About a year ago I made a new year’s resolution. I resolved to read 52 books in the year of 2011 – a book for every week. Said resolution was based on the fact that a year before that I decided to record every book I read in a year, and at the end of 2010, I was surprised to have read less books than I thought. I read 31 books in 2010 (26 if you’re not counting re-reads, but I count them, as you’ll see if you read the list). If I can put away The Hunger Games in a day, I thought I could do better than that. Frankly, I thought 52 would be easy.
Oh, self. That would be cute if it wasn’t so sad. Readers, I blame the month of July and the month of November for the result of this attempt. July because I read one book. One book. Really. November because sometime during that month, I utterly gave up on finishing. In a way, I think that helped the panic that came with December. Initially I had planned to get off to a good start in the year (which I did) and only leave a book or two for the crazy holiday season of December (which I didn’t).
I read 52 books in 2011. But it nearly killed me. Behold the complete list, which once again does not include submissions to the literary agency I worked at, short stories, fanfiction, essays, or blogs.
But first, I will list my three favourite new reads of the year:
1 & 2) The Demon’s Surrender, Sarah Rees Brennan, and The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Stieg Larsson
Tied for first and second place in my mind are two very different books. Rees Brennan’s book is the conclusion of a trilogy I’ve been following for many years. It deals with Human Emotion, brothers, demons, and what it means to actually hate your family and still love them more than anything. Larsson’s book I loved for her. Murder mysteries are great. Seriously. But she shone with the light of a hundred monitors. Salander broke my heart and broke it again. I tried to give a legit first and second place, but I couldn't choose a favourite between these books. For additional interest, I’d like to see the heroes of both these books put in a room together so I can take bets on who speaks first.
3) Misery, Stephen King
Oh, Stephen. You know you are my favourite even if I turn into a sniveling wreck of a woman whenever I read you. Misery had me so far gone that when something good happened, I was unable to continue reading for several hours because I knew it was going to go so horribly, horribly wrong. And I couldn’t! I just couldn’t. I picked it up again a few hours later (because Steve, honey, you know I can’t stay mad at you) and made it to the end, but I knew I was right to take that break. It did go horribly wrong, and I would have been broken.
Honourable mentions:
Valiant, Holly Black – The last line was easily the most romantic thing I’d read all year.
The Book Thief, Markus Zusak – Because someone was heart-breakingly right about a kiss.
January –
1. The Hunger Games, Suzanne Collins
2. Catching Fire, Suzanne Collins
3. Liar, Justine Larbalestier
4. The Forest of Hands and Teeth, Carrie Ryan
5. Assholes Finish First, Tucker Max
6. Mockingjay, Suzanne Collins
February –
7. Retail Hell, Freeman Hall
8. Bitten, Kelley Armstrong
9. White Cat, Holly Black
March –
10. The Dead-Tossed Waves, Carrie Ryan
11. Animal Farm, George Orwell
12. On Writing, Stephen King
13. Graceling, Kristen Cashore
14. The Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Douglas Adams
April –
15. City of Fallen Angels, Cassandra Clare
16. The Five Quarters of the Orange, Joanne Harris
17. The Outsiders, S.E. Hinton
18. The Demon’s Surrender, Sarah Rees Brennan
May –
19. Secret Daughter, Shilpi Somaya Gowda
20. Red Glove, Holly Black
21. The Demon’s Lexicon, Sarah Rees Brennan
22. The Demon’s Covenant, Sarah Rees Brennan
June –
23. The Demon’s Surrender, Sarah Rees Brennan
24. Breaking Dawn, Stephenie Meyer
25. Ash, Malinda Lo
26. Misery, Stephen King
July –
27. The Demon’s Lexicon, Sarah Rees Brennan
August –
28. Mort, Terry Pratchett
29. The Demons Covenant, Sarah Rees Brennan
30. Wither, Lauren Destefano
31. The Demon’s Surrender, Sarah Rees Brennan
September –
32. The Hunger Games, Suzanne Collins
33. Catching Fire, Suzanne Collins
34. The Book Thief, Markus Zusak
35. Venus in Furs, Leopold von Sacher-Masoch
October –
36. Mockingjay, Suzanne Collins
37. Breaking Dawn, Stephenie Meyer
38. White Cat, Holly Black
39. Valiant, Holly Black
November –
40. The Demon’s Lexicon, Sarah Rees Brennan
41. The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, Stieg Larsson
42. The Hunger Games, Suzanne Collins
43. Catching Fire, Suzanne Collins
44. The Girl Who Played with Fire, Stieg Larsson
December –
45. The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet’s Nest, Stieg Larsson
46. Inheritance, Christopher Paolini
47. Mockingjay, Suzanne Collins
48. Valiant, Holly Black
49. The Bridges of Madison County, Robert James Waller
50. The Demon’s Surrender, Sarah Rees Brennan
51. The Demon’s Covenant, Sarah Rees Brennan
52. The Outsiders, S.E. Hinton
Eight books in December. You read that correctly. Though one might correctly point out that I chose a ridiculously short book as the last one because I was running out of time (finished with six hours to go), I might in turn ask one to take a look at the size of the first two books I read in December. They don’t let people take the hard covers on planes because they could be used as weapons.
I have not made a resolution for 2012, reading-related or otherwise. The memory of reading four books between Christmas and New Year’s is still too fresh in my mind, I guess. Besides, at almost five weeks in, I’ve only read three books so far, and it feels great.
I feel pretty good about having made this goal. It wasn’t easy, and I read some excellent books that I might not otherwise have read. That said, I am prouder still of a few other things I did in 2011. I made up with a friend I thought I’d lost forever. I admitted defeat. I made it an entire semester without skipping a class. I supported the causes I believed in. These are the things that made 2011 for me. And if I also rocked my new year’s resolution while doing all this other great shit? Well, go me.
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