2018 Reading Round-Up

Happy first day of 2019, everyone! You know what that means: time for my annual reading tally for the past year. So, as is tradition, here is the breakdown of what I read in 2018, my top 18 books that were published 2018, plus some of my reading resolutions for 2019.

Thanks for the graphics and stats, GoodReads. Shocking that no one else has read “My Pet Died” by Rachel Biale.

WHAT I READ:

• I read 137 books, by 131 writers.

THE GENRE BREAKDOWN:

• Fiction: 19
• Nonfiction: 43
• Graphic novels/comics: 9
• Graphic memoirs/nonfiction: 7
• Poetry: 15
• Drama: 1
• Young adult/middle grade: 6
• Picture books: 37*
• Books that I had already previously read: 6**

*Most of these were for research. I swear.

**Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng, A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle, Playing Dead by Elizabeth Greenwood, Black Mass by Dick Lehr & Gerard O’Neill, The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates.

THE DEMOGRAPHIC BREAKDOWN:

• Books by women of color: 39
• Books by white women: 50
• Books by men of color: 14
• Books by white men: 26
• Books by non-binary people of color: 1
• Books by non-binary white people: 1
• Books by LGBTQ folks: ~26

THE REASON-FOR-READING BREAKDOWN:

• Books for research purposes: 30
• Books by Non-Fiction by Non-Men authors: 14
• Books for the Nobles English curriculum: 9
• Books for my true crime book club: 10
• Books for fun/other reasons/just for the hell of it: 74

E.B.’s TOP 18 BOOKS PUBLISHED in 2018:

I am really glad that I am doing this tradition of my top [xx] books published in 20[xx] because it means I get to add one more book to my list each year. HOWEVER: narrowing my list of books read this year down to only 18 was still brutal, so please appreciate the pain I went through to bring you this blog post. Now, without further ado, my top 18 books published in 2018, organized alphabetically by author’s last name.

1. Friday Black by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah (October 23, 2018)
2. How to Write an Autobiographical Novel by Alexander Chee (April 17, 2018)
3. All You Can Ever Know by Nicole Chung (October 2, 2018)
4. How To Sit by Tyrese Coleman (September 1, 2018)
5. My Own Devices by Dessa (September 8, 2018)
6. Freshwater by Awaeke Emezi (February 13, 2018)
7. Movers and Shakers by Hope Ewing (October 9, 2018)
8. Tango Lessons by Meghan Flaherty (June 19, 2018)
9. This Will Be My Undoing by Morgan Jerkins (January 30, 2018)
10. Sick by Porochista Khakpour (June 5, 2018)
11. If You Leave Me by Crystal Hana Kim (August 7, 2018)
12. I’ll Be Gone in the Dark by Michelle McNamara (February 27, 2018)
13. How to Be a Good Creature by Sy Montgomery (September 25, 2018)
14. Open Mic Night in Moscow by Audrey Murray (July 24, 2018)
15. The Friend by Sigrid Nunez (February 6, 2018)
16. There There by Tommy Orange (June 5, 2018)
17. Good and Mad by Rebecca Traister (October 2, 2018)
18. My Dead Parents by Anya Yurchyshyn (March 27, 2018)

E.B.’s READING RESOLUTIONS for 2018:

• I want to continue reading more and more books by people of color, and my goal for 2019 is to read a majority books by people of color. (This year, of 137 books, 80 were by white people and 57 were by people of color.)
• I also want to keep reading more and more books by nonbinary people and LGBTQ folks. This year I read work by two nonbinary individuals and 20% of the authors I read were LGBTQ, which is okay, I guess, but could definitely be better.
• I want to make sure my true crime book club reads more diverse writers as well! (So many white people love to write about true crime.)
• Like last year, I need to keep paying attention to who is writing the books I am reading for research and diversify the voices I am quoting in my own writing.
• And, as always, I want to continue to remind myself that if I don’t love something I am reading… I don’t have to finish it!!!! This is a reminder for you, too!

Here’s to more amazing books in 2019!