Over the last few months, I had a lot of nonfiction piling up. I needed to finish these review copies. I wanted to finish them. So, I decided to set aside April as a month of nonfiction to see how that would affect my reading. Would I be able to finish them? I had quite a list, and have actually given myself the liberty of finishing them by the end of the Spring Reading Thing. But I stipulated that I would read only nonfiction (save for whatever fiction I read to the kids).
This year, I’ve tried to track how many books and how many pages I’ve read each month, so it would be easy to compare. I knew I was still reading a lot (and read a lot of memoir, which does satisfy my need for a story to some degree).
The stats:
January — 2548 pages read
February — 1939 pages read
March — 2844 pages read
April — 2910 pages read
The conclusions:
Because of the self-imposed challenge, I read more in April because I was trying to clear the books off my pile. I also read two books that I wasn’t very fond of, but I kept reading them, even though that’s not usually my practice these days, because I didn’t want to not read a book for the challenge. It seemed an easy way out. I think that another reason I read more, is that I read some humor/essay type books, which tend to make for easy reading.
I also read more in March, because I was trying to clear off some extra fiction titles that I had on my nightstand because I didn’t want to carry them over to May.
I liked doing it. I might do it again, or something similar. I’m thinking of doing an “all ebook” month in the summer. I’m not sure about that, but I’m thinking about it. I think that it did make me appreciate the nonfiction offerings more and having a goal made me read a little more than I would normally.
It also helped me manage my review copies a bit better. Knowing back in March that I was undertaking this project, I was much more selective about what I accepted for review. However, when I told a publishing contact that I was doing it, she sent me two MORE books (that ended up being two of my favorite reads of the month).
I still love memoir, and I’ll still probably read as much memoir as fiction, but I love fiction for a reason. Although a memoir can be funny, warm, touching and riveting, it lacks the arc of a fiction, and when I’m away too long, I do miss it.
I’m actually surprised at how many I finished. I would have thought that I might have read less, but I didn’t.
The books(all linked to my reviews):
This is Not the Story You Think it Is — memoir, loved it
Hear No Evil — memoir/humor
Book of Awesome — humor/essay, it WAS awesome. Giveaway still open
Toxic Friends — hard nonfiction, not hard like difficult, but hard like solid nonfiction fact, unlike softer genres like humor or memoir.
Never Tell Our Business to Strangers — memoir, wouldn’t have finished it if it weren’t for the challenge
Confessions of a Rebel Debutante — memoir, funny with a Southern accent
Making Toast — memoir, almost finished, review to come
I gave myself through the first weekend in April to finish some books I was reading, so in addition the nonfiction above I did finish 2 YA fiction books. I also allowed myself to read to/with my kids, so I finished the 3rd Mysterious Benedict Society book, and read another full novel aloud with Amanda (review and giveaway to come for Wendy Mass’ Finally!), so that added over 700 pages to my page count, that was really fiction, not nonfiction.
That said, I still read more pages of nonfiction in April than I read in total in February.
Jennifer Donovan can’t believe that looking back on her adult life, there have been times that she wasn’t reading. She’s immensely enjoyed the last 4 years or so since she’s recaptured her love of reading. She blogs at Snapshot about other things in her life (and books too).
Carrie, Reading to Know says
That’s a lot of pages read! I’m impressed. =)
Laura says
I do like the idea of themed months, Jennifer. Well done for reading so much 🙂
Nikki-ann says
The last book I read was an auto-biography and the current book I’m reading is about a private investigator wizard! I like to go with something different each time 🙂
Which reminds me… I need to review the auto-biography.
Dawn says
Holy reading, batman!! Those are some majorly impressive numbers, but even beyond that, I think it’s really cool that you made such a unique goal and stuck with it. Well done, Boss Lady.
🙂
Callista says
Yay for nonfiction! I read mostly nonfiction every month as that’s what I focus on (along with children’s books.) Out of 30 books read this year so far, only 1 was adult fiction.