How many books do you think you'll get through this year?

[Richard_]

I know it's quality over quantity (After all, anyone could go through a thousand kids books in a year no problem) but I figure most, if not everyone here reads decently sized books (50'000 words minimum?)...

Anyway, I guess I'm wondering how many books you think you'll read this year, do you have a list of all those books? Realistically, how many of those books will you read?

Do you have a certain quota of books you want to get through per day/week/month?

Personally, I'm hoping I can get through at least fifty books this year.

So far I've only finished reading four books this year (As far as I can remember)... Which is a rate of about a book a month, and I'm currently half way through my fifth book; Green Mars. I need to pick up the pace!

Also... Off the bat - any SciFi literature fans here?

[PeterL]

I have already finished writing one novel, and I have parts of two others written. I don't know which of those two i will finish, but i may get both finished.

[Brock]

Personally, I'm hoping I can get through at least fifty books this year.


Ambitious! I'll see your fifty and raise you ten. Sixty books. Call or raise! :smile5:

[iamnobody]

I made my own list of "100 greatest books". My mission is to read them all this year.
32 down....

[Alexander III]

I have already finished writing one novel, and I have parts of two others written. I don't know which of those two i will finish, but i may get both finished.

{EDIT}

As for myself, I don't really set myself goals, I don't even know what I am going to read next, I just follow whims and fancies; but I would expect to get through fiftyish.

[Three Sparrows]

Hmm, I will probably go through about fifty or sixty, maybe more.

[Jono]

I know it's quality over quantity (After all, anyone could go through a thousand kids books in a year no problem) but I figure most, if not everyone here reads decently sized books (50'000 words minimum?)...

I agree that it is quality over quantity, but I think the question of quality is in the quality of the reading, as opposed to the quality of the writing. To read one book and fully understand and explore its inner meaning and relevance is far more worthwhile than to scrape the surface of fifty.

(just to clarify, I am not suggesting that it is impossible to read fifty books in a year in a worthwhile way- I think I probably aspire to :smile5: )

[papayahed]

I might manage around 18 or 20. I've been keeping track since 2004, the most I've read is 24 in one year. However, I don't read as much as I would like.

[ChicagoReader]

12 down so far so i figure 30-40, though with summer soon I'll have a lot more free time!

[PeterL]

duplicate

[hanzklein]

About 25 or so. If you're reading over 30, you're either a very dedicated reader or reading simple books, or not taking time to absorb a book.

52 weeks in a year. If you read 30, you'd be reading 3 every 2 weeks - which I don't think is a normal timeframe for even advanced readers.

[Cailin]

I'd be hoping somewhere around 30 - 40 ...

[marcolfo]

i'm lucky if I read 20,,
stupid work!

[Venerable Bede]

I created a list of around 65 books that I need to read to fill up holes in my classics retinue. Ideally, I would like to finish them all this year, but I'll be happy with just 40.

[iamnobody]

I made my own list of "100 greatest books". My mission is to read them all this year.
32 down....

Make that 33. Just finished War & Peace.

[kiki1982]

:smilielol5:

I am still... on number one! Somehow, I find Between Two Palaces by Mahfouz interesting, but it is incredibly slow in Dutch.

Ok, correction, if I count those two novellas by Kleist, then I am on number three, and if I really cheat I'll count Scott's Waverley too which I finished in January, but started in August... That also did not move at all.

I am still dying to read Térèse Raquin and The Mayor of Casterbridge, but I don't seem to get through Mahfouz.

So, I guess I'll be lucky if I get to ten, which is kind of my average.

[JBI]

Maybe 50-60 read in English, if I am lucky, another 40 or so textbooks of various sorts (mostly 200 page vocabulary intensive Chinese essays), and then cover to cover maybe a dozen or so Chinese books (I count here books that are 300 pages oft containing several books within). Though, that said, I have read quite a few short stories, and quite a few poems. Alas, schoolwork and the mountains call me, and a few extra volumes remain unmoved amongst the lingring dust on overambitious shelves.

