Hello my friends,
It’s that time of year again! Time for CHARTS!!! And an overview of how, what, and when I read books for work and for fun in 2024. Honestly, I look forward to this every year, not only because I get to show off what I read, but because I just freaking love charts. Join me on this statistical journey.
To start, let’s look at total books read this year compared to past years. It was not a banner year when it comes to this metric, and you know what? I don’t care! I was really chuffed to read 100 books last year, and maybe I’ll do that again someday. I feel the same way about that as I do about that 10k I ran that one time. I did it! Will I do it again? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ I still feel like I read a lot of books, and I did, and I feel like I enjoyed a lot of what I read so any way you slice it, 2024 was a great year in reading, if not the most active.
When I created this chart today, I thought I’d used the wrong data. It looks almost exactly like last years’, which I’m including below, too:
Except for the scale, 2024 (top) looks just like 2023 (bottom)!!! And it makes sense, of course. I stay inside and read during the cold months and get excited again about summer reading when it’s warm outside. I also think this coincides with clients sending me manuscripts to get ready for the Fall submission season. BY then I’m busy sending books out and doing all the holiday things, which leads to binge-reading on my Christmas vacation. Oh how predictable life becomes.
Last year, 85% of the books I read were published, compared to just over 60% this year. (Last year I didn’t separate Audio from Print/Ebook. I don’t know why I did that this year. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯) I’ve definitely felt the difference this year, reading more manuscripts than published books—in a good way! Next year, I’ll have exciting deals to announce.
As above, it was clear I mostly read manuscripts (MS), followed by audiobooks. I listen using both the Libby app and Libro.fm, and this year I expanded beyond my usual historical fiction titles to a lot more non-fiction. I read a good number of paperbacks (PB) and hardcovers (HC) and just a few ebooks. (I rather read my fun-books on paper since all my work-reading is manuscripts on my Kindle.) I read one mass-market paperback, which I decided to count all by itself because it was such a singular read, and one title using VoiceDream. This is a text to speech app that will read a document outloud and I decided to try it out on a client manuscript that I’d already read a few times before. It was mostly successful! The voice was fine (though hilarious when it came to some sound effect words like vrooooom etc) and I do think it was a good match of time management and technology. I wouldn’t do it with a query, submission, or client manuscript that I was reading for first time, but it does seem useful for catching up on revised manuscripts.
Of those ebooks and hardcovers, here are the different genres I read, categorized according to my own standards. I don’t actually have any big takeaways about this chart because I aim to read widely and look, I did it. Did you know you can read any kind of book you want? You have my explicit permission.
I get books from a lot of different places, of course. I bought just about as many books as I read from my clients and I got a full quarter of my books from the library. That funny category at the bottom that says “Myself!” is, well, my book! Yes, I did count reading my own forthcoming book in my total title count (and each time I read it, too) because that sucker is 80,000 words and I read it SIX TIMES start to finish this year. I think I’ll read it one more time before it goes to the printer but if don’t end up having to, I will be A-OK with that. Next year, I expect that number to go way down (but I hope it’ll include a different title).
Of course, I get a lot of books for free, either because my clients write them or editors send them to me. It’s one of the best perks of publishing. But I’m lucky to be able to buy the books I want at many different local bookstores, big and small. Yes, I buy books at B&N and a few from Amazon (usually ebooks). My local B&N in Park Slope has really been bringing it with their tables and selection lately, and I shop there a lot with my kid. Books are Magic on Montague Street is basically within sight of my office so you bet I find myself in there on my lunch break. Of course, these are just the books I read, not all the ones I bought, lol.
So what did I actually read? Here you go—minus the ones you can’t know about yet. If you want to shop any of them, I’ve put them all in my Bookshop storefront and any commissions earned will be donated to charity!
Happy new year, my friends. See you in 2025.
OXOXOXOXO,
Kate
The graph line tracing the number of books you've read per month looks disturbingly like your shrugging emoji.
Normally I glaze over when it comes to charts, but since they are about reading, I loved them! Thanks for this sneak peek into your reading habits. I usually get to 100 books a year, but this year it was 70. This is also the year I started writing and reading on substack, which I guess is about 30 books worth! 🤣 Will definitely be adding Write Through It to my TBR list for next year!