I'm back again with the rest of my January reads! 

In my 2018 Reading Goals and Resolutions post I mentioned that I'm now using Sophie's wonderful spreadsheet to track all kinds of statistics about my reading this year. So I thought that at the end of each month I'd share a little breakdown of some of my reading statistics for that particular month so you can keep up with how I'm doing on some of my reading goals for 2018. So here we have the nationalities and race of authors I read, genres and number of books and pages:




















Warcross by Marie Lu | ☆☆☆☆
Warcross isn't just a game, it's a way of life. When teenage hacker Emika Chen accidentally glitches herself into the international Warcross Championships, her life changes overnight. She is summoned to Tokyo not only to compete, but to act as spy for the game's secretive creator Hideo Tanaka. Emika is soon in over her head, not only with fame and fortune but a sinister plot that could threaten the entire Warcross empire.

Before I say anything else: if you're not into gaming, you should still read this book! Marie Lu has written an exciting story with incredible world-building and wonderful characters. The world-building in Warcross is what truly blew me away. Games in fiction are hard to do well, as it can be hard to get the reader to feel passionate about a game they've never played without over-describing everything. But Marie Lu does it so brilliantly, the technology of this world is so advanced and seamless yet so believable. It definitely feels more speculative than sci-fi, as I can see advances in technology getting close to this in the not-so-distant future.

Emika Chen is such a great protagonist, she's whip-smart and savvy and like many of us just-grown-ups she fights a constant battle between emotions and practicality. She's extremely analytical, always steps ahead of everyone else but over-analysing every single moment, possibility and interaction, something I can definitely relate to. I was seriously impressed by the diversity in Warcross' cast of characters, there are PoC main and side characters and queer and disabled side characters, all included so naturally, and I can't tell you how happy that made me.

The only reason why I gave Warcross four stars instead of five is because the last quarter of the book did feel a little rushed. I understand that Lu had to move the plot forward towards a sequel but the twists and cliffhangers felt slightly contrived. However I will definitely be picking up the next one when it's out as I'm now fully invested in this world and these characters.



The Bear and the Nightingale by Katherine Arden | ☆☆☆☆☆
In a village at the edge of the wilderness of northern Russia, where the winds blow cold and the snow falls many months of the year, an elderly servant tells stories of sorcery, folklore and the Winter King to the children of the family, tales of old magic frowned upon by the church. 


But for the young, wild Vasya these are far more than just stories. She alone can see the house spirits that guard her home, and sense the growing forces of dark magic in the woods... 

This book has been marketed for fans of The Night Circus and Uprooted so it immediately caught my attention when it was announced because I love those slow-moving, fairytale-inspired, magical historical fiction vibes. But for some reason or another I didn't end up finishing it when I first got hold of it, then the sequel was due to come out and I thought that it was about time I picked it up again. The Bear and the Nightingale definitely lived up to all it's hype for me. I absolutely loved this tale of bravery, family, magic and horror set in the medieval Russian wilderness. It's been described as a 'literary fairytale' and I don't think that could be more accurate. The setting was so atmospheric and beautifully described, it gave me real Burial Rites vibes (which is one of my all-time favourites). I loved the emphasis on folklore and how it was a very real part of everyday life in this isolated rural community. There is a subtle magic woven through the book and I loved reading about fairytales and folklore from a culture that I was previously unfamiliar with. Vasya is an excellent protagonist, she is full of heart and courage and I really rooted for her throughout. The plot moved a little slowly at first, but the excellent writing made up for it and I was soon invested in the story. This is the first in the Winternight trilogy and a new favourite for me.

The Girl in the Tower by Katherine Arden | ☆☆☆☆☆
This is the second book in the Winternight trilogy and the sequel to The Bear and the Nightingale. Even before I'd finished The Bear and the Nightingale I had to request The Girl in the Tower from the lovely folks at Ebury as I couldn't wait to find out what happened next and I just wasn't ready to leave this setting and these characters. The Girl in the Tower follows immediately on from the events of the previous book and what The Bear and the Nightingale lacked slightly in consistent pacing, this second book made up for it in an exciting plot which moved along nicely. Katherine Arden has created complex and original characters and the plot kept me guessing throughout. I absolutely adore this series and can't believe I'm going to have to wait almost a year for the next one. If you like magical realism, historical fiction, fairytale and folklore and strong female characters - definitely pick up this series.

For the past two years, I've posted my yearly reading statistics along with my thoughts on that years reading. I'm probably the only person who enjoys and all these numbers most likely mean nothing to you, but I find it interesting nonetheless! It helps me to reflect on how much I'm reading, how diversely I'm reading and how much I'm enjoying it. So here we go...


