Best books of 2022, reading stats, etc

[lillielangtry]

Hi all,

With just a few days to go this year I thought it was time to make the annual reading round-up thread. So come in if you want to let us know what your best (or worst?!) books of 2022 were, and if you track your reading, hit us with some stats!

I read 80ish books this year - I may sneak in another one or two before New Year. About 3/4 of them were by women and 1/4 were in translation. I added another 20 countries to my reading around the world challenge and in general I read some pretty good books. I am feeling pretty pleased with my reading year.

The books that have really stuck with me this year (not including rereads) were in no particular order:
Elizabeth Gaskell - Cranford - such a charming little classic that I listened to on audiobook
Emily St. John Mandell - Station Eleven - post-apocalyptic wonderfulness
Abdulrazak Gurnah - Afterlives - I just really enjoy his quiet, profound style
My Pen is the Wing of Bird by various Afghan authors - a hard but important collection
Balli Kaur Jaswal - Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows - definitely the lightest book on this list, but I think about it a lot; the story, set in the Sikh community of London, is both fun and serious
Kapka Kassabova - To the Lake - the only non-fiction on this shortlist, really interesting about the region around Lake Ohrid

[Liiisa]

Yay!

I just finished book #70 (and am about to finish #71), which I was surprised by since I started the year with a big fat nonfiction book; at the time I didn't think I'd reach 50. 32 of them were by women, which is nice considering that I didn't go out of my way to equalize it. Some things I read were amazing but had something about them that caused me not to put stars by them (e.g., "The Books of Jacob," which was a masterwork but just too long for my attention span).

Here are the ones I put stars by:
Fiction
Tom McCarthy, The Making of Incarnation
Hervé Le Tellier, The Anomaly
Claire North, Notes from the Burning Age
Ned Beauman, Venomous Lumpsucker
Amor Towles, The Lincoln Highway
Elif Batuman, The Idiot
Julia Armfield, Our Wives Under the Sea
Kevin Wilson, Now is Not the Time to Panic
Natasha Pulley, The Kingdoms

Nonfiction
David Graeber and David Wengrow, The Dawn of Everything
Rebecca Solnit, Orwell's Roses
Hugh Raffles, The Book of Unconformities: Speculations on Lost Time

[ozziegiraffe]

I’m up to 80 read. Will come back later with favourites.

[kneazle]

I'm not a particularly fast reader.

My goal was 30 and I'm currently on 29.

My top reads of the year were:
The seven husband's of Evelyn Hugo, Taylor Jenkins Reid - a 50s movie star in her her old age agrees to give an up and coming journalist an indepth interview about her life, loves and career. It's not exactly as simple a story as it seems.

Lessons in chemistry - Bonnie Garmus. Set in the 60s a scientist who just wants to work as a scientist without dealing with traditional expectations. She ends up hosting a cooking show where she treats cooking like chemistry and women like people with a brain.

A thousand splendid suns - Khaled housanni a bit late to the party on this. Given it's set in Afghanistan during the taliban and through the US invasion the ending probably hits differently now than when it was written.

[Phar Lap]

I really really really need to get my eyes checked, I’m sure I need new glasses.

I read the subject line as Best bonks of 2022.

[lillielangtry]

You're such an eclectic reader, Liiisa! And that was a lot of books to get through with things like The Books of Jacob included (I know, quality over quantity, of course!)

Kneazle, I have The Seven Husbands... on my shelf, so hopefully I'll enjoy it too.

[ozziegiraffe]

Only 13 of my 80 books were written by men.
Those I rated 5 stars on Goodreads:
This Much is True, Miriam Margolyes;
And Now for Something Completely Different, Jodie Taylor;
The Thursday Murder Club and The Man Who Died Twice, Richard Osman;
The Mapping of Love and Death and A Dangerous Place, Jacqueline Winspear;
The Elusive Mrs Pollifax, Dorothy Gilman;
Mullumbimby, Melissa Lukashenko;
Phosphorescence, Julia Baird;
The Boy from the Mish, Gary Lonesborough.

[tucano]

Kneazle, that's still a lot more than me. I am not a prolific book reader, but did ask for a number of books for Christmas so will get to those in January when I'm job hunting!

I did enjoy The Man Who Died Twice and got the sequel for Christmas. Look forward to reading that.

[Q-pee]

Dec 28, 2022 3:17:14 GMT -5 Phar Lap said:

I really really really need to get my eyes checked, I’m sure I need new glasses.

