’ve read loads by anyone’s standard, and will read lots more before the end of the year, so I’m not going to sweat it about the statistics.
A new home has meant fun tasks like unpacking my library (as well as not-so-fun ones like DIY). As a reward for successfully hosting a housewarming party and our first weekend guests, I let myself unbox and organize most of the rest of the books in my new study. My in-laws are bringing us a spare bookcase soon; it’s destined to hold biographies, poetry and short story collections. I thought I’d be able to house all the rest of my life writing and literary reference books on two Billy bookcases, but it’s required some clever horizontal stacks, special ‘displays’ on the top of each case, and, alas, some double-stacking – which I swore I wouldn’t do.
Scotland and Victoriana displays, unread memoirs and literary reference books at left; medical reads display and read memoirs at right.
I need to acquire one more bookcase, a bit narrower than a Billy, to hold the rest of my read fiction plus some overflow travel and humour on the landing.
I get a bit neurotic about how my library is organized, so questions that others wouldn’t give much thought to plague me:
- Should I divide read from unread books?
- Do I hide the less sightly proof copies in a stack behind the rest?
- Is it better to have hardbacks and paperbacks all in one sequence, or separate them to maximize space?
(I’ve employed all of these options for various categories.)
I also have some feature shelves to match particular challenges, like novellas, future seasonal reads, upcoming releases and review books to catch up on, as well as signed copies and recent acquisitions to prioritize. Inevitably, once I’ve arranged everything, I find one or two strays that then don’t fit on the shelves I’ve allotted. Argh! #BibliophileProblems, eh?
I’ve been skimming through The Bookman’s Tale by Ronald Blythe, and this passage from the diary entry “The Bookshelf Cull” stood out to me:
“Should you carry a dozen volumes from one shelf to another, you will most likely be carrying hundreds before you finish. Sequences will be thrown out; titles will have to be regrouped; subjects will demand respect.”
What are your August reading plans? Following any literary prizes?
How are your shelves looking? Are they as regimented as mine, or more random?
A Look Back at My 2021 Reading: Statistics and Superlatives
I hope everyone passed a lovely holiday week. We had house guests for a few days over New Year’s, so I haven’t had a chance to work up my statistics until now. Marcie sent me a spreadsheet template to keep track of my reading, and my tech whiz husband helped analyze the data. I look forward to catching up on everyone else’s best-of and stats posts, too.
How I did with my 2021 goals
My simple reading goals for 2021 were to read more biographies, classics, doorstoppers and travel books – genres that tend to sit on my shelves unread. I read one biography in graphic novel form (Orwell by Pierre Christin), but otherwise didn’t manage any. I only read three doorstoppers the whole year, but 29 classics – defining them is always a nebulous matter, but I’m going with books from before 1980 – a number I’m happy with.
Surprisingly, I did the best with travel books, perhaps because I’ve started thinking about travel writing more broadly and not just as a white man going to the other side of the world and seeing exotic things, since I don’t often enjoy such narratives. Granted, I did read a few like that, and they were exceptional (The Glitter in the Green by Jon Dunn, The Shadow of the Sun by Ryszard Kapuściński and Kings of the Yukon by Adam Weymouth), but if I include essays, memoirs and poetry with significant place-based and migration themes, I was at 26.
The numbers
Exactly the same total as last year (2019 had my maximum-ever of 343). From those three years’ evidence, I’d say I’ve found my natural limit. Next year I will aim for 340 again.
(This is what my lifestyle allows; yours is likely very different. I have bookish friends who read 80 books a year, 120, 150, 180, 200, and so on. My very busy university lecturer/town councillor husband felt bad for ‘only’ reading 65 books this past year, but keep in mind that the average person reads just 12 per year. My message to you, no matter your numbers, is YOU READ LOADS!)
Fiction: 49.7% (6.5% graphic novels; 5.3% short stories)
Nonfiction: 35%
Poetry: 15.3%
(Fiction and nonfiction are usually just about equal for me; I’m surprised that fiction pulled well ahead this year. I also read a bit more poetry this year than last.)
Female author: 66.47%
Male author: 30%
Nonbinary author: 0.88% (Meg-John Barker, Alice Hattrick and Olivia Laing)
Multiple genders (in anthologies): 2.65%
(I’ve been reading more and more by women each year, but this is the first time that female + nonbinary authors have outnumbered men by more than 2:1. I mostly attribute this to my interest in women’s stories. There were also three trans authors on my list.)
