In 2008, I needed a push to read more and set a goal of reading 20 books.  I did.  The next year I read 21, but haven’t completed more than 18 since.  Until 2015.  And by that I mean the final hours of 2015, but that very much counts.

As you can see, by the numbers this was a very good literary year.  I finished my second highest number of books while also reading the second highest number of pages.  It took me an average of 18 days to read each one.

The quickest was John Steinbeck’s “Red Pony,” which at a breezy 95 pages took six days.  The one in my life for the most time was also the longest — Marisha Pessl’s “Night Film” — at 37 days and 589 pages.

Here’s the full 2015 list with links to their respective blog posts:

–The Red Pony by John Steinbeck
–Golden Son by Pierce Brown
–Yes Please by Amy Poehler
–Mr. Kiss and Tell by Rob Thomas and Jennifer Graham
–A Visit From the Good Squad by Jennifer Egan
–And the Mountains Echoed by Khaled Hosseini
–Paper Towns by John Green
–Dark Places by Gillian Flynn
–An Ember in the Ashes by Sabaa Tahir
–Modern Romance by Aziz Ansari
–The Best Team Money Can Buy by Molly Knight
–Once There Was a War by John Steinbeck
–Moon Palace by Paul Auster
–A Field Guide to Awkward Silences by Alexandra Petri
–Night Film by Marisha Pessl
–The Book Thief by Markus Zusak
–Bossy Pants by Tina Fey
–The Big Short by Michael Lewis
–One More Thing by B.J. Novak
–Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel

If you read five of them: Yes Please, Best Team Money Can Buy, And the Mountains Echoed, Book Thief, Golden Son (and its predecessor Red Rising).

Mildly interesting thing: for the second year in a row I read three books that had the exact same number of pages (336) — Mr. Kiss and Tell, Best Team Money Can Buy, Paper Towns.

I saw movie versions of 3.5 of the books:  Dark Places, Paper Towns, Big Short, Book Thief (saw it in 2014).

The other interesting trend this year was that I only read 10 of the 20 books on my Nook after reading ebooks for the majority of 2014.  Of course that means a nice big stack for the traditional picture!

As always, please send along any great recommendations you have for 2016.  I’m already psyched for the final book in the Red Rising series to come out in February and the second Ember in the Ashes book later in the year.

I’m also planning on returning to writing some fiction, though not sure if I’m resuming an already started project or diving into something new.  One last shameless plug for my book in this wonderful year.

Read on, friends.

(Recaps from prior years can be found here)