I only read about 44 books this year, which is down about 8 or so from last year. That’s interesting to me, as I have been reading pretty voraciously. The NYPL digital book service is making my total go up, however a shorter commute, and the lack of using an ipod to read audiobooks (a combined effort of my larger ipod dying and NYC being too loud to listen to an ipod at normal audio levels). I also consulted a lot of books, but didn’t READ them fully, especially about travel. I need to figure out a better way to deal with that.

17 fiction/39% (20 last year/ 1% more than last year)
27 non-fiction/61% (32 last year/1% less than last year)

Wow, I am so consistent.

Only 2 could be construed as “religiously themed.” But food (7) and music (4) figured prominently.
5 books were of authors I met.
19 were audiobook, which is way up from last year–thanks NYPL!

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Biggest surprise: To Catch a Predator
Biggest letdown: Omnivore’s Dilemma, Smashed
Favorites: Nightmare Alley, They Shoot Horses Don’t They, the Dexter books, Outposts, God’s Harvard
Most Overrated: Omnivore’s Dilemma
Books I could not finish this year included:
Lenin’s embalmers (I will finish this, but haven’t yet–carryover from last year)
Lamb by Christopher Moore (Started on the plane)
4-Hour Work Week (started before I left home)
Thunderstruck (Started before I left home)

by oliver sacks

Man I have always wanted to read an Oliver Sacks book.  It seems perfect for me.  I listened to the audiobook, which was a bad move because non-American accents kill me on an audiobook.  It was just okay.  I found many of the vignettes interesting but there was no real common thread to bring it together.  Perhaps I have to try a non-audio version.

by Michael Pollan

It took me almost the whole year to read this book. I expected it to be SO GOOD, and everyone raved about it, but holy god is this book boring and pompous. First, could we get a food book that, instead of yelling about how horrible the food is in America, could even barely mention how LUCKY WE ARE to be able to choose between different kinds of food? I don’t feel quite in the food crisis Michael Pollan feels we are. Also, the interesting part of this book would have been inside the corn syrup factories, which he cannot go to. And there’s no real conclusive scientific evidence that HFCS is worse for you, not that this book has very much science in it. I did like the conversations with farmers. But the middle of this book almost killed me. I considered not finishing it. Basically this book says what tens of other books say, but in a more boring way, written in a voice that I find grating, ignorant, and unthankful.

by John Grisham

I am not a regular Grisham reader, but this is such an odd direction for him. A book about a couple who skip Christmas. I really really really want to skip Christmas. Seriously I am such a grinch. I would prefer to say I am actually quite pro-Christmas, but not the form Christmas takes–running around, buying people gift cards, stressing, guilt, etc. The first half of this book was amazing, but inevitably it becomes a heartwarming xmas tale. Blech. Still good, but I hated seeing the character I liked and agreed with so much get demeaned. I think you are supposed to think he’s an ass in the beginning, but instead I liked him. Harumph.

by john green

Wow why am I only reading depressing books? This is very Catcher in the Rye, but funnier. Another one from John Green of Brotherhood 2.0. I enjoyed the whole emphasis on people’s last words.

by Douglas Brinkley

Man this was the wrong book to read just as the nights got longer. It was obviously depressing. I had been meaning to read it for a while, and then Chad suggested it and it was available digitally. Thanks, NYPL!

While I enjoyed the book, and agreed with most of it, I didn’t feel like I learned a lot more than I already knew. The beginning of the book sets out very bluntly to find out whose fault it is. And yet, in the end, it’s still kind of everyone’s fault. While I agree with Brinkley’s statement that those who say it isn’t important whose fault it is probably say that because it would implicate them, I don’t think that fault is the be all and end all. It would have been more useful to know, say, how to prevent it happening again. And part of my frustration about this part of the book is because if someone did SOMETHING, anything at many points, the extent could have been lessened. That’s probably more a frustration with the situation than with the book though….

Mainly, though this book assigns fault, it doesn’t tell me WHY the people at fault did nothing. And that for me is the central mystery. Yes I know George Bush ignored NOLA’s pleas, but the book I want is WHY did he do so. I mean there is the easy Kanye West, “George Bush doesn’t care about black people.” which I do not doubt, although I think the more accurate statement would be, “George Bush doesn’t care about poor people.” This “WHY?” idea gets a SMALL mention at the end of the book (local lawmakers didn’t ask for anything specific from feds, just for “help,” which feds took as a sign they didn’t need anything) but not why any president would feel comfortable not doing anything in a time of national crisis is a question I still can’t answer. But probably no one can.

by Christopher Buckley

Silly, political, addictive, funny, biting satire.  I feel like at this point Christopher Buckley is super consistent–all of his books bring the same amount of cutting amusement.  The only difference on this one is that it’s about blogging, so it was a little more interesting to me.  But who knew there could be so much humor in a book about social security reform?  Although I often get bored at the DC-centric nature of Buckley’s books, this book made me realize I really wish he would run for office because I’d love to see his actual political beliefs.

A lot of these audiobooks I have been reading have been from Overdrive at the NYPL.  Of course I can’t listen to them on my ipod, or on my home computer.  I can listen at work though, which is nice.  The major bummer of the system though is that you can only check out a certain number of books, and you cannot return books you have checked out.  So digital books I checked out and finished two weeks ago are still in my queue and I cannot get them out!  It’s really annoying.  I can understand most other aspects of the library digital books copyright issues, but not why they force me to keep the book!

by john green

I don’t normally read a lot of YA, but I have been obsessively been watching Brotherhood 2.0 all week since I discovered it. John Green and his brother Hank have decided to not textually communicate for a year and thus video blog to each other. If you are a ZeFrank fan, you’ll love it.

