2021 Reading Summary

Ever since I kept a book blog, I've enjoyed writing an end-of-year post summarizing my reading for the year. For the past two years, I've tracked my reading using an Excel spreadsheet that I designed for this purpose, tracking the things that I want to track (because statistics and graphs are fun).

So before getting in to my favourite books of the year, let me begin with some of those numbers:

Total books read in 2021:  41
Fiction/Non-Fiction/Poetry Ratio:  30/10/1
Paper/E-book/Audiobook Ratio:  27/11/3
Best Reading Month:  March (7 books completed)
Worst Reading Month:  December (1 book completed)
Number of re-reads: 6 (with 4 of them being on the syllabus for a C. S. Lewis course I audited)
Number of books by Canadian Authors:  12
Number of books by LGBTQ+ Authors*:  10
Number of books with LGBTQ+ Characters**:  8 with main characters; 8 more with secondary characters
Number of books by non-White Authors*:  10
Number of books with non-White Characters**:  14 with main characters; 3 more with secondary characters
Book published most recently:  No Cure for Being Human by Kate Bowler (published September 28, 2021)
Book published most distantly:  The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett (published 1911)
Books published before 2000:  6 (with 5 being from the aforementioned C. S. Lewis course)

* Because I am trying to read more diverse authors (especially with books that I purchase rather than borrowing from the library), I have done my best to internet-sleuth out this information. This information wasn't always available, so this data may not be fully accurate.

** Based on how the characters are explicitly presented on the page.

For my 2022 spreadsheet, I think that I am going to add a column to indicate where I got the book (e.g. library, purchased, gift).

And now for my favourite books of 2021! In no particular order...

No Cure for Being Human (Kate Bowler) - this is a spectacular book that everyone should read, along with her earlier book, Everything Happens for a Reason (And Other Lies I've Loved). The two books cover a similar time period, but examine them from a different perspective. This latest is written from the perspective of the author having survived un-survivable cancer and she now needs to figure out how to live an "ordinary" life. As this book was finished after the beginning of the pandemic, in the end she includes some things that she has learned that might apply to all of us now.

Out of the Deep I Cry (Julia Spencer-Fleming) - this is the third book in a new mystery series that I started reading this summer. They are set in small-town upstate New York, and the main characters are the Chief of Police and the local Episcopal priest. I love how theology and the rhythm of the church year are interwoven with the story. I've read the first four in the series at this point - I named Out of the Deep I Cry here, because it was beautifully crafted moving between different time lines.

Five Little Indians (Michelle Good) - this is a book that has been top of the bestseller lists this year, especially after the story of unmarked burials at Residential Schools hit the media over the summer. It is a heartbreaking and haunting and eventually hopeful story of a group of Residential School survivors and how their stories intertwine with one another in the decades after they leave the school.

 

 

 

An Everlasting Meal (Tamar Adler) - this was one of my re-reads this year. Tamar Adler is not only a beautiful writer, but she is also writing about food in a way that resonates deeply with me - food as a joy, as something that should be sustainable, with cooking as something that is accessible. And as I was just finishing this re-read, I (along with many others) managed to sign myself up (through her Instagram) as a volunteer recipe tester for the cookbook she is currently working on.

 

Hana Khan Carries On (Uzma Jalaluddin) - I loved her first book, Ayesha At Last (a Pride and Prejudice re-telling set in Toronto's Muslim community), and couldn't wait to read her newest book that came out this summer. This time around, she set out to write a re-telling of the movie, You've Got Mail (which is, itself, a Pride and Prejudice re-telling... I sense a theme here!), set as a rivalry between two halal restaurants in Toronto. Her characters feel so real to me, the story touches on Islamophobia which is a problem in Canada, and yet the families and the neighbours come together to support each other in the end. (Don't read this book if you are hungry.)

 

And that was my year in books.

Here's to more happy reading in 2022!