Then again, I did not count the books for coursework when I get back home, which should be a couple dozen, plus selected books of criticism and history, and various other texts of use.

[Drkshadow03]

I average 52.6 books a year so far. This is an average from when I started keeping track in 2006 (http://beyondassumptions.wordpress.com/books-read-in-previous-years/). The most I have ever read in a year is 73. The least (which was last year) was 27.

Like most people I don't keep track of EVERYTHING. The millions of online articles, the occasional teaching theory book, the chapter in a textbook (say Art History or Science), web comic, or magazine that I read in a year don't make it into my count.

This year I am up to 17 books.

[Gilliatt Gurgle]

I'll be lucky if I get through my 2011 - Eleven new authors challenge.
I need to take an inventory, but I am somewhere in the neighborhood of five completed.

.

[mortalterror]

More than 25 less than 50. I've already read about 120 comic books this year which probably don't count towards that number. My biggest problem is that I rarely finish books since I stopped reading methodically. If I find I no longer enjoy a book, I'll put it down after reading a hundred or more pages and read something else. With a lot of non-fiction I will read selectively, purposely only reading the parts I think are relevant to what I'm trying to learn. Often, I will dip into a book I've already read just for an evening, or to refresh my memory. This year, I think I've read about 8 books.

[Mutatis-Mutandis]

I'm hoping to get around to 30-40 books read. So far I've read 18, so if I keep the base (which I probably won't once I'm taking classes again) I should be able to hit that mark, maybe more.

If you'd like to keep track with me, come to me super-cool and fun thread, List the Books You Read In One Year Starting .... NOW! (http://www.online-literature.com/forums/showthread.php?t=59961)


About 25 or so. If you're reading over 30, you're either a very dedicated reader or reading simple books, or not taking time to absorb a book.

52 weeks in a year. If you read 30, you'd be reading 3 every 2 weeks - which I don't think is a normal timeframe for even advanced readers.
I don't know. It's kind of difficult to make a hard-and-fast rule that says how much people can read and absorb. Everyone's different. Plus, I know people who read several books a week, and they usually don't watch, or maybe even own, a TV.


More than 25 less than 50. I've already read about 120 comic books this year which probably don't count towards that number.
Why wouldn't they count? Sure, one comic book doesn't equal a book, but I would say about ten would equal the time it takes to read a 150-200 page book, at least the way I read comic books (stopping to look at the pictures and what-not).

[The Comedian]

Why wouldn't they count? Sure, one comic book doesn't equal a book, but I would say about ten would equal the time it takes to read a 150-200 page book, at least the way I read comic books (stopping to look at the pictures and what-not).

I like that math you have there. As for comics "counting" as books, I usually only count trades or graphic novels, but treat individual issues as magazines. So while I read Scalped, B.P.R.D, Hellblazer serials in issues, I tend not to count them in my reading list. But I like that 10 issues = 1 book idea.

[Drkshadow03]

About 25 or so. If you're reading over 30, you're either a very dedicated reader or reading simple books, or not taking time to absorb a book.

52 weeks in a year. If you read 30, you'd be reading 3 every 2 weeks - which I don't think is a normal timeframe for even advanced readers.

I know someone that can read about 200 - 300 books per a year. As of March (http://juandahlmann.wordpress.com/), he completed 100 books for 2011. He also happens to be a fairly insightful reader and if you look at the titles on this year's list those are hardly simple books. So I have to agree with Mutatis. It depends on the person really.

[Cunninglinguist]

Just to add some perspective, 2 hours a day at 30 pages an hour (a rather moderate rate) is 21900 pages a year, or about 55 400 page books. Considering that, if you're reading less than 30 books a year you're no where near being a dedicated reader.

[Big Dante]

Think I've done around 20 so far but with school and exams, 30-40? We'll see.

[JBI]

Just to add some perspective, 2 hours a day at 30 pages an hour (a rather moderate rate) is 21900 pages a year, or about 55 400 page books. Considering that, if you're reading less than 30 books a year you're no where near being a dedicated reader.

