During a year with more than its fair share of ups and downs, reading provided a sense of much-needed constancy for me in 2021. For at least a couple minutes of almost every day, I spent some time with one of 21 different books in hand (and, for a couple, in ear).
This is my third year of keeping track of my reading, and I now feel like I can confidently say that reading has secured its place atop my (currently kind of short) list of hobbies. Just two years ago, reading 10 books felt like both a task and an accomplishment, and now I'm reading double that each year. Continuing two trends from 2020, I once again read as many books as the year and came up with some ways to visualize the data I collected.
As usual, I like to genre-hop and during this year especially I feel that my reading choices and pace reflect what I was doing or feeling during each point in time. The year started out with a lot of positivity and new-ness – my boyfriend and I moved into a really nice condo in January (hence my Kondo-kraze) and I started a new job in March (which I read a book on brands that was recommended to me as preparation) – and then I barely read at all from mid-May through mid-June because my mind/time was occupied by the passing of my mother; I read a book about Russian spies around the time my boyfriend and I binge-watched The Americans and Margaret Atwood's (unfortunately timeless) Handmaid's books whilst states chip away at women's rights. I sped-read Barack Obama's behemoth of a book in the short 21-day loan period of the Chicago Public Library. Almost all the books I read this year were authored by women. Two books were found at local bookshops. Another book was a hand-me-down from a coworker on her last day, that I happened to pack with me last-minute for Spain. I explored some niche interests of mine, as well as some less-familiar/tougher topics. And of course, I needed some good ol' fiction sprinkled in here and there for some mindless escape-ism.
I did most of my reading through Kindle (both on the eponymous device and, because it's usually more handy, the phone app), but this year I also utilized audio books for the first time in years. It's also cool to see charted out how I tend to read fiction books of various lengths at much faster rates than any non-fiction, and overall I typically spend closer to 20 days with each book (again, library loans are 21 days) and average only about 25 pages a day.
The 21 books that I spent my time with in 2021:
The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up: The Japanese Art of Decluttering and Organizing, Marie Kondo
Spark Joy: An Illustrated Master Class on the Art of Organizing and Tidying Up, Marie Kondo
Normal People, Sally Rooney
Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat: Mastering the Elements of Good Cooking, Samin Nosrat
The Hero and The Outlaw: Building Extraordinary Brands Through the Power of Archetypes, Margaret Mark + Carol S. Pearson
A Promised Land, Barack Obama
When No One Is Watching, Alyssa Cole
Alone Time: Four Seasons, Four Cities, and the Pleasures of Solitude, Stephanie Rosenbloom
Radical Acceptance: Embracing Your Life with the Heart of Buddha, Tara Branch, PhD
Men Explain Things to Me, Rebecca Solnit
The Secrets We Kept, Lara Prescott
Planning Chicago, D. Bradford Hunt and Jon B. DeVries
Lies My Teacher Told Me: Everything Your American History Textbook Got Wrong, James Loewen
Such a Fun Age, Kiley Reid
The Personality Brokers: The Strange History of Myers-Briggs and the Birth of Personality Testing, Merve Emre
Seek You: A Journey through American Loneliness, Kristen Radtke
In Five Years, Rebecca Serle
The Handmaid's Tale, Margaret Atwood
World Travel: An Irreverent Guide, Anthony Bourdain and Laurie Woolever
Brand Hacks: How to Build Brands by Fulfilling the Human Quest for Meaning, Dr. Emmanuel Probst
The Testaments, Margaret Atwood
I also started another book apropo for the new year, but that'll have to wait for my 2022 post. I'm hoping to read at least 22 books to continue my streak, but overall my goal is to continue to seek out what interests me.
Until next year!
The chart above was created using Google Sheets. Click here to see how I designed it.
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