Books Read in 2020

In 2017, I read 101 books.

In 2018, I read 82 books.

In 2019, I read 88 books.

Well, last year, the grand total came to forty-six.  What happened, you may ask--after all, I had more time at home than ever before, so why wasn't I reading a whole lot more?

Possibly the low count is due to the fact that I only count books, and not short stories.  I spent a good portion of my reading time consuming short Good Omens fan fiction stories.  Lots and lots of them.  What can I say?  It sort of took over my life last year--a wonderful, albeit too short, TV series based on a wonderful book I've loved for thirty years.  I was having FUN with that.  (And still am!)

So.  46 books.  Turns out most of them were re-reads of old favorites, including most of William Marshall's wry mystery series set in Hong Kong, Yellowthread Street, and Janwillem van de Wetering's philosophic mystery series from Amsterdam.  Plus a couple of Alan Bradley's Flavia de Luce mysteries set in 1950s Britain which feature an 11-year-old sleuth who could give Sherlock Holmes a run for his money.  Speaking of whom, I've also been re-reading the entire Holmes oeuvre.

And of course I re-read Neil Gaiman's Good Omens, as well as my second favorite of his, Stardust.

Thirty-two of those 46 books were re-reads.  I was in a mood to revisit the glorious past.  Hm.  I wonder why.

The new stuff was often disappointing.  Several history books sounded quite promising, but turned out duller than watching paint dry.  I slogged through them to the bitter end anyway.  The most entertaining of the new books were all travel/memoir/travel-history things--not sure how to categorize them, but basically, the authors lived or traveled in intriguing places and wrote wittily about them.  See annotated list below!

2021's first book is Doyle's A Study in Scarlet, as I continue to make my way back through the Holmes canon.  Good old Sherlock holds up quite well, I'm happy to say.  

My second excuse for not reading more in 2020 was the loss of my volunteer gig at the Friends of the Richland Library used bookshop in March, due to the pandemic.  I used to get a lot of my reading matter there.  The Friends hope to re-open sometime this summer.  My fingers are duly crossed.

THE LIST

Fiction (EVERY single one of these was a re-read!)

Adams, Douglas  Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

"                           Restaurant at the End of the Universe

"                           Life, the Universe, and Everything

Bradley, Alan     The Sweetness at the Bottom of the Pie

"                          The Weed that Strings the Hangman's Bag

Doyle, A. Conan  The Lost World

"                           The Return of Sherlock Holmes

"                           His Last Bow

"                           Case Book of Sherlock Holmes

Fforde, Jasper   The Eyre Affair

Gaiman, Neil    Good Omens

"                        Stardust

Marshall, William   The Far-Away Man

"                               Road Show

"                               Yellowthread Street

"                               Gelignite

"                               Skulduggery

"                               War Machine

"                               Head First

Van de Wetering, Jan  Outsider in Amsterdam

"                                   The Corpse on the Dike

"                                   Tumbleweed

"                                   Death of a Hawker

"                                   The Japanese Corpse

"                                   The Blond Baboon

"                                   The Mind-Murders

"                                   The Streetbird

"                                   The Rattle-Rat

"                                   Hard Rain

"                                   Just a Corpse at Twilight

Nonfiction

Adams, Mark   Tip of the Iceberg (travel/history of Alaska)  This author was my favorite find from last year--entertaining, informative, and amusing.

Adams, Mark  Turn Right at Machu Picchu  (Ditto)

"                       Meet Me In Atlantis

Cunliffe, Barry  Europe Between the Oceans 9000BC - AD1000  (less tedious than other stuff I read, though not by much)

Edwards, Betty  Drawing on the Artist Within (a RE-READ)

Ferris, Timothy  Coming of Age in the Milky Way (history of astronomy; enjoyed early sections but more recent stuff was too difficult)

Harkness, Deborah  The Jewel House:  Elizabethan London and the Scientific Revolution (a disappointingly dull history)

McAuliffe, Mary  When Paris Sizzled (tedious history of 1920s artists/authors; disappointing!)

McKenney/Bransten  Here's England: A Highly Informal Guide  (travel book from the 1960s, amusingly written with lots of historical tidbits)

Mayle, Peter   Encore Provence  (life in rural area of France, wryly entertaining)

Sugg, Richard  Fairies: A Dangerous History (quite good look at the darker aspects of fairy lore)

Toth, Susan  My Love Affair with England (a RE-READ, did not hold up well.  Sigh.)

Wainwright, Alfred   Coast to Coast Walk (British travel guide)

Williams/Breen  The Luck of the Irish (couple's adventures on a rural Irish farm.  Good!)

Uncle John's Perpetually Pleasing Bathroom Reader

Uncle John's Legendary Lost Bathroom Reader  (hey, they're fun!)