Hi all!

Since we are started a new year, which feels like is come around quicker each year, I thought I’d look back on my reading year with a survey.

I’ve adapted this from questions for Cait at paper fury. It looked like fun and the pie chats looked so cute. You will be glad to know that I found a way to simplify the pie chart making process, and now have a spreadsheet which I fill in throughout the year and it automatically makes the charts yay!!

Also this is for the all books I’ve read in 2023 so not all where released this year.

Number of books read: 167
Number of rereads: 3

In 2023, I took part in three reading challenges:

• Goodreads Challenges
• Around the Year in 52 Books
• Finish Series

Goodreads Challenge

I am beyond thrilled that I was able to read 100 books again this year. 2023 has been my best reading year of all time. I managed to hit my goal in August so

Around The Year in 52 Books

Goal: 52
Read: 45

I am thrilled with the progress I made on this challenge. I adore doing this challenge each year and am fully okay with the fact I never finish it – mostly because when I have a pain flare I need of comfort reads and will put off reading titles which will push my reading boundaries. This year, my 24 books to read in 2024 will help to expand my reading which might help me tick off a few more of these prompts.

Finish Series

Goal: 22

Read: 8

This might just be the worst I’ve ever done in this challenge. Out of the 10 series I wanted to catch up on, I completed 4 of the series and made progress in 1 (as you can see below)

• Castle in the Air (Howl’s Moving Castle #1) by Diana Wynne Jones
• House of Many Ways (Howl’s Moving Castle #2) by Diana Wynne Jones
• Tools of Engagement (Hot & Hammered #2) by Tessa Bailey
• The Damned (The Beautiful #2) by Renee Ahdieh
• The Righteous (The Beautiful #3) by Renee Ahdieh
• The Ruined (The Beautiful #4) by Renne Ahdieh
• Sword Song (The Last Kingdom #4) by Bernard Cornwell
• The Burning Lands (The Last Kingdom #5) by Bernard Cornwell
• Death of Kings (The Last Kingdom #6) by Bernard Cornwell
• Blessed Monsters (Something Dark and Holy #3) by Emily A. Duncan
• All the Feels (Spoiler Alert #2) by Olivia Dade
• Ship Wrecked (Spoiler Alert #3) by Olivia Dade
• Endurance (Harris Brothers #2) by Amy Daws
• Keeper (Harris Brothers #3) by Amy Daws
• Surrender (Harris Brothers #4) by Amy Daws
• Dominate (Harris Brothers #5) by Amy Daws
• Twisted Games (Twisted #2) by Ana Haung
• Twisted Hate (Twisted #3) by Ana Haung
• Twisted Lies (Twisted #4) by Ana Haung
• The Dare (Briar U #4) by Elle Kennedy
• The Women of Tory (Women of Troy #2) by Pat Barker

Fingers crossed I can do better to finish my series to finish TBR this year. Despite how terrible I did with this list of books, I did manage to finish 30 series in 2023 which is huge. I will continue to dedicate 1 month a quarter to reading only series.

I had an amazing reading year! Not only did I read the most amount of books I didn’t give any book under 3 stars which is a massive win in my book. For a break down 38 books recieved 5 stars, 58 recieved 4.5 stars, 44 recieved 4 stars, 15 recieved 3.5 stars and 12 books recieved 3 stars.

My average rating for the year was 4.3 stars

These are all my 5 star reads for the year!

I am not really surprised to see that most of the books I’ve read were published in the last 5 years as I didn’t read any classics this year. The earliest published book I read was Castle in the Air by Diana Wynne Jones which was released in 1990. I do have at least 1 classic on my 2024 TBR so fingers crossed this year I see more variation in this graph.

I read 46 2023 releases (17 of which was ARCs and one of those was a 2024 release), 97 books released in 2022, 119 books were released in 2021, 22 books were released between 2019 and 2020, 24 were released between 2011 and 2028, 1 book was released between 2006 and 2010 and 1 book was released in the 90s.

I wasn’t too adventurous with my reading in 2023 as I struggled to find some kind of work/life/study balance and my health issues amped up. So I’m not surprised to see Romance was my top genre. Romance was closely followed by my other two favourite genres, Paranormal and Fantasy. .

To breakdown the numbers; 63 were romance, 61 paranormal, 31 fantasy, 4 mythology, 3 historical fiction, 2 literary fiction, 2 nonfiction and 1 graphic novel.

There is a massive divide between my three top genres, romance, paranormal and fantasy compared with my next two most read genres; mythology and historical fiction. I would like to see this divide decrease this year because I do adore historical fiction and mythology and I have a books on my shelves that I am dying to get to.

The stats for target audience really do go hand in hand with numbers of which genres I read the most in 2024. Since Paranormal and Romance books made up 75% of my books read in 2023 it makes sense that adult is my most read target audience.

To breakdown the numbers; 159 of the books were intended for an Adult audience, 6 were YA and 2 where Middle Grade.

Lets see if we can increase the number of Middle Grade and YA titles I read this year as I have a ton on my shelve. For an added bonus this would also help with my goal to focus on my physical TBR.

2023 was the year of Audiobook for me and with everything I had going on this year I’m not surprised since if I didn’t have audiobooks I would’ve read next to nothing this year. My next most used format was eBook so looks like I’m tending to favour digital books. I would like to see the number of physical books I read in 2024 to be greater than the eBooks I’m read because it would mean I’m reading the books I own. It would be nice to reduce my physical TBR by 100 this year but this is a dream goal so I won’t be holding myself accountable.

I read 142 digital books (49 eBooks, 16 digital ARCs and 60 Audiobooks) and 42 physical books (38 paperbacks, 3 hardbacks and 1 physical ARC).

I read 59,773 pages across 167 books, which honestly blows my mind. Those numbers are crazy and my little brain cannot compute.

I have broken the trend of January being my best reading month and it was actually my worst reading month where I read 10 books and 3,731, which on reflection make sense has work was a nightmare in last January. In 2023 my best reading month was October were I read 17 books and 6,210 pages.

On average I read 14 books per month.

The shortest book I read was The Six Deaths of the Saint by Alix E. Harrow at 30 pages and Order of Scorpions by Ivy Asher was the longest book I read at 761 pages.

My average book length in 2023 was 358 pages.

I cannot tell you how thrilled this graph makes me! I am finally finally! finishing and continuing with more series than I am starting. In 2023 there was 4 months were my goal was just to read sequels and I would select what I’m reading using my Wheel of Sequels. I will be bringing the Wheel of Sequels back this year as I managed to finish 30 series this year, which is wild!

I read 25 standalone books, 54 first books in a series and 88 series sequels.

That’s all for me. Comment down below and let me know what your favourite read of 2023 was 

Until next time, happy reading and wishing you all a happy New Year!
Dearna