Although I didn't scale the dizzy heights of 2014 (32 books read. 32!!), I have managed to reach my two books a month average this year. Half of these weren't on the original list, unfortunately, and I didn't always manage to blog about all of them, but I'm determined to do better in 2017. There are so many great books on my shelves, it's time to knuckle down and do them justice. Although I'll only be able to do this if the publishing industry stops being awesome and releasing amazing new books, of course. Such a dilemma!
To my surprise, I've read more fiction (14) than non-fiction (10) this year. If you'd have asked me, I would have told you that I'd read far more non-fiction, but it looks like I've been doing a better job of mixing things up than I realised. Although, having said that, five of the books were autobiographies by actors and celebrities, so perhaps not that mixed up... Will have to try and keep an eye on that next year.
So, my ideal reading list for 2017 would be longer, include more 'list' books and fewer autobiographies. It would also be great to get in a classic or two and some science fiction. Been a while since we've had some of that, so we'll have to see what we can do.
I would also love to see Benjamin Mee's follow up to 'We Bought a Zoo' on next year's list too, but two years after supporting the crowdfunding to help Dartmoor Zoo gain charitable status, the promised book still isn't finished. It's easy to forget that writing is a proper, full-time job, so it's not really a surprise that the guy is finding it hard to balance with running a zoo. Talk about multi-tasking.
I hope to keep working through Winston Graham's Poldark books next year too. Must keep ahead of the BBC series! Although they're such great books, I would definitely want to be reading them anyway. Good to have an incentive sometimes though!
While I'm still reading the Poldark series, I did actually finish another set of books in 2016; Ian Fleming's Bond novels. So even though I may not feel like I've achieved much this year, I have achieved that.
As always, thank you so much for your support and I do hope you're still enjoying the blog. To keep things interesting for you, I'm working on some posts about some great author-related places I've visited and hope to come up with some other book-related articles for you too. Watch this space!
It's always great to hear from you, so don't forget you can tweet me via @EileenFurze.
That's it for now, so all the best for 2017 and happy reading!
Reviews of the Year
2015
2014
2013
2012
2016: A Year in Books
January
'The Rendez-Vous and Other Stories' by Daphne Du Maurier
'Wishful Drinking' by Carrie Fisher
February
'To Kill A Mocking-Bird' by Harper Lee
March
'You Say Potato' by David and Ben Crystal
April
'Moranifesto' by Caitlin Moran
'Carmilla' by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
May
'Red: A Natural History of the Redhead' by Jacky Collis Harvey
'Absolute Pandemonium' by Brian Blessed
'Not My Father's Son' by Alan Cumming
'The Black Moon' by Winston Graham
'Dead Man's Folly' by Agatha Christie
'Gut' by Giulia Enders and Jill Enders
August
'The Swordfish and the Star' by Gavin Knight
'Spectacles' by Sue Perkins
September
'You Only Live Twice' by Ian Fleming
'The Man with the Golden Gun' by Ian Fleming
'The Heart Goes Last' by Margaret Atwood
'Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children' by Ransom Riggs
October
'Josephine' by Kate Williams
'Conclave' by Robert Harris
November
'The Four Swans' by Winston Graham
'On Her Majesty's Secret Service' by Ian Fleming
December
'No Cunning Plan' by Tony Robinson
'The Secret Diary of Adrian Mole Aged 13 3/4' by Sue Townsend