Number of books
The first thing you'll notice is that I read *a lot* less books last year. In 2016 I read 77 books, this year I read 36. I had to resist writing 'only' 36 then, it's hard not to judge myself harshly but I'm just reminding myself that some people could only dream of reading 36 books in a year, and 36 is better than none! Sometimes life gets in the way of reading, but luckily there were some awesome books sprinkled in there.

Gender of authors
Last year I read a staggering 80% female authors, compared to 2016's 68%, and this is something I'm thrilled about as I love supporting women writers. This year it might be interesting to read a few more male authors, but I'd still like to keep a majority female. This might be controversial but it's just the way I feel.

Age range
In 2016, my reading skewed more to YA so it's interesting to see that last year I read quite a lot more adult fiction. I don't know whether this is because I'm getting older or my tastes are changing, but I do still love YA and I'm looking forward to reading plenty of it in 2018, hopefully with a lot more children's fiction too.

Genres
I read a lot fewer genres in 2017 than any other year with contemporary/general fiction and non-fiction coming out on top. I read a lot less fantasy last year, around 11% of my total books read were fantasy, compared to around 20% in previous years. I guess my tastes are just changing! In last year's post I stated I was going to read one classic per month, this failed spectacularly as I didn't actually read *any* classics at all. That's got to change this year.

Star ratings
I rated a lot more books at three stars in 2017, which shows I'm becoming a harsher critic and the gap between a four and a five star is getting wider. I think I used to rate nearly all books four stars, but that's definitely changing. This one will be interesting to watch this year.

Author nationalities
Unfortunately the diversity in the nationalities of the authors I read is still very low, with most books being from US or UK authors. This really needs to change, and I'm going to be talking about this more in my 2018 reading resolutions post coming up soon.

Plans for 2018
This year instead of tracking my reading in my bullet journal, I'm going to be using Sophie's (of Portal in the Pages) wonderful 2018 Reading Statistics spreadsheet - so hopefully next year's round up will be much more in depth!

I'd love to know if and how you track your reading. Do you just use goodreads? Do you use a spreadsheet or your bullet journal? Let me know!

This time last year I posted about my 2015 reading statistics, where I looked back on a year of reading to try and measure the diversity of the books I'd been picking up. This year I've done the same again except this time it didn't take me 7386746 hours because I'd been tracking it throughout 2016 in my bullet journal. So here's my year in books for 2016, all wrapped up in a pretty infographic:


If you take a look at my 2015 year in books you'll notice that I didn't read as many books last year but I think my reading was a little more diverse. As usual I read a lot more female than male authors without making a conscious effort to do so, but I have absolutely no problem with it! I read a lot less middle-grade books last year than in 2015 which is a shame but at least there's a nice balance between adult and YA. I think I'm going to try and make an effort to pick up more middle-grade this year though.

My top two MG/YA genres (fantasy and contemporary) are the same as 2015 but my tastes have clearly changed when it comes to adult fiction. In 2015 my top two genres were classics and contemporary whereas in 2016 I read mostly non-fiction and graphic novels. I put this mostly down to binge-reading Saga last year but my preference for non-fiction has continued into 2017.

One thing I'm a bit disappointed in is the lack of classics I read last year. In 2015 I read ten classics whereas in 2016 it was only four, therefore this year I'm going to try and pick up one classic a month.

I'm a little sad that I read less five star books last year than in 2015, but perhaps I've just become a bit more discerning with my ratings. Interestingly I read the same amount of two and three star books in 2015 and 2016.

Although I did read more diversely in terms of authors' nationalities (10 different countries instead of five), I still read mostly US and UK authors - this is something I'm keen to work on.

I found it really interesting to compare my reading statistics across two years and it's definitely something I'm going to keep doing! I've once again incorporated a tracker for reading into my 2017 bullet journal (which I'll have a post about up soon!). As I said in last year's post, these statistics probably aren't interesting to anyone but me but I thought I'd share them anyway. I'd love to know if you track any statistics about your reading and how you do so!

There we have it! I read a lot more female than male authors this year, without making a conscious effort to, which I'm pretty surprised and pleased about - power to the ladies! I'm also happy about my balance between reading adult and YA books and the fact that I read 10 classics last year! The one thing I am a bit concerned about is that I seem to be reading US and UK authors pretty much exclusively, that really needs to change this year.

This post was so fun to do, even if it did take far too many hours to collate the data and make the infographic! I think it'll be really fun to look back at this in a years time and see how my reading statistics for 2016 compare. I definitely want to make an effort to read authors from more diverse nationalities and I think it'll be interesting to see if my tastes in genres change over the year.

I don't know if anyone except me will be interested in this post but I think it's important for me to keep a record of these things. I hope you at least found it a little interesting!