30 is a slow rate surely. On paperbacks I can hit up to 80-100 if I concentrate, reading virtually every word.

I could probably read over 30 out loud. I assume the average rate is higher than that.

[Desolation]

I've been reading pretty slowly lately...Balancing it out between the girlfriend, job hunting, writing, and socializing. My goal this year is pretty much:

War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy (finished)
In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust
Ulysses by James Joyce

And, if I have time...
The Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann
The Rosy Crucifixion by Henry Miller

[Alexander III]

"War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy (finished)
In Search of Lost Time by Marcel Proust
Ulysses by James Joyce"

Wow Desolation, this might just be the best reading year of your life ever, once you have read these 3 in a year it's gonna be dam hard to top, arguably the 3 greatest novels.

[Delta40]

As toilet paper and calcualting an average of 400 pages per book, I'd say 20 books easy...

[Desolation]

Wow Desolation, this might just be the best reading year of your life ever, once you have read these 3 in a year it's gonna be dam hard to top, arguably the 3 greatest novels.

That most certainly sums up my exact reasons for picking those three works. Tolstoy could get a little tedious at times, but reading Proust, although so far I'm only half way through Swann's Way right now, has constituted one of the greatest joys that I have ever known within the mines of literature.

I know that Joyce is going to be the biggest struggle, but I'm really looking forward to it. Hopefully, I'll be revisiting each many times throughout the course of my life.

[Sano]

Since I started as an undergraduate in philosophy this year, I think I'll probably read at least 20-30 books; this is actually the list of books I started reading but didn't finish yet. But I'll read probably twice that amount, which is almost 1 book per week. Scary. But then, I have this habit of going on a reading spree sometimes and reading 4, 5 books in a week, so...

[deguonis]

Only 27 so far. Last year I got up to 32. I want at least to have read 49 books by the end of the year

[mk3500]

1, if that.

[Leobloom]

My reading list is sort of similar, Desolation. I'm reading Ulysses at the moment, I'm 200 pages in and it is the greatest book I've ever read.
I got the full set of Proust earlier in the year, in preparation for the summer. I'd also love to read Gravity's Rainbow this year and 2666 by Roberto Bolano. There are others and they're long and difficult as well, so I'm probably not going to finish too many this year.
I like the idea of making my own list. I tend to just read what I want to at the time and, if I get tired of it, I drop it. I'm going to stop giving up on books and I'm going to try setting myself a daily target of something like 50 pages a day, which is easy. With most of these books, 50 pages takes a bit longer and is tougher but I should be reading at least that everyday.

[tonywalt]

15. But War and Peace ate into the whole bloody process.

[nursemom77]

Probably from 25 to 30. Not that I wouldn't read more if I had the time.

[Kalkin]

I have read 11 books already. And I'm going to read at least another 7 books to the end of the year.
First, it will be the remaining three parts of Gene Wolfe's "Book of the Long Sun". I have finished the first one, "Nightside the Long Sun" just today, and I love it!
Second, it will be the autobiography of Motorhead's leader, Lemmy Kilmister.
Third, it will be Jonathan Coe's novels, "The Rotter's Club" and "The Closed Circle". I already bought these books.
However, my reading list exists only in my head. I can modify it easily according to circumstances.

[G L Wilson]

I should read 70 or 80 if I can get off the Internet.

[dfloyd]

in a specified time period. What matters is what you read, or in other words, the quality of the books you read. Reading three books in a year the quality of War and Peace, Les Miserables, and Bleak House is better than reading 30 novels the quality of The Da Vinci Code, Harry Potter, or The Vampire Chronicles.

[G L Wilson]

in a specified time period. What matters is what you read, or in other words, the quality of the books you read. Reading three books in a year the quality of War and Peace, Les Miserables, and Bleak House is better than reading 30 novels the quality of The Da Vinci Code, Harry Potter, or The Vampire Chronicles.

Quite right.

[oanna]

I hope that more than 50.

[Rores28]

Pretty busy but I think I'll still be able to squeeze in 30-40

[Kundan]

14 read already, so 40 for sure