SciFi and Fantasy Book Club discussion

Come share interesting stats about your year in books! What challenges did you accomplish? What goals did you reach? What were the highlights and hell no's you read?

Go here to see your 2020 "My Year in Books" page.

65 books until today. 20 of them were sci-fi, 13 were fantasy and 16 classics. I was kinda dissopointed by the sci-fi books I read this year. Fantasy was my favourite genre (a lot of Harry Potter books). And I read a lot of classics that were hidden in my library because I couldnt buy many new books. I "met" 2 authors that became my favourite for 2020, Saramago and Murakami. 1 of 65 books was written by a greek author, the legendary Kazantzakis!

My average rating has gone up from 3.3 to 3.4 stars this year. Slightly enjoying my picks more, then.

And I still want GR to have another category for non-book like short stories since they made my 'books' amount look high even though it's not the case.

;P my average rating went down 4.0 - 3.9 - 3.8 over the last three years. But this year I dnf'd several books without rating them, so perhaps a 3.7 would be more appropriate.

The only challenge I finished is the general one. I set it to 100 books. Every other challenge I somehow let slide and couldn't muster the energy to update them ^^'. New year, new enthusiasm, new discipline!

My 2020 average rating (on GR) is 3.0, and in my spreadsheet (half stars) it's 2.85. That's about how good I've felt about reading this year in general :/

32 books (although a few were graphic novels/collections, not sure how much those count), average rating of 3.7, least shelved book was the latest in the series that began with which is a series I've really enjoyed to date. A five star read outside the club was .

Gabi wrote: ";P my average rating went down 4.0 - 3.9 - 3.8 over the last three years. But this year I dnf'd several books without rating them, so perhaps a 3.7 would be more appropriate.

The only challenge I ..."

That's still pretty high. Mine never goes beyond 3.5 since 2009.

General challenge is easy since they count quick reads like short stories, comics, and graphic novels too.

Anna wrote: "My 2020 average rating (on GR) is 3.0, and in my spreadsheet (half stars) it's 2.85. That's about how good I've felt about reading this year in general :/"

Aww :( I hope you'll get to read more enjoyable books next year.

Silvana wrote: "That's still pretty high. Mine never goes beyond 3.5 since 2009.

General challenge is easy since they count quick reads like short stories, comics, and graphic novels too.
."

My ratings are so high, since I can easily be enthused by books, never rate 1 star (this would be a total failure in writing for me, and so far I didn't come across a book I would count as such) and try to mostly pick up books that "feel" good for me.

I set my general challenge to 100 books that have more than 150 pp. Whenever I rate something with less pages that is counted by GR I add +1 to the challenge goal. (I think this year I ended with 105)

Silvana wrote: "I hope you'll get to read more enjoyable books next year."

To be fair that includes 49 romance books, and I think I've rated most of them 1.5 stars. If I remember, I'll take a look at how the stats look without romance at the end of the year.

Anna wrote: "
To be fair that includes 49 romance books, and I think I've rated most of them 1.5 stars. If I remember, I'll take a look..."

Whelp! Why did you do this to yourself?

I have a bit of a summary here, though I still have to update:

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

Gabi wrote: "Why did you do this to yourself?"

I haven't been able to really concentrate on SFF or anything I'm actually interested in *shrug*

251 books for me so far with 122 SF&F and nine that were part of an omnibus/compilation

out of the 122, 50 were Anthologies/Compilations so I really put a dent in my SF&F TBR books

6 NonFiction
105 Fiction (mostly mysteries)

Gabi, that sounds like a good idea. I might have my own excel sheet just to have the stats I want since shelving did not fully solve it.

Anna wrote: "Silvana wrote: "I hope you'll get to read more enjoyable books next year."

To be fair that includes 49 romance books, and I think I've rated most of them 1.5 stars. If I remember, I'll take a look..."

Yeah, what is the problem with romance books nowadays? It is so difficult to find one where the 'ship' isn't so messed up you feel like rating it 1 star. I wish there would be a blog with all the messed up romance books out there so you could be warned before starting any new romance book.

Gabi wrote: I set my general challenge to 100 books that have more than 150 pp. Whenever I rate something with less pages that is counted by GR I add +1 to the challenge goal. (I think this year I ended with 105."