BIPOC author: 18.5%
(The first time I have specifically tracked this figure. Not too bad, but I’d prefer 25% or higher.)
Work in translation: 5%
(A decline from last year’s 7.2%. Must try harder!)
E-books: 13.2%
Print books: 86.8%
(Slightly higher than last year because of my new reviewing gig for Shelf Awareness, for which I read almost exclusively e-books.)
2021 releases: 41.8% (add in the 2020 releases and it’s 54.4%)
Pre-release books: 20%
Rereads: 12 (3.5%)
Where my books came from for the whole year:
- Free print or e-copy from publisher: 31.8%
- Public library: 24.7%
- Secondhand purchase: 16.8%
- Free (The Book Thing of Baltimore, the free mall bookshop, a giveaway, Little Free Libraries, etc.): 9.4%
- Downloaded from NetGalley or Edelweiss: 5.9%
- New purchase (sometimes at a bargain price): 5.6%
- University library: 3.8%
- Gifts: 2%
(Decreased from last year: review copies, NetGalley/Edelweiss, gifts; increased from last year: library borrowing, new and secondhand purchases, free books.)
Additional statistics courtesy of Goodreads:
73,520 pages read
Average book length: 216 pages (thank you, novellas and poetry!)
Average rating for 2021: 3.7
Extra Superlatives
First book completed:
Last book completed (also the shortest, at 46 pages)
Longest book, at 628 pages:
Authors I read the most by: Anne Tyler (5), thanks to Liz’s readalong project; Jim Davis and Alice Oseman cartoons (4 volumes each); Jim Crumley nature books and Emily Rapp Black memoirs (3 each)
Publishers I read the most from: Carcanet (18), then Picador (17), then Bloomsbury and Faber (14 each); in overall first place was undoubtedly Penguin and its many imprints.
My top discovery of the year: the Heartstopper teen graphic novel series.
My proudest bookish achievement: being asked to be a judge for the McKitterick Prize.
The books that made me laugh the most: The Echo Chamber by John Boyne and Early Morning Riser by Katherine Heiny.
Best book club selections: The Light Years by Elizabeth Jane Howard, Woman on the Edge of Time by Marge Piercy, The Year of Living Danishly by Helen Russell.
Most genuinely helpful book: How to Talk to a Science Denier by Lee McIntyre.
Best last lines encountered: “So where are we gonna go? / I don’t know. Let’s just drive and find out.” (from Heartstopper, Volume 4 by Alice Oseman).
Best 2021 book title: Mrs Death Misses Death.
Shortest book title encountered: In (Will McPhail), followed by Lot (Bryan Washington).
Biggest disappointments: Some of my lowest ratings went to Indelicacy by Amina Cain, Klara and the Sun by Kazuo Ishiguro, and Ness by Robert Macfarlane.
A 2021 book that everyone loved but me: The Lincoln Highway by Amor Towles.
Themes that kept turning up in my reading: Covid-19, colours (thanks to my summer reading challenge), disability (thanks to shadowing the Barbellion Prize), the mental and physical health benefits of time in nature; perennial topics like friendship, parenting and sisterhood.
Novellas in November Wrap-Up
Last year, our first of hosting Novellas in November as an official blogger challenge, we had 89 posts by 30 bloggers. This year, Cathy and I have been simply blown away by the level of participation: as of this afternoon, our count is that 49 bloggers have taken part, publishing just over 200 posts and covering over 270 books. We’ve done our best to keep up with the posts, which we’ve each been collecting as links on the opening master post. (Here’s mine.)
Thank you all for being so engaged with #NovNov, including with the buddy reads we tried out for the first time this year. We’re already thinking about changes we might implement for next year.
A special mention goes to Simon of Stuck in a Book for being such a star supporter and managing to review a novella on most days of the month.
Our most reviewed books of the month included new releases (The Fell by Sarah Moss, Small Things Like These by Claire Keegan, Assembly by Natasha Brown, and The Writer’s Cats by Muriel Barbery), our four buddy reads, and The Cost of Living by Deborah Levy.
