2022 Reading Round-up

This year I used StoryGraph for the first time. I usually like to do a roundup of how many authors of color I read to make sure that I’m diversifying my TBR, but I thought this was a fun way to look at other stats.

For example, this year I read 73 books. 38 of them were physical books, 26 were digital (e-reader) books, and 9 of them were audiobooks. I love these random facts!

Jumping into my Diverse Reading Stats.

For 2021:
Black- 9
Asian/Indian- 7
White- 37
Male- 7

For 2022:
Black- 9
Asian/Indian- 12
Latinx- 1
White- 42
Male- 5

Out of the 69 authors I read this year (had a few authors who I read multiple times), my authors of color were about 31%. In 2021 I was at about 26%, so that’s a pretty solid increase! I’m proud of myself for that, and also for adding a Latinx author into my reading. I think I fell into that same pattern of being better about reading diverse authors at the beginning of the year, but I think that’s partly because towards the end of the year I read some more holiday reads, a few of which were Hanukkah reads.

I attempted one challenge this year and that was the read 8 books that were from my bookshelf. Ones that I already owned. I managed to knock off 4 of them. Not too bad, but considering the challenge started from one of my friends saying she was going to read one book a month from her shelf, and I told myself I was only going to pull 8, not too good. I also added a lot more to my shelf this year compared to others. I currently have 5 new books that I haven’t tackled, including the 4 left over from last year. Oops.

Another fun stat from my library is that I saved $948 by using my library rather than buying books! So, even though I did spend money on buying books (all used except for the ones I was gifted), I did save almost $1000 on my reading. Not too shabby.

Finally, my favorite and least favorite books of the year.

My Top 5 books this year were

Carrie Soto is Back by Taylor Jenkins Reid

Sadie on a Plate by Amanda Elliot

Black Love Matters by Jessica P. Pryde

We Are Not Like Them by Christine Pride and Jo Piazza

The Cartographers by Peng Shephard

I definitely had more 5 star reads, but some that are from my favorite authors, so I tried to pick ones that stuck with me that weren’t from my tried and trues. For example, I loved Kate Quinn’s new book this year, but that’s almost a given, so I picked different authors that made a lasting impression.

My Bottom 3 books this year were

Exit West by Mohsin Hamed

Love on the Brain by Ali Hazelwood

Meet Me Under the Mistletoe by Jenny Bayliss

Overall, I had a pretty good reading year. My average star rating was a 3.79 for the year, 12 of which were 5 star reads. I only had one book I didn’t finish, but I did have 6 books I rated under 3 stars. Last year, my average rating was a 3.56 with only 8 5 star reads. The nice thing about Storygraph is it lets you give half star ratings, so I think my stats this year were a little more accurate. It’s nice to be able to rate something 2.75 stars or 4.5 stars and be able to look back on that.

I love being able to look back on all of this information. I think one of my favorite things that I’ve seen is that by making a direct effort to diversify the authors I read, I’ve added some permanent authors of color to my lists. It has exposed me to some wonderful authors that I might not have picked up if I hadn’t been expressly looking for it. I also love seeing that this year I have enjoyed more of what I read, which I think is shown in the amount of reading I did.

Adding audiobooks into my routine has also increased my reading and my diversity. I forgot how much I love reading memoirs until I got back into them through audiobooks. I’m hoping that I can continue to read different types of books through audio that I’m not tackling with physical books.

What are your favorite/least favorite books of 2022? Do you have anything about your reading habits that surprised you this year?