Lift Up Your Hearts!

This was a good year for books; not a record, but a very respectable 76 books, 6.33 per month. The fiction/non-fiction ratio was almost exactly the same as last year. No doubt about it: fiction is a lot easier to read when you are at risk of being interrupted. I've been working on RFK Jr.'s The Wuhan Cover-Up for many weeks. It's fascinating, frightening, and frustrating; having read The Real Anthony Fauci two years ago, I'm certain it will also be enlightening, important, and highly accurate. But like that book, it's also so packed with references and documentation that it takes focus to be able to do it justice. The book that is capturing my attention at the moment, Brandon Sanderson's Warbreaker, is not light reading—nearly 600 pages of a complex story filled with unpronouncable names—but there's no denying it's more fun to read.

The stats:

• Total books: 76
• Fiction: 63 (83%)
• Non-fiction: 12 (16%)
• Other: 1 (1%)
• Months with most books: April (10)
• Month with fewest books: July (2)
• Authors read most frequently: Four stood out: Mark Schweizer (15), Jenny Phillips (10), Brandon Sanderson (9), and Robert Heinlein (8). The next highest was three, a position held by several authors.

Here's the list, sorted by title; links are to reviews. The different colors in the titles only reflect whether or not you've followed a hyperlink. The ratings (★) and warnings (☢) are on a scale from 1 to 5, with 1 being the lowest/mildest. Warnings, like the ratings, are highly subjective and reflect context, perceived intended audience, and my own biases. They may be for sexual content, language, violence, worldview, or anything else that I find objectionable. Nor are they completely consistent. For example, Brandon Sanderson's books could easily rate a content warning in all of the above categories, yet they are mostly not inappropriate to the context and could be considered quite mild—for a modern book. Your mileage may vary.