Some authors who were reviewed more than once (highlighting different works) were Margaret Atwood, Henry James, Elizabeth Jolley, Amos Oz, George Simenon, and Muriel Spark.
Of course, novellas are great to read the whole year round and not just in November, but we hope this has been a good excuse to pick up some short books and appreciate how much can be achieved with such a limited number of pages. If we missed any of your coverage, let us know and we will gladly add it in to the master list.
See you next year!
Sixth Blog Anniversary (& International Women’s Day)
Bookish Beck launched six years ago today. This is the 874th post, which means I’m producing 2.8 posts per week – a pleasing average.
My six most popular posts of all time, with the number of views, are:
Some new interest there in super-short novellas and in a Barbara Kingsolver event. Me daring to admit I don’t love Elena Ferrante has been quite a draw. My The Diary of a Bookseller review was in my most popular lists last year and the year before as well. The First Bad Man was one of the first reviews I ever published here and has always been among my top posts, for some reason. The Clock Dance review was in the top four at the time of my fourth anniversary, took a break last year, and is now back in the rankings.
It’s also International Women’s Day today. Six of my favorite books by women that I’ve read in the last few years are:
Fiction
March by Geraldine Brooks
The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver*
Moon Tiger by Penelope Lively
Nonfiction
Traveling Mercies by Anne Lamott*
Priestdaddy by Patricia Lockwood
A Three Dog Life by Abigail Thomas*
*These were rereads and I loved them even more the second time around.
Thanks to all who support my blog by commenting, retweeting, and so on. You’re stars!
Final 2020 Statistics and Retrospective / 2021 Reading Goals
In 2020…
My mother was supposed to visit us in May – my first visit from family in 13 years – and we were meant to be in the States for Christmas. These planned trips had to be cancelled, of course, and many gigs and regular events we would have attended in London and elsewhere couldn’t go ahead.
We managed two mini-breaks, one to Dorset and Devon and one to Hay-on-Wye, as well as a daytrip to Avebury and Silbury Hill, a night out at an Oxford comedy club, a few meals out, and some outdoor meet-ups with family and friends.
It was also the year we finally started doing video chats with family in America, and we kept up with certain friends better than ever thanks to Zoom meetings.
All told, I have no grounds for complaint about the year that has just passed. I know we are lucky to have had good health, stable employment and a wonderful town and community.
Moreover, I was spoiled for choice with online bookish and musical content last year:
- 45 livestreamed gigs (28+ Bookshop Band, 4 Duke Special, 3 Edgelarks and Megson, 2 Switchfoot, and 1 each by Bellowhead, Krista Detor, Lau, Mark Erelli and Nerina Pallot)
- 8 neighborhood book club meetings
- 8 literary festival events
- 8 quizzes (mostly general trivia; 1 bookish, run by Penguin – I did well among the hundreds of entries!)
- 6 literary prize announcements
- 4 festivals, mostly of folk music
- 4 book launch events
- 3 book club/preview events
- 2 conferences (mostly book-related)
I’m also lucky that, unlike many, my reading was not affected by a stressful year. My reading total was very close to the previous year’s (343), which means that after five years above 300 and climbing, I’ve now figured out what my natural limit is. Next year I will aim for 340 again.
Some interesting additional statistics, courtesy of Goodreads:
First read of the year: Last read of the year:
This was my Christmas book haul thus far (I have a feeling more may be marooned at my in-laws’ house), including money to spend the next time I can get to Bookbarn. I started a few of them right away.
My husband reads between one-fifth and one-quarter of what I do in a year, but by anyone’s accounting, 76 books is a lot in a year, especially considering that he has a busy full-time university lecturer job, is a town councillor, and is on lots of other voluntary committees. We overlap in some of our reading tastes (nature and travel writing, and some literary fiction) and I pass a lot of my review copies or library books his way, but he’s less devoted to new books and more likely to pick up books with heavier historical, political, or scientific content. If you’re interested, his rundown of his reading, including his top 3 reads of the year, is here.
2021 Reading Goals
My immediate priorities are to clear my set-aside pile (20 books) and everything I’m currently reading, start some January releases, and get back into some university library books to last me while I have limited access to our public library.
