2015: the year of being 23, second year of marriage and grad school, traveling, moving, adjusting to being a semi-adult in my college town, learning how to be more comfortable in my own skin. This year was a whirlwind. It was all of the feels and I am ready to welcome a new year. There is the possibility of so much change in the next few months and it makes me equally giddy and terrified to think of it. BRING IT.
This is my third year to keep this up and I can't wait until I'm 60 years old and doing the same thing. I have a January birthday so it just made sense when I came up with it a few years ago. The idea is that however many years old I am, that's how many books I read. I typically go over although the amount of books I read is nowhere near the surplus so many friends read in a year. Regardless, it keeps me on track and away from netflix/interwebs so much and keeps me sane in the torment of grad school (DRAMATIC, SUE ME). I read some amazing books and nerded out at really incredible (new to me) bookstores this year: Bookman, Bookwoman (Nashville, TN), McKay Books (Nashville, TN), Coffee and a Good Book (Van Buren, AR), and The Tattered Cover (Denver, CO). I am a book nerd through and through and PROUD OF IT. So if you want to talk about books or be in a book club or really just drink coffee...I'm in. There's me in a nutshell!
Without further ado, my 2015 booklist (in the order they were read). So many good books and many tears were shed this year. I LOVE IT.
1. The Book Thief
2. The Shell Collector
3. I'll Give You the Sun
4. East of Eden
5. Everything I Never Told You
6. Traveling Mercies: Some Thoughts on Faith
7. The Silver Linings Playbook
8. Brain on Fire
9. The Girl on the Train
10. The Goldfinch
11. We Are All Made of Molecules
12. The Opposite of Loneliness
13. Riding the Bus with My Sister
14. Little Bee
15. The House on Mango Street
16. Maniac Magee
17. We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves
18. Station Eleven
19. Eleanor & Park
20. Kitchens of the Great Midwest
21. Where the Red Fern Grows
22. Orange Is the New Black: My Year in a Women's Prison
23. The Year of Magical Thinking
24. A Homemade LIfe *reread*
25. The Zookeeper's Wife
26. On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft
27. All the Bright Places
28. The Martian
29. Crossing to Safety
30. Fates and Furies
31. Infinite Home
HONORABLE MENTIONS: The Book Thief, Traveling Mercies, Where the Red Fern Grows (Wow, I never read this growing up and HELLO SO MANY EMOTIONS. I absolutely SOBBED. No regrets), Orange is the New Black, A Homemade Life (forever, I love you Molly Wizenberg), The Silver Linings Playbook.
TOP 3: Brain on Fire, Station Eleven, Kitchens of the Great Midwest
I think I've recommended Kitchens to at least 10 people. I laughed, I teared up. It's funny and bizarre and all about people and good food and LIFE. I need to own that book. I saw Station Eleven all over instagram but didn't think it really sounded like my kind of book. So different, incredibly written, and I loved seeing the stories come together as one. Technically post-apocolyptic but not incredibly depressing. Brain on Fire - WOW my goodness, could not put down. Maybe I was partly interested because it related to a lot of classes I had just taken (neuro, adult language disorders) but I thought this book was phenomenal. Cahalan does a fabulous job of balancing the medical information with the personal. LOVE.
Overall this was a great year for reading. I'm ready to dive into the next year - hoping for 40 books! Any recs?
Cheers to slowing down and reading more books!