Books, 2015

[rachelleneveu]

Goal: 100 books by January 1st, 2016
Current Status: 60/100 (as of 12/31/15)

Fiction: 47
Nonfiction: 13

January:
My Boyfriend Wrote a Book About Me: And Other Stories I Shouldn’t Share with Acquaintances, Coworkers, Taxi Drivers, Assistants, Job Interviewers, Bikini Waxers, and Ex/Current/Future Boyfriends but Have, Hilary Winston – (reread) – 1/4

Texts from Jane Eyre - And Other Conversations with Your Favorite Literary Characters, Mallory Ortberg – 1/5

The Boss, Abigail Barnette – 1/6

The Girlfriend, Abigail Barnette – 1/15

World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War, Max Brooks – (reread) – 1/30

February:

God’s Man: A Novel in Woodcuts, Lynd Ward – 2/4

A Thousand Acres, Jane Smiley – 2/5

Beautiful Disaster, Jamie McGuire – 2/10

Honolulu, Alan Brennert – 2/11

Buffalo Lockjaw, Greg Ames – 2/12

The Girl on the Train, Paula Hawkins – 2/15

The Hook-Up, Abigail Barnette – 2/17

The Original 1982, Lori Carson – 2/21

March:
Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail, Cheryl Strayed – 3/4

The Girl With All The Gifts, M.R. Carey – 3/12

Live From New York: The Complete, Uncensored History of Saturday Night Live as Told by Its Stars, Writers, and Guests, James Andrew Miller and Tom Shales – 3/21

Dark Places, Gillian Flynn – 3/25

I Don’t Know What You Know Me From: Confessions of a Co-Star, Judy Greer – 3/29

April:

The Disaster Artist: My Life Inside ‘The Room,’ the Greatest Bad Film Ever Made, Greg Sestero and Tom Bissell – (reread) – 4/4

This Is How You Lose Her, Junot Díaz – 4/28

May:
Vampires in the Lemon Grove, Karen Russell – 5/3

Zeus Grants Stupid Wishes: A No-Bullshit Guide to World Mythology, Cory O’Brien – 5/3

The Bride, Abigail Barnette – 5/5

Juliet’s Nurse, Lois Leveen – 5/5

The Handmaid’s Tale, Margaret Atwood – (reread) – 5/12

Only Ever Yours, Louise O’Neill – 5/12

The Ex, Abigail Barnette – 5/15

The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake, Aimee Bender – 5/16

Yes Please, Amy Poehler – 5/18

Fires I Would Like to Know, Hannah Johnson – 5/18

Station Eleven, Emily St. John Mandel – (reread) – 5/23

Bridget Jones’s Diary, Helen Fielding – (reread) – 5/26

Ophelia, Lisa Klein – 5/29

June:
The Robber Bride, Margaret Atwood – (reread) – 6/13

Unclean Jobs for Women and Girls, Alissa Nutting – 6/14

Clatter, Neil Hilborn – 6/20

July:

Practical Magic, Alice Hoffman – (reread) – 7/1

The Poisonwood Bible, Barbara Kingsolver – (reread) – 7/20

The Painter, Peter Heller – 7/24

10:04, Ben Lerner – 7/30

August:
Lady Macbeth, Susan Fraser King – 8/2

Down the Rabbit Hole: Curious Adventures and Cautionary Tales of a Former Playboy Bunny, Holly Madison – 8/6

Toad Words, and Other Stories, T. Kingfisher – 8/7

First Time (Penny’s Story), Abigail Barnette – 8/8

First Time (Ian’s Story), Abigail Barnette – 8/11

The Scorpio Races, Maggie Stiefvater – 8/28

Play Something Dancy, Dee Simon – 8/30

September:
The Lost Girls: The True Story of the Cleveland Abductions and the Incredible Rescue of Michelle Knight, Amanda Berry, and Gina DeJesus, John Glatt – 9/2

Sadie Walker is Stranded, Madeline Roux – 9/4

Salvage, Alexandra Duncan – 9/16

Dad is Fat, Jim Gaffigan – 9/17

October:
Make Something Up: Stories You Can’t Unread, Chuck Palahniuk – 10/19

November:
Are You My Mother?, Alison Bechdel – 11/16

Why Not Me?, Mindy Kaling – 11/30

Everything I Never Told You, Celeste Ng – 11/30

December:
The Namesake, Jhumpa Lahiri – 12/20

Fun Home, Alison Bechdel – (reread) – 12/21

Ghost World, Daniel Clowes – (reread) – 12/26

A Visit From the Goon Squad, Jennifer Egan – 12/27

Never Let Me Go, Kazuo Ishiguro – (reread) – 12/31

Standard Q&A

How many books read in 2015?

60, plus 2 that I’m currently reading but didn’t finish before the deadline.

Fiction/Nonfiction ratio?

47:13

Male/Female authors?

20:35

Favorite book read?

Station Eleven, by Emily St. John Mandel, for the second year in a row. Good lord, this book was beautiful.

Runner’s up, in no particular order: Buffalo Lockjaw, Juliet’s Nurse, Live From New York, Wild, Texts from Jane Eyre, The Original 1982, The Disaster Artist, Zeus Grants Stupid Wishes, This Is How You Lose Her, Only Ever Yours, The Handmaid’s Tale, Yes Please, The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake, The Robber Bride, Clatter, Practical Magic, Salvage, The Namesake, and Never Let Me Go.

Least favorite?

Beautiful Disaster, hands down. That book was such garbage, I swear, and not even fun garbage! Just glamorized emotional abuse and a terrible plot and was honestly just a complete waste of paper all around. A Visit from the Goon Squad had its moments, but honestly just dragged in the last couple chapters and should have ended with Alison’s slideshow – the whole thing felt like a lecture from an aging hippie, especially the whole “never trust anyone over thirty” vibe lingering under the text despite the pointed declarations otherwise. The Painter was also pretty unenjoyable, too, which made me sad if only because I absolutely loved Heller’s book The Dog Stars, and was very sorry to see that lightning doesn’t always strike twice. :(

Oldest book read?

God’s Man, which was published in 1929.

Newest?

Looks like it’s Why Not Me?, which came out in September 2015.

Longest book title?

My Boyfriend Wrote a Book About Me: And Other Stories I Shouldn’t Share with Acquaintances, Coworkers, Taxi Drivers, Assistants, Job Interviewers, Bikini Waxers, and Ex/Current/Future Boyfriends but Have, by Hilary Winston.

Shortest title?

10:04, by Ben Lerner.

How many rereads?

12, which isn’t super-unusual. A lot of my books were on my Nook, seeing as how I didn’t have space for my fully collection of physical books with all the moving I’ve been doing this year, and I honestly didn’t have the patience to read something new on all the plane trips I took, either.

Most books read by one author this year?

6, since I started Abigail Barnette/Jenny Trout’s The Boss series and couldn’t put it down.

Any in translation?

Nah, unfortunately not this year. The Oresteia will have to wait!

And how many of this year’s books were from the library?

Not a one. Although, to be fair, when I was in Hawaii it took me about five months to figure out just where the hell the nearest Safeway was, and then when I was in the Adirondacks nearly everything necessary was almost an hour away, so all in all the public library was a bit low on my list of locational priorities this year.