These are the 2021 proofs and finished copies I have received thus far:
Looking further ahead, I plan to continue and/or participate in many of 2020’s reading challenges again, as well as join in Liz’s Anne Tyler readalong for the novels I own and haven’t read yet. (The first one for me will be The Clock Winder in mid- to late February.)
Genres in which my achievement often lags far behind my intentions include literature in translation, biographies, and travel books. To address the first one, I’m going to set up a shelf in my house for unread works in translation, as a visual reminder and area to select from. I’ll start with the one below left as part of my “M” 4-in-a-Row.
I would be happy to read even one biography this year, since they often take me many months to read. I’m going to make it the one above, of Janet Frame. Standard travel narratives intimidate me for some reason; I get on with them much better if they are in essays or incorporate memoir and/or nature writing. We have a whole shelf of unread travel books, many of which are of the more traditional going somewhere and reporting on what you see type. I want to clear the shelf to give them to my father-in-law, who expressed interest in reading more travel books. I’ll start with the 2018 Young Writer of the Year Award winner, above.
A “Classic of the Month” and “Doorstopper of the Month” are regular features on my blog, yet I don’t always manage to complete one each month. My aim will be to have at least one classic and one doorstopper on the go at all times, and hope that that translates to one a month as much as possible. Here’s my first pair:
I can see that lots of other book bloggers are prioritizing doorstoppers and backlist reading in 2021. Apart from the modest goals I’ve set here, I expect my reading to be as varied and over-the-top as ever. I know I’ll read lots of 2021 releases, but backlist books are often more memorable, so I’ll try to arrange my stacks and choose my challenges so as to let them shine.
What are some of your reading goals for 2021?
Random 2020 Superlatives and Statistics
My top ‘discoveries’ of the year: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie (4 books), Octavia E. Butler, Tim Dee (3 books each, read or in progress), and Louise Erdrich (2 books, one in progress).
Also the publisher Little Toller Books: I read four of their releases this year and they were fantastic.
The authors I read the most by this year: Carol Shields tops the list at 6 books (3 of these were rereads) thanks to my buddy reads with Buried in Print, followed by Paul Auster with 5 due to Annabel’s reading week in February, then Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie with 4, and finally Anne Lamott with 3 comfort rereads.
Debut authors whose next work I’m most looking forward to: Naoise Dolan, Bess Kalb, Dara McAnulty, Mary South, Brandon Taylor, and Madeleine Watts
My proudest reading achievement: 16 rereads, which must be a record for me. Also, I always say I’m not really a short story person … and yet somehow I’ve read 19 collections of them this year (and one stand-alone story, plus another collection currently on the go)!
My proudest (non-reading) bookish achievement: Conceiving of and coordinating the Not the Wellcome Prize blog tour.
Five favorite blog posts of the year: Love, Etc. – Some Thematic Reading for Valentine’s Day; Polio and the Plague: Epidemics in Fiction; Thinking about the Future with David Farrier & Roman Krznaric (Hay Festival); Three Out-of-the-Ordinary Memoirs: Kalb, Machado, McGuinness; Asking What If? with Rodham by Curtis Sittenfeld (I had a lot of fun putting the current post together, too!)
The bookish experience that most defined my year: Watching the Bookshop Band’s live shows from their living room. Between their Friday night lockdown performances and one-offs for festivals and book launches, I think I saw them play 33 times in 2020!
Biggest book read this year: Going by dimensions rather than number of pages, it was the oversize hardback The Lost Words by Robert Macfarlane and Jackie Morris.
vs.
Smallest book read this year: Pocket-sized and only about 60 pages: No One Is Too Small to Make a Difference by Greta Thunberg.
Oldest author read this year: Peggy Seeger was 82 when her memoir First Time Ever was published. I haven’t double-checked the age of every single author, but I think second place at 77 is a tie between debut novelist Arlene Heyman for Artifact and Sue Miller for Monogamy. (I don’t know how old Michael McCarthy, Jeremy Mynott and Peter Marren, the joint authors of The Consolation of Nature, are; Mynott may actually be the oldest overall, and their combined age is likely over 200.)
vs.