My r..."

Oh, this is an idea, since I often read a lot of graphic novels single issues and they do increase the book count way too much.

Romance novels:

I love romance novels! Or I used to. It's harder to love them in audiobook format. A lot of things that would not annoy me in print, do annoy me in audiobook. Plus the sex scenes make me laugh/groan in audio.

At least the genre has a lot of variety and it's possible to find something you like in it.

As for lists. Hm, my tastes do not always line up with the most popular, etc. I was much more social & making an effort to connect with people the first couple of years on GR. I lucked out in becoming friends with people that I can use as a gauge on how I would feel about a book. That has been more useful as a "Will I like this?" metering tool than most of the reviews written on GR/Amazon/Audible/etc.

I'll have to update on 12/31 because I plan on reading till the end. =D

I'm giving a good go at hitting 963 as my "last ditch try" at hitting 1000. I don't think I'll ever hit these #'s again. So, Woo!

At the end of the year or start of 2021, I'll tally fun new authors, favorite books, etc.

As of 12/18/2020:

Pages Read: 364,772

(This does have page count for audiobooks. AND the page count for The Wandering Inn: Volume 7 is wrong.)

Books Read: 933

Shortest Book: The Origin of the Flow @ 5 pgs

Longest Book: The Wandering Inn: Volume 7 up to Soltice Pt1 @ 9,504 pgs
TWI7 is not finished yet. Solstice will be the ending for the volume & it could be 3 or more parts.

Most Popular: Ready Player One

Least Popular: Pet Priest, #1-3

Highest Rated: Wintersteel #8 Cradle Series (Cultivation)

1st Book Reviewed: Dispel Illusion

Last Book Reviewed: Legend

My Average Rating for 2020: 3.3 Stars

I've read 145 books this year, for a total of 47,734 pages read. I'm still reading three books right now, so that'll be changing.

Hoping to finish at least three more this year, but so far I've read 124 books and 13 books I considered "too short" to count towards my goal.

This is the first year I've read all of the Hugo nominees.

I've expanded my reading more into books that represent people outside the majority, including many new-to-me authors who are of color, queer, or--my favorite finds this year--translated! While doing this, I have kept gender equity in my shelves with feminine-presenting or gendered authors being roughly equivalent to masculine presenting or gendered authors.

I've read or at least attempted every group book this year, and am proud to say that Anna and I kicked off Virtual Book Club, a successful Award, and a few other virtual community events to help us all through this largely terrible year.

My favorite books of the year were:

After Atlas
Spirits Abroad
Redemption in Indigo
We
The Marrow Thieves
Neverwhere
Deeplight
The Left Hand of Darkness
The first two Nightwatch books in Discworld
Exit West
The Raven Tower
The Martian
The Thief
Let the Right One In

Yay Night watch! My fave arc/subseries in Discworld, no contest.

Spirits Abroad was one of my highlights too this year.

Same here and Night Watch is the best book in the whole DiscWorld series IMO.

My stats for this year are super wonky - I just started my account in late November, so the 300ish books on my shelf are all just things I could think of off the top of my head. Goal for next year: 400 books!

Alabaster wrote: "My stats for this year are super wonky - I just started my account in late November, so the 300ish books on my shelf are all just things I could think of off the top of my head. Goal for next year:..."

good luck - I've only managed about 270 this year

Melanie wrote: "Same here and Night Watch is the best book in the whole DiscWorld series IMO."

+1

Silvana wrote: "Gabi, that sounds like a good idea. I might have my own excel sheet just to have the stats I want since shelving did not fully solve it."
Hi, What other stats are you thinking of (half-stars probably)?

The usual ones like how many SF books, fantasy books, genrebenders, female/enbi authors, POC authors, own voices, Asian/diaspora authors, shorts, novellas, award winners, page per day, monthly stats, buddy reads, etc etc

I went through my ratings for this year and looked at my 5 star books

My favourite reads of the year were:

Migrations
Rhythm of War
The Doors of Eden
The Trials of Koli
Beowulf: A New Translation
The Vanished Birds
The Stone Wētā
Vita Nostra
The Memory Police
Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead
A Tale for the Time Being
The End of the Ocean
The Ocean at the End of the Lane
The Dazzle of Day
The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle
Disappearing Earth
Among Others
The Heart's Invisible Furies
Passage
The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August
The Just City
The Overstory
Tyll
Little, Big
Atlas Alone/Before Mars/After Atlas
Les Miserables - Victor Hugo
The Future of Another Timeline

I'm at 117 "books" read but that includes a bunch of short stories & novelettes, so probably closer to 100 (including novellas).

