This year I read 71 books (second highest after 2017), with an average rating of 3.35 (same as 2017), continuing the trend towards lower scores as time goes on.
My gender split wasn't as good this year, at 37% female vs 63% male (last year was 48% female). So I dropped the ball a bit on that one, though it is still an improvement over time.
However, my focus this year was on reading authors from a greater diversity of backgrounds. This year 70% of authors were white/anglo/western, compared to 80-90% in previous years.
None again this year.
4.5 stars (6)
Black Swan Green,David Mitchell,"Life as a 12 year old boy in '82 England. So messy & agonising, glor… ",https://t.co/1DTp7dqzdW
The Good People,Hannah Kent,Captures the pervasive superstition & grinding desperation of a poor & i… ,https://t.co/1cK1fo77LR
The Patterning Instinct,Jeremy Lent,Reveals the cultural & cognitive biases we've built up over '000s… ,https://t.co/DaTQE8KdhZ
The Paper Menagerie and Other Stories,Ken Liu,"A splendid collection exploring historical wrongs, futu… ",https://t.co/2zujWRb7rh
How To Change Your Mind,Michael Pollan,"Upends decades of bias against psychedelics, which may actuall… ",https://t.co/CIrMGD3fNX
No Is Not Enough,Naomi Klein,Trump is the end-product of a disastrous economic & political system. Pa… ,https://t.co/SqvPN5EEIX
4 stars (14)
The Lacuna,Barbara Kingsolver,"Very slow to start, but builds a great head of steam encompassing Frida K… ",https://t.co/ODPMRT4lNh
Winter's Bone,Daniel Woodrell,"A cold and stark, yet hopeful, portayal of hillbilly life in the drug-hol… ",https://t.co/NMnlw2IqeZ
Girt,David Hunt,"Australian history made ... funny? And it works. Packed full of character, puns, and f… ",https://t.co/PbO02GEBBC
The Bush,Don Watson,"A sprawling tour of the settlement of Australia, and the dire consequences for natu… ",https://t.co/vpgDQKK4ka
How Did We Get Into This Mess?,George Monbiot,"A selection of his finest articles, exploring the madness… ",https://t.co/SVMronWbis
Lincoln in the Bardo,George Saunders,"Letting go through death. Quirky, original and quite a lot of fun. Completely unexpected.",
The People of the Book,Geraldine Brooks,"A fascinating journey through the history of European Jews, usi… ",https://t.co/yAkfZjP6aP
H is for Hawk,Helen Macdonald,Gets inside the wonderful and predatory mind of the goshawk. Hawking: not… ,https://t.co/RLsO5rMslZ
Assassin's Fate,Robin Hobb,"Fitz, the Fool, Wolf Father, Bee! A fitting finale (?) for some of fantasy's… ",https://t.co/SUrozKg1Kw
Utopia for Realists,Rutger Bregman,A convincing & enthusiastic call to dream big and be idealistic. A basic… ,https://t.co/R6NPbfR24A
In Other Lands,Sarah Rees Brennan,Makes up for poor writing with great characters and relationships. Tu… ,https://t.co/QETC1VRYNN
Planet of Exile,Ursula Le Guin,An intriguing world where each season last 15 years and a long-establis… ,https://t.co/S1XXBZizan
Rocannon's World,Ursula Le Guin,"A masterful melding of fantasy & sci-fi, highlighting the forces coloni… ",https://t.co/LY4iwQhmW9
Homo Deus,Yuval Noah Harari,Fascinating and confronting on the illusion of individuality and the spect… ,https://t.co/YIeG0TZKm5
3.5 stars (18)
The Morality Of Gentlemen,Amanda Lohrey,"Engaging insight into the inner working of unions, back when… ",https://t.co/tMDvwBuY6F
Oathbringer,Brandon Sanderson,Phew. Not so much epic as long. Some good twists to the good vs evil trope.,
The Call of the Reed Warbler,Charles Massey,"Not much new in the stories of regenerative agriculture,… ",https://t.co/Qvpa6ak61j
Looking for Jake & Other Stories,China Mieville,"His usual surreal, unsettling creations. Sentient st… ",https://t.co/OR1iyUyqNU
The Grace Of Kings,Ken Liu,Silkpunk fantasy with fun pre-steam tech. Some decent characters despite t… ,https://t.co/dgjr1UV7j3
The Wall of Storms,Ken Liu,"A world where strategy, learning & clever engineering win out over brute s… ",https://t.co/cVOAC4Uc9A
On The Banks Of Plum Creek,Laura Ingalls Wilder,Locusts! Fire! Blizzards! Mother Nature throws every… ,https://t.co/BEnwgAzsPu
Steam Pigs,Melissa Lucashenko,Coming of age through the muck and violence of being Indigenous in Quee… ,https://t.co/3nW8HEVObh
We Need New Names,NoViolet Bulawayo,"From the colour & chaos of a Zimbabwean slum, to the self-indulge… ",https://t.co/gHoYNCUyke
Other Minds,Peter Godfrey-Smith,"A pedestrian look at the evolution of intelligence, but with wonderfu… ",https://t.co/JI2bF9szro
All The King's Men,Robert Penn Warren,A lot more to this than I grasped. Wanders off in extravagent description.,
