Half-Year Books-Read Update

I'm using a site called GoodReads to track my reading this year. At the halfway point of the year, I can report that I have read thirty books so far this year. I'm about half-way through number thirty-one. Twenty-seven of the thirty-one books have been library books. I have purchased four.

Looking back at last year at this time, I see that my pace of reading is almost the same. On June 30 last year I had finished thirty-one books and the ration of library books to purchased books was exactly the same.

I guess I'm predictable.

Books in 2009

I've chosen a tool to try out as my books and reading tracker for 2009. I was looking for a way to track my reading for the year; different from the WordPress blog I tried in 2008.

I did some poking around and looked into several different book-lover sites. I also considered creating a Google Docs spreadsheet to track my books. But when I took a look at goodreads, set up to "improve the process of reading and learning throughout the world," I decided to give it a shot.

It looks like it will allow me to maintain a list of books organized into "shelves." I'm starting with to-read, currently-reading, read, library-book, and owned. I may add more later. It comes with lots of metadata about books built-in and is set up as a social site, encouraging reviews and recommendations among users.

I've added a goodreads widget to the left-hand side-bar. It tracks books as I finish them. We'll see how it works out.

A Year in Books

I read 63 and one-half books in 2008, an average of one book every 5.7 days. That's one of the findings of my year-long Reading Log experiment.

Starting a year ago today, with Custer’s Brother’s Horse, and running through The Mysteries of Pittsburgh, which I started on December 29 and was halfway through as the ball dropped between 2008 and 2009, I have kept a blog-style reading list. I have recorded title, author, publication date, publisher and a few short thoughts about each book that I have read.

The word-cloud that decorates this post (thanks wordle!) is built from the tags I used for each post. It suggests that I prefer fiction to non-fiction and favor historical fiction and fantasy (often in combination). Most books I read are set in the US or the UK and many had to do with war or its effects on folks.

Just over 56% of the books I read (36) were from the Lewes Library. Of the remaining 44%, most were books I bought or was given as gifts, except for a few that were loaners from my brother Matt.

The overwhelming majority (60) were novels. Two were collections of essays, one was organizational self-help, and one was biography.

I'm not certain how to carry forward into 2009. I know I'll keep reading. I always have, as far back as I can remember. But I don't know that I still want to "blog" my reading. I have a day or two to consider, while I finish 2008's final book. Then I may create an on-line spreadsheet, or look for some twitter-like tool that will let me keep track.

Any suggestions?

Half a Year of Reading

We're at the end of June, the (more or less) halfway point of the year. This seems a good time to look back over my 2008 Reading Log for a bit of literatural accounting. I read 31 books in the 181 days between January 1 and June 29. That's an average of one book each 5.8 days. (Yes, I know it sounds like bragging, but I'm being anal about this stuff this year.)

Most of the books I read, 27 of them, were from the Lewes Library. Only four were books I own; most of those were gifts. I like my small-town library.

Twenty-eight were fiction. Two were standard non-fiction and one was a book of essays. I enjoy the escape of diving into a fictional landscape. I have always read more of fiction than any other category.

Seventeen were set in the United States and nine were set in the United Kingdom. One was set partially in India and one in Roman Britain.

I read two books set around the US Civil War. Two were mysteries. And two were fantasy. Fourteen were historical fiction.

I'm In Sync With Delaware Public Libraries!

When I started my 2008 Reading Log at the New Year, I had no idea that I was pre-joining a new program about to be offered by the Delaware Public Libraries.

The Delaware Division of Libraries' Center for the Book has announced "Between the Lines," a journaling program designed to help readers use journals to "help them direct their free-choice learning to achieve self-awareness, self-improvement and self-empowerment." The program includes hard-bound spiral notebooks that participants can use to record their reading and their thoughts about their reading.

That's pretty much what I've been doing with my Reading Log. I swiped the idea from Jessamyn West (a librarian), but it's a fairly standard blogging approach.

I plan to stick with my on-line journal, but I think I'll try to attend the workshop the Libraries folks are offering later this month at Lewes Public Library about Between the lines. It's one of a series they plan (PDF).

I'm a big fan of the public library, especially my library here in Lewes. It's where I find so many great books.

Damn You, Art Garfunkel (Shakes Fist)

I'm feeling very eclipsed by the singer Art Garfunkel just now. Not because he's a better singer than I am; that's been true longer than I've been alive. I'm pretty much used to that. No, what has me feeling beaten is Art's reading list, which puts my new Reading Log blog to shame.

I started a 2008 Reading Log to celebrate the new year. I plan to post the titles of, and a bit about, each book I enjoy his year. You may have noticed the Book Log RSS feed I've placed in the left side column.

This is not a new idea. I swiped it from the librarian Jessamyn West.

But today, reading the New Yorker magazine, I came upon a report on the Garfunkel Library, "a chronological index of the thousand and twenty-three books that he has read since June, 1968." Forty years of reading, recorded on loose-leaf paper, and now posted on the official Art Garfunkel web site.

That's some impressive obsessiveness, Mr. Garfunkel.

Count Me in the "Reader" Column

The AP is reporting a poll that found that a quarter of US adults read no books in the last year.

The survey reveals a nation whose book readers, on the whole, can hardly be called ravenous. The typical person claimed to have read four books in the last year -- half read more and half read fewer. Excluding those who hadn't read any, the usual number read was seven.

That's not good. In an era in which we worry about our nation falling behind others economically, this slide away from knowledge and culture can only hurt us.

I am a reader. It is an activity that has given me joy, comfort, knowledge, and peace for almost 40 years now. (Assuming I date the start of my reading to around First Grade.) And I am probably ravenous reader. I probably average about one book each week.

It works for me.

Why I Read Jasper Fforde

Here's how Jasper Fforde begins his latest Thursday Next novel, First Among Sequels:

The dangerously high level of the stupidity surplus was once again the lead story in The Owl that morning. The reason for the crisis was clear: Prime Minister Redmond van de Poste and his ruling Commonsense Party had been discharging their duties with a reckless degree of responsibility that bordered on inspired sagacity. Instead of drifting from one crisis to the next and appeasing the nation with a steady stream of knee-jerk legislation and headline-grabbing but arguably pointless initiatives, they had been resolutely building a raft of considered long-term plans that concentrated on unity, fairness and tolerance. It was a state of affairs deplored by Mr. Alfredo Traficcone, leader of the opposition Prevailing Wind Party, who wanted to lead the nation back onto the safer grounds of uninformed stupidity.

I am not ashamed to declare that I like absurdity. And Mr. Fforde offers inspired silliness in all of his novels that I have read so far. I plan to read more.