Reading – Page 2 – LARSEN

Reading and writing in 2020

2020 was a strange and difficult year. One in which worry replaced creativity, and in which I returned to re-reading, great TV writing and easy reads in search of distraction from the drama outside, and to multi-book series for the relief of staying within the same world for longer than one book alone could provide. But in spite (or because) of all this, I still read 134 books in 2020 (just 13 short of my personal best).

Reading and writing in 2019

Another New Year, another book tally… which tells me that I read 127 books over the course of 2019 (twenty shy of last year’s personal best). That means I read a total of 753 books during the 2010s decade, averaging just over 75/year or almost 1.4/week during that time.

Reading and writing in 2018

2018 was another huge year of reading and writing… Thanks both to my looser, freelance lifestyle and judging of the Territory Reads Awards, I once again re-set my personal best record to 147 books read over the course of the year (averaging just under 3 books a week – not counting literary journals or children’s books).

Reading and writing in 2017

Phew. What a readerly/writerly adventure 2017 turned out to be. Thanks to my four-month Reading and Writing Sabbatical, I screamed past my previous personal-best record and ended the year with a whopping 105 books under my belt (averaging just over 2 books each week – not including repeats, journals or children’s books). Huzzah.

Books about modern Australia

As usual, in the lead-up to Invasion / Survival Day, I’ve been revisiting the list of books I recommend that provide a better reflection of life in contemporary Australia (by which I mean the last 20 years) than a national(istic) holiday on the worst possible date.

2016 in reading and writing

OK, the results are in. The spreadsheet has been updated. And just short of last year’s personal best, it looks like I averaged 1.4 books a week over the course of the 2016 reading year, finishing 72 in total (not including repeats or literary journals).

2015 in reading and writing

So many books, so little time. But over the course of the last reading year, I averaged 1.5 books a week – finishing 79 in total, plus every edition (bar the most recent of each) of Kill Your Darlings, Overland, Meanjin and Poetry magazine. Phew.

Read what you know: the comfort of the familiar

At the start of each new year, I look back on all the books that I have read the year before. In 2013, it was a list that spanned a lifetime of reading, with books from all the decades of my life. More than ever, it was also a list full of books that I found myself returning to for a second (or third, or fourth) time.