In Which I Review My Reading Year

I've always read a lot of books, but before this year I've never kept a record of which books I've read or how many. This year I decided to keep a reading log and, since this is the last day of the year  it seems an appropriate time to review the year. Here's the cover of the reading log. I just used an old notebook and decorated it with stickers.

I used a different color pen for each age group. Here's an example of a two page spread showing books of different age groups. The crossed out part is a book I started but quite reading after a few chapters.

As you can see, I recorded more than the book's title. I record the author (and illustrator in the case of picture books and graphic novels with more than one creator), the genre, the dates I started and finished the book, and a sentence or two about the book.

Before I break down the numbers, let me make some things clear. First, I count audiobooks as reading. My 11yo and I almost always listen to an audiobook while we drive back and forth to school and other places around town. I listen to own audiobook both while I'm driving by myself and doing things around the house. That's how most of the adult books made it on the list. I only count books I read for the first time. I reread a few books with my 11yo that I read a previous year and didn't add them to the list. I teach two year old preschool three days a week and I also don't count the dozens of board books I read to the kids again and again at work. I do count picture books I read on my own to study picture book craft (which I still have a lot to learn about).

My grand total of books read in 2022 is 217. Yes, that's a huge number, but keep in mind that most of these aren't 300+ page novels written for adults. The large majority are middle grade books, which do tend to be quicker reads. Breaking it down by age category, I read:

58 adult books

4 young adult books

137 middle grade books

5 chapter books

13 picture books

Of these, 153 were print books and 64 were audiobooks.

Only 6 of the books I read were nonfiction. The other 211 were fiction.

This number may seem amazing to you, or you may have read even more books this year. It doesn't really matter. If you read this year (and remember, audiobooks count as reading) you're a winner in my book.