So after I exhausted all the videos, I went on to the audiobook. I kind of wish this weren’t YA. I think this book would have been more awesome if set with adults. But nonetheless it was really funny, personal, and dorky. I hear the print version has crazy charts and footnotes so I am going to check that out too. I read this in a day.

by Jennifer Crusie and Bob Mayer

I started this on audiobook and hated it.  I read it in real book form and much preferred it.  I liked the whole mystery aspect but I do prefer her books without it….

by Amy Sedaris

I love Amy Sedaris, but when I flipped through this book in the store, I wasn’t all that enthused about it.  I found the NYPL had a digital audio copy and found her reading of it far more enjoyable.  I think it would have been weird though had I never seen the book.  Although she mentions that she didn’t want it to be just a jokey book that happened to have recipes, I think that’s exactly what it was.

by Ayn Rand

I have tried to read this book many times in my life, but have never gotten through more than 100 pages. A few years ago I even read Atlas Shrugged, but still could not get through this book. I read both on audiobook which made the whole affair much, much longer, but parts of these books are so boring, I think if forced to read it in paper, I would have hurled the book across the room.

I am not the kind of person who forces myself to read things. There are far too many things to read in my life that I will never get to. However, I am a libertarian and when I tell people that they usually think I am an Ayn Rand wacko. So I felt I had to read this if only to not associate myself with it.

I really dislike Ayn Rand. First of all, she shouldn’t be writing fiction. Her fiction is a roundabout allegory for all of her “teachings.” If you want to teach me a lesson that emphatically (i.e. every page is agenda), write some non-fiction.
Very little happens for long, long stretches in this book. The major “action” is when people say inappropriate things. To realize these things are inappropriate you need 200 pages of backstory about their personal life goals. Because the themes that one lives one’s life by are very, very tied into their relationships.

I know Ayn Rand is supposed to be uber-rationalist, but the main romance of this novel makes no sense. Clearly by page 200 it is obvious that 2 main characters should be together, yet one decides that is exactly why she shouldn’t be with him? Huh? That makes no sense. Then she marries several men, whom she doesn’t love (which, in the Rand way would be more like, “respect”) and breaks up with them inevitably. For as free market as Ayn Rand is, all relationships are really feelinglist and communist.
The beginning of this book is very boring because I think you are supposed to be fully convinced of what a rational badass Howard Roark is. Instead he seems to range from semi-normal, if boring, rationalist to cold, unfeeling sociopath. I assume I am supposed to like him? And I guess, relative to other people in the book I do, but honestly I don’t feel one way or the other about anyone in this book as they are all puppets playing out the “TAKE RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE SELF” agenda. There was a brief period in the middle that was fine, but then, 1/2 way through it just kept getting worse and worse. I felt like I was in an abusive relationship with The Fountainhead.

The annoying thing is that I mainly AGREE with the agenda of this book yet I still did not like it.

I think in retrospect I did like Atlas Shrugged more. But really they’re the same book, since the stories are totally irrelevant.

by david rakoff

His previous book, Fraud was more up my alley, but I liked this a lot too. I love that he reads his own books, because his delivery is hilarious.

 by Chris Anderson

Part of the problem with reading the hip book way, way after everyone else has read it is that many of its ideas seem self-evident and old news.  Enjoyable, quick read.  Many of its ideas I felt were true but the evidence used wasn’t the best.  However, of course, I am sure there is a lot more evidence now, years later, than when this was published.

by Christopher Moore

Read the entire entry …

by Simon Winchester

I love everything Simon Winchester, and when I love something, especially a book, I prolong the ending as long as possible.  I think I prolonged the ending to this well over a year, because the last chapters mentioned the Pitcairn Islands.  The Pitcairns are particularly interesting to me, but sadly he doesn’t get to go to them.

Basically the premise is that he visits all of the far flung islands still considered part of the British empire and talks about the way of life there.  With my recent work subject of esoteric islands, I thought it was time to finish it.  It was great.  I highly recommended it.  It really made me want to buy an island.

by Jeff Lindsay

Of course not as good as the first but a very interesting premise.  I am excited to see how it plays out in the tv show.  The end of this really dragged for me, and the villian wasn’t that interesting to be.  But good overall.

by Mitchell Parcelle

I thought this would be a longer term history of the Empire State Building, i.e. why it was built and such.  Instead it was a really soap opera-y business saga of who owned it and sold it in the 80s and 90s.  I would only read this if I were super interested in NYC real estate (I am not) or Donald Trump (I am really not) or the history of the Empire State Building (I am not so much).  I would have liked to know the original history of its erection, but this was a snooze.

by Jeff Lindsay

I usually don’t read mysteries, but I do read a lot of true crime. In fact, whenever I have been forced to read mysteries, I have truly hated them. Mainly I have read PD James and oldetymey English stuff. However, I love the tv show Dexter. So I tried it out. And I loved it, but I have to say, while the TV show is very true to the book, there are some major interesting differences.

But now I am at a crossroads–read the next book or wait until the second season. Well I cannot wait, so I will forge ahead!

by Augusten Burroughs

Burroughs is often compared to Sedaris, and this seems to be his most Sedaris-like yet.  Much “happier” than his previous books.  I found it very enjoyable, but for the life of me, I cannot distinguish its stories from Magical Thinking! I like his reading of his books, though!

by Mark Kurlansky

I tried to read this in book form on the plane to New Orleans only to learn it was about NYC history, which wasn’t really what I was looking for. I LOVE Kurlansky’s book Cod, so I gave it a try when I saw it on audiobook. I liked it, but some parts were slow. It is amazing how dependent on oysters New York was. Today I also noticed that my preferred hair product (Dep sport clay) has oyster shells IN IT. Weird. It definitely made me want seafood all the time. I liked the book, and now I want to read an eel book someone recommended. It seems animal histories are all the rage.