After reading 30+ books last year easily, I started off this year with a goal of reading 50 books, and I definitely made it, with some half-read books to spare. Here is the list of the 50 I read, pretty much in that order, with links to the reviews I wrote.*
(PS Add me on GoodReads!)
Book #1 of 2014: “Turn Around Bright Eyes” by Rob Sheffield
Book #2 of 2014: “The Ocean at the End of the Lane” by Neil Gaiman
Book #3 of 2014: “The Signature of All Things” by Elizabeth Gilbert
Book #4 of 2014: “Orange Is the New Black: My Year in a Women’s Prison” by Piper Kerman
Book #5 of 2014: “TransAtlantic” by Colum McCann
Book #6 of 2014: “Drown” by Junot Diaz
Book #7 of 2014: “The Color Master” by Aimee Bender
Book #8 of 2014: “Kitchen” by Banana Yoshimoto
Book #9 of 2014: “The Summer We Got Free” by Mia McKenzie
Book #10 of 2014: “The Illusion of Separateness” by Simon van Booy
Book #11 of 2014: “A Field Guide to Getting Lost” by Rebecca Solnit
Book #12 of 2014: “Real Marriage: The Truth About Sex, Friendship, and Life Together” by Mark & Grace Driscoll
Book #13 of 2014: “Love to the Uttermost” by John Piper
Book #14 of 2014: “The Dog Stars” by Peter Heller
Book #15 of 2014: “The Art of Travel” by Alain de Botton
Book #16 of 2014: “Moonlight Shadow” by Banana Yoshimoto
Book #17 of 2014: “Willful Creatures” by Aimee Bender
Book #18 of 2014: “Steal Like an Artist: 10 Things Nobody Told You About Being Creative” by Austin Kleon
Book #19 of 2014: “The Secret History” by Donna Tartt
Book #20 of 2014: “The Harmony Silk Factory” by Tash Aw
!Book #21 of 2014: “The Book Thief” by Markus Zusak
Book #22 of 2014: “The Goldfinch” by Donna Tartt
Book #23 of 2014: “The Indie Conference Organizer Handbook” by Max Krüger and Peter Bihr
Book #24 of 2014: “The Book of Unknown Americans” by Cristina Henriquez
Book #25 of 2014: “This Is Water” by David Foster Wallace
Book #26 of 2014: Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell
Book #27 of 2014: “Help Thanks Wow: Three Essential Prayers” by Anne Lamott
Book #28 of 2014: “Chelsea Chelsea Bang Bang” by Chelsea Handler
Book #29 of 2014: “Show Your Work!: 10 Ways to Share Your Creativity and Get Discovered” by Austin Kleon
Book #30 of 2014: “Underground: The Tokyo Gas Attack and the Japanese Psyche” by Haruki Murakami
Book #31 of 2014: “This Is Where I Leave You” by Jonathan Tropper
Book #32 of 2014: “The Waters and the Wild” by Francesca Lia Block
Book #33 of 2014: “Bridge to Terebithia” by Katherine Paterson
Book #34 of 2014: The Anatomy of Dreams” by Chloe Benjamin
Book #35 of 2014: “Little Bee” by Chris Cleave
Book #36 of 2014: “The Unnamed” by Joshua Ferris
Book #37 of 2014: “Americanah” by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Book #38 of 2014: “The Handmaid’s Tale” by Margaret Atwood
Book #39 of 2014: “Pastrix: The Cranky, Beautiful Faith of a Sinner & Saint” by Nadia Bolz-Weber
Book #40 of 2014: “Functional Programming in Swift” by Chris Eidhof, Florian Kugler, and Wouter Swierstra
Book #41 of 2014: “Gone Girl” by Gillian Flynn
Book #42 of 2014: “Not That Kind of Girl” by Lena Dunham
Book #43 of 2014: “The Lipstick Gospel” by Stephanie May Wilson
Book #44 of 2014: “The Shadow of the Wind” by Carlos Ruiz Zafón
Book #45 of 2014: “Flight Behavior” by Barbara Kingsolver
Book #46 of 2014: “Here is Berlin” by JM Stim
Book #47 of 2014: “3D Graphics with Scene Kit” by David Rönnqvist
Book #48 of 2014: “Yes Please” by Amy Poehler
Book #49 of 2014: “Life of Pi” by Yann Martel
Book #50 of 2014: “Weetzie Bat” by Francesca Lia Block
Now that it’s 2015, my goal is the same. I think 50 books a year is reasonable and doable. so I will shoot for that again. The only change I’d like it to be better at writing reviews of them. That said, any book recommendations you want to give me?
*Those who follow me on Twitter might note that I also had two other books I wrote about, but I didn’t finish them (which is the trouble with writing about them before finishing them, something I stopped doing halfway through exactly for this reason). These books were “The Blue Flower” by Penelope Fitzgerald (originally #12) and “Love in the Time of Cholera” by Gabriel García Márquez (originally #24). I do hope to finish both of these books at some point (though the former is proving to be difficult), but I just didn’t get to the end before 2014 came to a close.
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