I read the subject line as Best bonks of 2022.

Whole other thread

[Q-pee]

This year was a low reading year for me for reasons... I'll get to thirty which is about half my usual read.

There were quite a few re-reads

of the thirty
5 were by men
5 were non fiction (this is lower than usual)
7 started out in other languages and a further 3 were non-anglo culture stuff
0 were by LGBTQI authors (as far as I know)

So next year I want to be back to my usual reading rate, and up the diversity again.

Best reads
Non Fiction = Invisible Women

Fiction
Stone Blind
The Marriage Portrait
Before the coffee gets cold

Next best
Klara and the Sun
The Daughter of Dr Moreau

[kneazle]

I read 2 non fiction (about standard for me)
10 by men, 19 by women
1 originally written in another language
6 by people of colour
1 by a local writer (need to improve this)
And 1 LGBQ+ author plus my current read

[ozziegiraffe]

6 1/2 of mine were non-fiction (one was a fictionalised version of historical figures, hence the half)
At least 2 authors were LGBTQI, and this was relevant to the subject.
12 1/2 were Australian authors, of whom 2 were First Nations people writing about First Nations issues. The half is Miriam Margolyes, who has dual citizenship.
I might need to look for more non-Anglo authors!

[HalcyonDaze]

Reading a few books at the moment so may make it to 82 official books by year's end.
I say official because I tend not to record the insomniac kindle reads, as they are trashy cozy mysteries etc.


I didn't read a single non-fiction book last year. (I did read a lot of long form articles, just no books). I always say I will up non-fiction reads and never do it. This year I didn't bother saying it at all.


17 books were by Australian authors, but not all those books had an Australian setting

65 books were by women.

I didn't read any books in translation, but there were books from non-Anglo authors.

[HalcyonDaze]

More categories:

Books written by ex LP mods - 1.
(A History of Dreams - Jane Rawson)

Books I handed over to my Mum - 9
The Guncle - Steven Rowley
Looking for Jane - Heather Marshall
A Spoonful of Murder - J M Hall
The Angry Women's Choir - Meg Bignell
The Secret Life of Albert Entwhistle - Mait Cain
Call of the Penguins - Hazel Prior
The Library of Lost and Found - Phaedra Patrick
The Beautiful Words - Vanessa McCausland
The Garden of Hopes and Dreams - Barbara Hannah

That has some crossover with favourite books, or books that stayed in my mind for various reasons

Looking for Jane - Heather Marshall
The Guncle - Steven Rowley
A Psalm for the Wild Built - Becky Chambers
Gods of Jade and Shadows - Silvia Morena-Garcia (and that started a binge on her books. Also loved Velvet was the Night and Signal to Noise)
Clarke - Holly Throsby

[kneazle]

I made it to 30.
I remembered a light fluffy book I could read in a day

[scrubb]

Thought I might finish my current book last night/last year, but didn't, so my total was 110 books, 9 of which were re-reads.

Only 17 non-fiction. I think that's my fewest ever - must make more of an effort!

In terms of diversity -
Looks like 11 in translation: Norwegian, Polish, Turkish (2), Italian, Portugese, German, Swedish (2, or possibly 3), French, and Japanese
Other books were written in English by authors originally from (or grew up in): China, Sierra Leone, and Afghanistan.
Books from English speaking countries of: US, England, Scotland, Ireland, India, Australia, and Canada
60 by women, 50 by men
2 were by queer authors about queer characters, one of which was excellent and one of which was crappy.

Best of the year - fiction. It turns out I really liked a lot of books this year. Trying to refine it to the very top ones:
The Hired Man, by Amanatta Forna
Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead, by Olga Tokarczuk
Dina's Book, by Herbjorg Wassmo
Hamnet, by Maggie O'Farrell (I also read a non-fiction by her this year which I also loved, but decided to only include her once and I liked the fiction better than the non fiction)
Piranesi, by Susanna Clarke
Boy Swallows Universe, by Trent Dalton
Washington Square, by Henry James

Favourites - non fiction
Lab Girl, by Hope Jahren
How to Change Your Mind: What the New Science of Psychedelics Teaches Us About Consciousness, Dying, Addiction, Depression, and Transcendence, by Michael Pollen
The Feather Thief, by Kirk W. Johnson

[scrubb]

I should add that "You Don't Belong Here: How Three Women Rewrote the Story of War" by Elizabeth Becker was also excellent.