Average rating 3.7 which is down from the past 2 years when it was 3.9. I guess I got a bit grumpy this year, I definitely DNF'd more.

Genre stats
Scifi 34
Fantasy 47
Mystery 4
Other fiction 4
Non-fiction 21

Anthology/collection 8 (all SFF I believe)

Author stats
Female 54
Male 38
Non-binary 2

Authors of color 27
White authors 66

lgbtq+ 10 (to the best I can determine)

Meredith the Guessing Queen wrote: "Average rating 3.7 which is down from the past 2 years when it was 3.9. I guess I got a bit grumpy this year, I definitely DNF'd more...."

Same! Prior to this year I only ever dnf'd one book. This year I think I reached double digits.

Most of my fiction reading were books with dragons, so I guess 2020 was the year of a dragon for me?

Total: ATM - 84 (may go up to 87)

Paperback/Hardcover: 34 books
Audio: 19 books
ebook: 39 books (wow - wouldn't have thought it. A lot of them were kids books)

SF: 26
Fantasy: 22
Children's: 14
MG/YA: 11
Regular Fiction: 9
Novellas/Short: 9
Poetry: 8
Graphic Novels/Comics: 4
Non-Fiction: 2

Authors/Illustrators demographics (by number of books):
Women: 46
Men: 33
Non-binary or LGBTQ+: 8
BIPOC: 15

US/UK/Canada Authors/Publishers (and English): 67
Rest of the World (Authors and/or Publishers): 9 (this should be more)

Owned before 2020: 33
Rereads: 8

I don't care too much about GR's stats. Shortest book 24 pages (kids book). Longest book: 1318 pages (1Q84). Most popular: The Alchemist. Highest rated: The Way of Kings. My average rating: 4.2 I guess I'm easy to please!

DivaDiane wrote: "I guess I'm easy to please!"

Ummm, isn't your name DivaDiane?

I find my average rating is going up because with the help of my friends, I am choosing more wisely.

Gabi wrote: "Meredith the Guessing Queen wrote: "Average rating 3.7 which is down from the past 2 years when it was 3.9. I guess I got a bit grumpy this year, I definitely DNF'd more...."

Same! Prior to this y..."

I still don't find it easy, but I am getting better at it. I even DNF'd a couple short stories this year.

Hank wrote: "DivaDiane wrote: "I guess I'm easy to please!"

Ummm, isn't your name DivaDiane?

I find my average rating is going up because with the help of my friends, I am choosing more wisely."

I'm not your average Diva, Hank.

With the high number of books I'm reading off my own shelves, I find those books that I actually bought at one point to always be at least 3.5 - 4 stars, if not 5 stars. I generally wait quite a while to read anything new and shiny and wait till it's been vetted by my friends and generally no longer new and shiny.

Where does one find one’s 2020 in review?

I am curious but won’t look until December 31 or so....

there's a link in post 2

You can also find it if you go to your profile or the home page, I believe.

I just got a 2020 stats email from Audible, and it says I've listened to 162 titles from them in 2020. I can't believe that's true, I mean yes they have Audible Plus now, and I had two months of Escape free in early 2020, but I didn't think I'd listened to even 50! I checked my spreadsheet, and it says 70. I'd like to see the list of titles they think I've listened to?!

I guess I've relistened to some things a lot, and I don't mark those in the spreadsheet... Hmm, surely I haven't done nearly a hundred comfort relistens?!

Anyway, it's true that I've listened to a lot of audiobooks this year, 82% of my recorded reading was on audio, but I know for sure that most of that is from Storytel.

My stats were wrong too. It said that I only rated 3 books on Audible. I rate every book that I read on there.

It also said that I listened to 27 hours of non-fiction. I listened about about 12 hrs.