Don't Take Your Love To Town,Ruby Langford Ginibi,"An illuminating Indigenous biography, from grinding… ",https://t.co/GAjNc9OxUO
Down Among The Sticks And Bones,Seanan McGuire,"A wonderfully imaginative, contemporary fairytale. Ends abruptly.",
The Map That Changed The World,Simon Winchester,Evocative and enthusiastic portrayal of the trials a… ,https://t.co/qhxdmHdZBi
Whole Earth Discipline,Stewart Brand,A challenge to anti-science environmentalists. Mostly convincing… ,https://t.co/mTNjWXjGB6
The Complete Orsinia,Ursula Le Guin,"A tale of family, friends and revolution in a fictional but fam… ",https://t.co/i5eptztM81
City of Illusions,Ursula Le Guin,A journey to discover the truth in an era of paranoia. Less convincing than the others.,
The High Mountains of Portugal,Yann Martel,"Comically odd, mysterious and touching. Three entwined spiritual journeys (maybe?).",
3 stars (24)
And Then There Were None,Agatha Christie,"My first! A bit over the top, but a decent bite-sized piece of light entertainment.",
Love Over Scotland,Alexander McCall Smith,Same old. A bit like a well-worn TV series.,
Espresso Tales,Alexander McCall Smith,Light and humourous. A good switched-off holiday read.,
The World According to Bertie,Alexander McCall Smith,"Perceptive, charming & amusing.",
Transactions,Ali Alizadeh,Cynical and unnecessarily explicit.,
Terra Nullius,Claire Coleman,The tragedy of colonialism. Heavy-handed.,
The Underground Railway,Colson Whitehead,"Opened my eyes to disturbing extraordinariness of slavery, bey… ",https://t.co/SXpOPIOeHP
The Rapture of the Nerds,Cory Doctorow & Charles Stross,A quasi-dystopian comedy where humans have most… ,https://t.co/uIvZzjh6ry
True Girt,David Hunt,Lacks the hilarity and colourfulness of the prequel. Uses sarcasm to good effect r… ,https://t.co/zecEl3G6QX
Number9Dream,David Mitchell,"Momentarily horrifying, occassionally confusing, mostly harmless.",
A Million Wild Acres,Eric Rolls,"A labour of love. Traces, in excessive detail, the history of the Pilli… ",https://t.co/OfsK9CtiWR
IQ,Joe Ide,Sherlock goes LA gangsta style. Pulls it off but feels a little cheap.,
The Pedant In The Kitchen,Julian Barnes,Insufficiently pedantic (is that a heaped or rounded teaspoon??… ,https://t.co/XacR6ubm4T
Wild Cat Falling,Mudrooroo,The first novel by an Indigenous author. Dripping with cynicism and self-destructiveness.,
Skin In The Game,Nassim Nicholas Taleb,Scattered and incohesive. Dripping in arrogance. A useful persp… ,https://t.co/VKei9mXLeE
The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms,NK Jemisin,Caught up in an intrigue of the gods. Creative and satisfying.,
Lyra's Oxford,Philip Pullman,Pleasant enough. Rather short.,
The Land Before Avocado,Richard Glover,"Mildly amusing, but nothing too surprising - we've come a long way in 50 years.",
The Willful Princess & the Piebald Prince,Robin Hobb,"A nice little tale of love, power and treachery.",
Enlightenment Now,Stephen Pinker,Charts humanity's extraordinary progress thanks to the application of… ,https://t.co/G4ujdkySEw
Europe: A Natural History,Tim Flannery,"A bit repetitive, but has its moments. More engaging once humans come on the scene.",
The Bluest Eye,Toni Morrison,"The poverty, violence and self-hatred of African-American life. Couldn't q… ",https://t.co/j4mdi442SB
Tales from Earthsea,Ursula Le Guin,A pleasing fleshing out of her classic magical world.,
In Xanadu,William Dalrymple,A jaunt following Marco Polo. A bit heavy on architecture. Attitude shows it's age.,
2.5 stars (4)
The Three Body Problem,Cixin Liu,"Some cool physics and an interesting context (revolutionary China),… ",https://t.co/wZdb9nYWCQ
Monkey Grip,Helen Garner,"The delusion of free love, the disappointing clash of ideals and reality. Ov… ",https://t.co/xCS4wTEcp7
That Deadman Dance,Kim Scott,The (not so) friendly frontier. Jumbled and aimless.,
The Barefoot Investor,Scott Pape,"Rather simplistic, but usefully so for the financially clueless. Aw… ",https://t.co/8bq3OvQdGQ
2 stars (5)
The Crow Trap,Ann Cleeves,"Hardly 'thrilling'. A bit boring, to be honest...",
The Ministry of Utmost Happiness,Arundhati Roy,"Chaotic, confusing, directionless. A depressingly cynical picture of India.",
Solar,Ian McEwan,"Some decent prose, but a slothful, misogynistic, self-absorbed physicist does not make… ",https://t.co/fEfpyjmQu0
The Gold Coast,Kim Stanley Robinson,"Shows its age, set in a (now near) future full of Soviets and nuke… ",https://t.co/OA0MWxklqK
Whipbird,Robert Drewe,"Aussie family reunion goes bad. A decent snapshot of Australian life, but nothing of substance.",
