Happy New Year 2014!

Published on by Margaret

Happy New Year everyone! I wish you all a very happy, healthy and peaceful 2014 – and one filled with many good books!

So it’s goodbye 2013 – I’ve enjoyed this year of blogging and reading – some excellent books were read.

In total I read 98 books, some very long and some very short. The longest was The Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett and the shortest was Short Sentence: 10 stories of dastardly deeds, a collection of crime short stories at the minuscule length of 44 pages, which all goes to show that counting the numbers of books read is not a good guide to how much a person reads in a year. Goodreads tells me I’ve read 31, 432 pages in 2013 – but even that isn’t a true reflection because some of the e-books I read don’t have page numbers.

Most of my reading was fiction with just 9 non-fiction books. And of the fiction nearly half was crime fiction. But I think the best way to sum up my year’s reading is by how much I enjoyed them.

These are my Favourite Books of 2013 (in the order I read them)

2014 bks

These are just the tip of the iceberg – I rated 52 of the 98 books between 4 and 5 stars (using Goodreads’ system of star ratings).

And so on to 2014 – my Reading Resolutions. 

I’ve joined a few challenges this year – all aimed at reducing the numbers of unread books that I own. I actually don’t know how many I have because my record keeping on LibraryThing and Goodreads is not complete – I keep finding books I’ve not added, but know that I’ve owned for longer than a year. And then there are many books on Kindle that I haven’t listed either.

So I’m aiming:

  • To reduce the TBRs on my shelves, both physical and virtual.
  • At the same time to read what I want when I want – which means being very selective about accepting books offered for review.
  • And above all to be relaxed about reading – I’m not setting any targets for numbers of books or the number of pages read, (I usually read the same number of books each year in any case) although I won’t be able to resist checking my progress!

10 thoughts on “Happy New Year 2014!”

  2. That’s a great list of favourites! Like Jackie, I love Wild Swans and To Kill a Mockingbird. I haven’t read any of the others yet, but The Redemption of Alexander Seaton and After Flodden both sound like books I would enjoy.

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  5. You did well in 2013! I’m not setting any targets for numbers of books read either. I see you can do it on Goodreads but I can’t really see the point. It’s enough to be doing the TBR challenge to try and shift a few books off the pile! Happy reading in 2014, Margaret!

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  6. So many bloggers are talking about a more relaxed approach to reading and reviewing that I think I can officially call this a trend. :) I share the feeling!

    To Kill a Mockingbird truly is a wonderful book–so glad you got to experience it.

    Happy New Year!

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  7. I’m also planning to attack my existing pile of unread books (both physical and virtual), but I also inevitably leave room for serendipity. Best of luck and fun with your 2014 reading!

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  8. Margaret – Happy New Year. I hope 2014 will be a very, very good year for you. I’m impressed with all of the reading you’ve accomplished. Among other things you’ve got quite a variety there. And you’ve reminded me of a few (e.g. After Flodden that I want to read. Have a good year!

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