*shrug* The stats were weird.

I think when you remove an Audible Plus book from your library, it may also delete your rating & book status of read/etc. Which is why I've been using GR as my tracker for books read.

Unfortunately, GR is not 100% reliable for keeping records. Between random deletion of books/stories and random updates disrupting changes.

Maybe next year, I will start logging in my books on Clz. The book collection software I've decided to use for logging my print library. =)

I've returned all the A+ titles I've listened to, so if they don't count those, my numbers should be lower, not higher! I wonder if they count each time I *start* a book? Because I tend to start them a lot as I go to sleep, and then restart the next day.

My Audible stats are useless since I "listen" to audiobooks all night lol. According to them I've read hundreds of books this year, but it's that I keep using the same 5 books to help me fall asleep.

Anna, yes. One month they were doing a "listen to 5 books to get a credit" and I listened to Witches Abroad over and over that week at night and got the credit. It was the only book I "finished" that week. (It's conveniently about 8 hours long, so if it's still playing when I wake up, it's back to sleep!)

Allison yes, exactly! If they count each one as a listen, then sure I can see how I've "listened" to 162 Audible books. By the same logic I've listened to 750 Storytel books XD

"Anna, you've listened to Catwings 361 times this year!"

XD

(No, they did not tell me that, but it would be true.)

Right lol. If we're going by how many times something is playing in my general vicinity, I've read about 365 more books this year lol

My humble stats this year and my treasured favorites!

Books completed: 35, out of which -
Sci-fi 28
Fantasy 7 very picky with Fantasy still :(
Audiobooks 5 (poor stats on my Storytel!)

Repeat Authors: 5
Robert A. Heinlein
Kurt Vonnegut Jr
Philip K. Dick (2)
Neil Gaiman
Andy Weir (Short Fiction)

My New Authors: 17
Adrian Tchaikovsky (5) - Most Read Author this year. New favorite author!
Ursula K. Le Guin - New Favorite Author!
Nnedi Okorafor (Novella)
Susanna Clarke
Tade Thompson
Matt Haig
N.K. Jemisin (Short Fiction)
T. Kingfisher
T.J. Klune
Martha Wells (Novella)
Silvia Moreno-Garcia
Blake Crouch
Simon Jimenez
Alix E. Harrow
Cory Doctorow (Novella)
Ted Chiang (Short fiction)
Arkady Strugatsky
Jeff Vandermeer
Franks Herbert
Liu Cixin

My Treasured 5 Stars: 11
Children of Time Adrian Tchaikovsky
Children of Ruin Adrian Tchaikovsky
The Doors of Eden Adrian Tchaikovsky
Vanished Birds Simon Jimenez
The Dispossessed Ursula K. Le Guin
The Lathe of Heaven Ursula K. Le Guin
Dune Frank Herbert
The Sirens of Titan Kurt Vonnegut
The Moon is Harsh Mistress Robert A. Heinlein
Ocean at the End of the Lane Neil Gaiman

Short reads favorites:
Radicalized Cory Doctorow
Emergency Skin N.K. Jemisin

Well, I generally stay away from challenges, since I have enough anxiety already, and I figure the perfect number of books to read is the number I feel up to reading given my circumstances.

But! I do love data!

Total Read: 132
Including 12 short stories and 38 manga/comics, so my pages are comparatively quite low. (But still in total more than usual!)
This seems to match this year, which had the effect of compulsively snacking on a bunch of easily-consumed books, rather than deep dives into epic series.

Total Pages: 29,634
Average Pages: 224
Longest Book: The Secret Commonwealth, 784 pgs
Shortest Book: The Smuggler and the Warlord, 3 pgs
Average Rating: 3.7
This is higher than average, which makes sense, since I did more comfort rereads of favorites this year.

Highlights: Everything T. Kingfisher, This is How You Lose the Time War, Spinning Silver

Hell nos: The Viscount Who Loved Me
Anticipating the Netflix Bridgerton show got me try this series, but was disappointed and horrified by the rape culture.

I'll have to come back to full diversity audit, but my gut impressions are: extremely female, very gay, very white.

The most random stat I've found that amused me is that I finish most books on a Tuesday, and least on a Friday! From this Bookstats online tool.