Youngest author read this year: You might assume it was 16-year-old Dara McAnulty with Diary of a Young Naturalist, which won the Wainwright Prize (as well as the An Post Irish Book Award for Newcomer of the Year, the Books Are My Bag Reader Award for Non-Fiction, and the Hay Festival Book of the Year!) … or Thunberg, above, who was 16 when her book came out. They were indeed tied for youngest until, earlier in December, I started reading The House without Windows (1927) by Barbara Newhall Follett, a bizarre fantasy novel published when the child prodigy was 12.
Most As on a book cover: Americanah by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
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Most Zs on a book cover: The Hiding Place by Trezza Azzopardi. I haven’t read it yet, but a neighbor passed on a copy she was getting rid of. It was nominated for both the Booker Prize and the Orange Prize.
The book that made me laugh the most: Kay’s Anatomy by Adam Kay
Books that made me cry: Writers and Lovers by Lily King, Monogamy by Sue Miller, First Time Ever by Peggy Seeger, and Catalogue Baby: A Memoir of (In)fertility by Myriam Steinberg (coming out in March 2021)
The book that put a song in my head every single time I looked at it, much less read it: I Am an Island by Tamsin Calidas (i.e., “I Am a Rock” by Simon and Garfunkel, which, as my husband pointed out, has very appropriate lyrics for 2020: “In a deep and dark December / I am alone / Gazing from my window to the streets below … Hiding in my room / Safe within my womb / I touch no one and no one touches me.”)
Best book club selections: Notes from an Exhibition by Patrick Gale and The Wife by Meg Wolitzer tied for our highest score ever and gave us lots to talk about.
Most unexpectedly apt lines encountered in a book: “People came to church wearing masks, if they came at all. They’d sit as far from each other as they could.” (Gilead by Marilynne Robinson. Describing not COVID-19 times but the Spanish flu.)
Most ironic lines encountered in a book: “September 12—In the ongoing hearings, Senator Joseph Biden pledges to consider the Bork nomination ‘with total objectivity,’ adding, ‘You have that on my honor not only as a senator, but also as the Prince of Wales.’ … October 1—Senator Joseph Biden is forced to withdraw from the Democratic presidential race when it is learned that he is in fact an elderly Norwegian woman.” (from the 1987 roundup in Dave Barry’s Greatest Hits – Biden has been on the U.S. political scene, and mocked, for 3.5+ decades!)
Best first line encountered this year: “And then there was the day when Addie Moore made a call on Louis Waters.” (Our Souls at Night by Kent Haruf)
Best last lines encountered this year:
- “my childhood falls silently to the bottom of my memory, that library of the soul from which I will draw knowledge and experience for the rest of my life.” (Childhood by Tove Ditlevsen)
- “What I want to say is: I misremember all this so vividly it’s as if it only happened yesterday.” (Other People’s Countries: A Journey into Memory by Patrick McGuinness)
- “these friends would forever be her stitches, her scaffold, her ballast, her home.” (The Dearly Beloved by Cara Wall)
My favorite title and cover combo of the year: A Registry of My Passage Upon the Earth by Daniel Mason
The book I wish had gotten a better title and cover: Tennis Lessons by Susannah Dickey – I did enjoy this second-person novel about a young woman who is her own worst enemy, to the tune of 3.5 stars, but the title says nothing about it and the cover would have been a turnoff had I not won a signed copy from Mslexia.
The most unfortunate typos I found in published works: In English Pastoral by James Rebanks, “sewn” where he meant “sown” (so ironic in a book about farming!) versus, in Mr Wilder & Me by Jonathan Coe, “sown” in place of “sewn.” Also “impassible” where it should read “impassable” in Apeirogon by Colum McCann. This is what proofreaders like myself are for. We will save you from embarrassing homophone slips, dangling modifiers, and more!
The 2020 books that everybody else loved, but I didn’t: The Mirror and the Light by Hilary Mantel, Hamnet by Maggie O’Farrell, and Shuggie Bain by Douglas Stuart
The year’s biggest disappointments: I don’t like to call anything “worst” (after all, I didn’t read anything nearly as awful as last year’s Jonathan Livingston Seagull), but my lowest ratings went to A Traveller at the Gates of Wisdom by John Boyne and At Hawthorn Time by Melissa Harrison, and I was disappointed that When the Lights Go Out by Carys Bray was misleadingly marketed.
