2023: The Year In Books

As 2023 comes to a close, my third full year of remote working, I managed to far surpass my previous records by completing a whopping 59 books, four books more than my previous high from last year and my third consecutive year completing the 52 books in 52 weeks challenge.  I completed the challenge in late November and surpassed last year’s total in mid-December.  I read (or listened) to 21,394 pages, by far my highest total of all time and only the fourth time I’ve passed 10,000.

Of those books, eleven were non-fiction and, of the remaining 48 novels, only four were tied to a TV show, either as the source material or as a tie-in.  None of the books came out of my dwindling “to-read” drawer, with 53 e-books and two audiobooks.  I continued to take advantage of my library card, which helped me procure 44 of the books I consumed throughout the year.

Over 61% of the books I read this year were by authors I had read before. The 22 authors that I read for the first this year were:

Selma Blair Stacy Willingham Gillian McAllister Chuck Klosterman
Gabrielle Zevin Ronan Farrow Matthew Perry Amor Towles
Jason Rekulak Emily St. John Mandel Bonnie Garmus Thomas Mullen
Naomi Hirahara Maitland Ward Busy Phillips Elliot Page
Jinwoo Chong Maureen Ryan Minka Kelly Britney Spears
Emily Henry Rebecca Makkai

Jennifer McMahon, Karin Slaughter, Taylor Jenkins Reid, Erle Stanley Gardner, Grady Hendrix, Jeffery Deaver, Laura Lippman, Ruth Ware, and Stacy Willingham were the only authors that I read multiple titles from during 2023.

18 of the books I read were released this year, while only five of them were released last century, with the oldest first published in 1934.

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Book 13 (of 52) – The Nineties

The Nineties: A Book – Chuck Klosterman

How does one define the Nineties?  Chronologically, the Nineties started January 1, 1990 and ended on New Year’s Eve 1999.  Culturally, it can be argued that the decade began on November 9, 1989 with the fall of the Berlin Wall and ended on a Tuesday September morning when the Twin Towers did the same.  Regardless of how you define it, Chuck Klosterman’s book takes a look back at the last decade of the 20th century, the decade that formed the background of Generation X.

Klosterman digs deep into the figures and events of the day, both the obvious and the less so.  From Singles, the prototypical Gen X movie (at least if you’re white) to the hullabaloo surrounding 2 Live Crew and Ice T’s controversial release Cop Killer.  The fast political rise and just-as-quick fall of Ross Perot and the Teflon-like nature of Bill Clinton.  The country’s brief obsession with clear drinks, like Crystal Pepsi and Zima.  Michael Jordan’s baseball career.  O.J. Simpson and the white Ford Bronco.  Dolly the cloned sheep.  And how the fallout from the election in 2000 has led to the political polarization we see today.