I finished 190 books in 2020, there were several reasons for dropping from my 2019 total; really busy at work and distracted by what seems to be even more pressing world events at the moment. I did reach my Good Reads Target though. Here are my stats for the last years reading.
My total pages read was 49347 and my monthly average of books was 17, just ahead of last years, 16.7. This broke down into these monthly totals:
January – 17
February – 16
March – 16
April – 16
May – 16
June – 16
July – 18
August – 17
September – 15
October – 15
November – 16
December – 12
The split of books read
Male Authors – 131
Female Authors – 59 i.e. 31% (This was 2% down on last year’s reading)
Review Copies – 94 (last year was 90)
Library Books – 42 (last year was 89)
Own Books– 54 (last year was 25)
Non-Fiction – 141 – 74.5%
Fiction – 25 – 13%
Poetry – 24 – 12.5%
Stars Awarded:
5 Stars – 14 Books
4.5 Stars – 21 Books
4 Stars – 79 Books
3.5 stars – 41 Books
3 stars – 27 Books
2.5 Stars – 4 Books
2 Stars – 3 Books
1.5 stars 0 Books
1 star – 0 Books
Genres
I use a spreadsheet to keep a note of the types and genres of books that I read. There are detailed below:
| Travel | 38 |
| Natural History | 26 |
| Poetry | 23 |
| Memoir | 13 |
| Fiction | 12 |
| Science | 9 |
| Science Fiction | 7 |
| Fantasy | 6 |
| Landscape | 5 |
| History | 5 |
| Environmental | 4 |
| Miscellaneous | 4 |
| Language | 3 |
| Gardening | 2 |
| Britain | 2 |
| Maths | 2 |
| Politics | 2 |
| Biography | 2 |
| Craft | 2 |
| Psychology | 2 |
| Maps | 1 |
| Spying | 1 |
| Technology | 1 |
| Sport | 1 |
| Humour | 1 |
| Social History | 1 |
| Cricket | 1 |
| Reportage | 1 |
Publishers
These are the number of books read by each publisher. The top eight are all independent publishers. Bloomsbury were top last year.
| Eland | 12 |
| Faber & Faber | 9 |
| Elliott & Thompson | 8 |
| Canongate | 8 |
| Granta | 7 |
| Bloomsbury | 6 |
| Fly on the Wall Press | 6 |
| Little Toller | 6 |
| John Murray | 6 |
| Jonathan Cape | 5 |
| Saraband | 5 |
| Penguin | 5 |
| Picador | 4 |
| William Collins | 4 |
| Haus Publishing | 4 |
| Icon Books | 3 |
| Chelsea Green Publishing | 3 |
| Allen Lane | 3 |
| Cinnamon Press | 3 |
| Sandstone Press | 3 |
| Corgi | 3 |
| Penned In The Margins | 2 |
| Vintage | 2 |
| Melville House | 2 |
| Hamish Hamilton | 2 |
| September Publishing | 2 |
| Salt | 2 |
| Head of Zeus | 2 |
| Michael O’Mara Books | 2 |
| Bradt | 2 |
| Modern Books | 2 |
| Gollancz | 1 |
| Jo Fletcher | 1 |
| W&N | 1 |
| The Westbourne Press | 1 |
| Summersdale | 1 |
| The Bodley Head | 1 |
| Golden Antelope Press | 1 |
| Myriad Editions | 1 |
| Carcanet | 1 |
| Duckworth | 1 |
| Birlinn Books | 1 |
| Dey Street | 1 |
| Chroma Editions | 1 |
| Headline | 1 |
| Profile Books | 1 |
| Michael Joseph | 1 |
| Arcadia Books | 1 |
| Little, Brown | 1 |
| Batsford Books | 1 |
| Headline | 1 |
| Wildings Press | 1 |
| Stella Maris | 1 |
| Titan Books | 1 |
| Sphere | 1 |
| Portobello | 1 |
| Allen & Unwin | 1 |
| Seven Dials | 1 |
| 4th Estate | 1 |
| Pelagic Publishing | 1 |
| Sort of Books | 1 |
| Twist It Press | 1 |
| Reaktion Books | 1 |
| Doubleday | 1 |
| Inkandescent | 1 |
| Pursuit Books | 1 |
| Wood Wide Works | 1 |
| Pan Macmilliam | 1 |
| Uniform Books | 1 |
| Unbound | 1 |
| Longbarrow Press | 1 |
| Octopus Publishing | 1 |
| Tor | 1 |
| Fitzcarraldo Editions | 1 |
| Influx Press | 1 |
Amazing! I love the way you categorized them. Is your reading at all part of your job?
Thank you, Joanne. No, it isn’t, I design and engineer lava lamps
Fascinating stats, and I love how many publishers you have there, and so many indies, too! Happy reading in 2021!
Thank you, Liz. There is quite a lot when I think about it. Indy publishing seems to be tapping a deep vein in the publishing world.