The downright strangest books I read this year: Enter the Aardvark by Jessica Anthony, A Traveller at the Gates of Wisdom by John Boyne, The House Without Windows by Barbara Newhall Follett, and The Child in Time by Ian McEwan
The people and themes that kept turning up in my reading: Rachel Carson and Henry David Thoreau; curlews and plagues; how we define and relate to history; childhood memoirs (seven of them).
Some of my 2020 curlew reading. (Two more books with curlews on the cover were borrowed from the library.)
Some statistics on my 2020 reading:
Fiction: 57.2%
Nonfiction: 36.8%
Poetry: 6%
(Fiction reigned supreme this year! Last year my F:NF ratio was roughly 1:1. Poetry was down by ~5% this year compared to 2019.)
Male author: 34.1%
Female author: 63.8%
Nonbinary author: 0.3% (= 1 author, Jay Bernard)
Multiple genders (anthologies): 1.8%
(Women dominated by an extra ~5% this year over 2019. I’ve said this for four years now: I find it intriguing that female authors significantly outweigh male authors in my reading because I have never consciously set out to read more books by women; it must be a matter of being interested in the kinds of stories women tell and how they capture their experiences in nonfiction.)
E-books: 10.6%
Print books: 89.4%
(Almost exactly the same as last year. My e-book reading has been declining, partially because I’ve cut back on the reviewing gigs that involve only reading e-books and partially because I’ve done less traveling. Increasingly, I prefer to sit down with a big stack of print books.)
Books by BIPOC: 14.7%
Literature in translation: 6.6%
(Down from last year’s 7.2%; how did this happen?! This will be something to address in 2021.)
Where my books came from for the whole year:
- Free print or e-copy from publisher: 25.6%
- Public library: 25.6%
- Free (giveaways, The Book Thing of Baltimore, the free mall bookshop, etc.): 14.9%
- Secondhand purchase: 11.6%
- Downloaded from NetGalley, Edelweiss or Project Gutenberg: 6.7%
- New purchase (sometimes at a bargain price): 6.3%
- Gifts: 5.5%
- University library: 3.8%
I promised to scale back on review copies this year, and I did: last year they accounted for nearly 37% of my reading. My library reading was higher than last year’s, despite the challenges of lockdowns; my e-book reading decreased in general. I bought more than twice as many new books as usual this year, and read lots that I either bought secondhand or got for free.
Number of unread print books in the house: 435
At the end of last year this figure was at 440 after lots of stock-ups from the free mall bookshop, which has since closed. So even though it might look like I have only read five books of my own, I have in fact read loads from my shelves this year … but also acquired many more books, both new and secondhand.
In any case, the overall movement has been downward, so I’m calling it a win!
The Ones that Got Away: DNFs, Most Anticipated Reads & More
Following on from my late June list of DNFs, here are the rest of the books I abandoned this year (asterisks next to the ones I intend to try again someday):
Summer before the Dark: Stefan Zweig and Joseph Roth, Ostend 1936 by Volker Weidermann – Too niche.
The Motion of the Body through Space by Lionel Shriver – Too non-PC.
When They Call You a Terrorist: A Black Lives Matter Memoir by Patrisse Khan-Cullors – Too been-there.
*The Wild Laughter by Caoilinn Hughes – Too much economics.
Birdsong on Mars by Jon Glover & Two Tongues by Claudine Toutoungi – Carcanet poetry releases. Style/reader mismatch issue for both.
That Reminds Me by Derek Owusu – Too dull.
3 Summers by Lisa Robertson (poetry) – Too weird.
Apeirogon by Colum McCann – Too long.
*We Were the Mulvaneys by Joyce Carol Oates – Too much of quirky folks.
Persuasion by Jane Austen – Too much telling.
Golden Boy by Abigail Tarttelin – Too brutal.
The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller – Too much Greek myth.
*Shuggie Bain by Douglas Stuart – Too misery-memoir.
Night-Gaunts and Other Tales of Suspense by Joyce Carol Oates – Maddening punctuation.
The Corset by Laura Purcell – Too lifeless.
True Story by Kate Reed Petty – Too consciously relevant.
As You Were by Elaine Feeney – Too much of mental hospitals.
*House of Glass by Hadley Freeman – Too detailed.
Rootbound: Rewilding a Life by Alice Vincent – Too much snowflake woe.
Le Bal by Irène Némirovsky – Too gloomy.
The Wasp Factory by Iain Banks – Too disturbing.
The Girl with the Louding Voice by Abi Daré – Too precocious.
Restless by William Boyd – Too ordinary.
No getting around it: I have lots of DNFs. I’ve not done a great job recording them this year, but I think it was 46, which works out to about 12% of the books I’ve started. Most years it’s around 15%, so for me that’s not too bad, but I know some of you never have DNFs, or could count them on one hand. How do you do it? Do you sample books beforehand? Do you make yourself finish everything you start even if you’re not enjoying it? Or are you just that good at picking what will suit your tastes? Sometimes I overestimate my interest in a subject or my tolerance for subpar writing. In recent years my patience for mediocre books has waned, and I’m allergic to some writers’ style for reasons that are often difficult to pinpoint.
In early July, I highlighted the 15 releases from the second half of the year that I was most looking forward to reading. Here’s how I did:
Read: 10 [Slight disappointments (i.e., rated 3 stars): 4]
Languishing on my Kindle, but I still intend to read: 2
Haven’t managed to find yet: 3
Getting to two-thirds of my most anticipated books is really good for me!
I regret not having enough time left in 2020 to finish Tyll by Daniel Kehlmann, especially because Cathy and Susan both named it as one of their favorite books of the year.
The additional 2020 releases I most wished I’d found time for before the end of this year (from my late November list of year-end reading plans) include Marram by Leonie Charlton, D by Michel Faber, and Alone Together: Love, Grief, and Comfort in the Time of COVID-19. This last one was offered to me by the editor on Goodreads and I feel bad for not following through with a review, but somehow the subject feels too close to the bone. Maybe next year?
I’ll be back to start the countdown of my favorite books of the year on the 26th, starting with fiction and poetry. On the 27th it’s all about nonfiction. A break for Library Checkout on the 28th, followed by 2020 runners-up on the 29th, best backlist reads on the 30th, and some superlatives and statistics on the 31st.
Merry Christmas!
Reading Statistics for the First Half of 2020, Including Where My Books Came From
Almost halfway through the year: how am I doing on the reading goals I set for myself? Pretty well!
- It might not look like it from the statistics below, but I have drastically cut down on the number of review copies I’m requesting or accepting from publishers. (This time last year they made up 43% of my reading.)
- I’ve reread nine books so far, which is more than I can remember doing in any other year – and I intend to continue prioritizing rereads in the remaining months.
- Thanks to COVID-19, over the past few months I have been reading a lot less from the libraries I use and, consequently, more from my own shelves. This might continue into next month but thereafter, when libraries reopen, my borrowing will increase.
- I’ve also bought many more new books than is usual for me, to directly support authors and independent bookshops.
- I’m not managing one doorstopper per month (I’ve only done May so far, though I have a few lined up for June‒August), but I am averaging at least one classic per month (I only missed January, but made up for it with multiple in two other months).
- On literature in translation, I’m doing better: it’s made up 9.7% of my reading, versus 8.1% in 2019.
The breakdown:
Fiction: 57.6%
Nonfiction: 36.3%
Poetry: 6.1%
(This time last year I’d read exactly equal numbers of fiction and nonfiction books. Fiction seems to be winning this year. Poetry is down massively: last June it was at 15.4%.)
Male author: 34.7%
Female author: 63.5%
Anthologies with pieces by authors of multiple genders: 1.8%
(No non-binary authors so far this year. Even more female-dominated than last year.)
E-books: 12.7%
Print books: 87.3%
(E-books have crept up a bit since last year due to some publishers only offering PDF review copies during the pandemic, but I have still been picking up many more print books.)
I always find it interesting to look back at where my books come from. Here are the statistics for the year so far, in percentages (not including the books I’m currently reading, DNFs or books I only skimmed):
- Free print or e-copy from the publisher: 25.5%
- Public library: 21.2%
- Free, e.g. from Book Thing of Baltimore, local swap shop or free mall bookshop: 16.4%
- Secondhand purchase: 10.3%
- Downloaded from NetGalley or Edelweiss: 8.5%
- New purchase: 7.3%
- Gifts: 5.4%
- University library: 5.4%
Bookish Beck = Rebecca Foster. American transplant to England. Freelance proofreader and book reviewer.
Bookish Beck 