2023 Reading Survey

Hey hi hello friends, and welcome to a super last minute addition to my end of year posts!

I fully planned on having only one more blog post (my December wrap-up) but I saw this video by Gabby from gabbyreads and I knew I had to do my own post about it. It's a reading survey for 2023! I feel like this is a perfect ending for 2023, especially since I kind of fell off the stats bandwagon in the second half of the year. 

So grab a snack, relax, and let's get into it!

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How many books did you read? Did you meet your goal?

    As of right now, I've read 142 books in 2023, but I'm in the middle of one and I'm hoping to squeeze in a few manga tomorrow, so I'm going to round up and say 145. Unfortunately, that still means that I didn't meet my Goodreads goal of 150 books, but I'm probably just going to change it last minute so that I completed it. I don't care if that's cheating, I can't stand seeing an incomplete Goodreads goal.

Most read genre?

    No surprise here, but my most read genre was overwhelmingly fantasy. Of the 142 books, 79 of them were fantasy, so over half. After fantasy is a three-way tie between mythology, horror, and historical fiction. I'm pretty happy with these genres being my top four.

Longest and shortest books you read?

   The difference in page number between these two books just cracks me up. The shortest book I read in 2023 was Mary Ventura and the Ninth Kingdom by Sylvia Plath at 64 pages, while the longest book I read was Oathbringer by Brandon Sanderson, which is a whopping 1,233 pages. I'm pretty sure that's the longest book I've read ever, including my bind-up of The Lord of the Rings. 

Favorite book published in 2023?

    Definitely To Shape a Dragon's Breath by Moniquill Blackgoose. I read a lot of really incredible new releases this year, but this is also my favorite book of 2023 in general, so I had to mention it here.

Favorite debut book in 2023?

    Technically this would also go to To Shape a Dragon's Breath, but I'll pick another debut just to keep myself from repeating. So my actual answer for this question is After Sappho by Selby Wynn Schwartz. I thought this was brilliant, and if Selby keeps writing like this, I will absolutely keep picking up her books.

Favorite book not published this year?

    This should come as no surprise to anyone who has been following me on other platforms, but absolutely If We Were Villains by M.L. Rio. I'm totally obsessed with this novel and these characters. They remind me a lot of the Gangsey from The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater, in that they're so close that they're kind of all in love with each other. To everyone who has ever told me to read this book, directly or otherwise, I thank you.

A book that lived up to the hype?

    Again, I'm not going to go with the obvious answer (see above) in order to keep from repeating myself. For this question I'll go with The Stormlight Archive by Brandon Sanderson, specifically The Way of Kings. I'd tried to read this book a couple of years before and only got like, 50 pages into it before I gave up. But I knew I wanted to try again, and I'm so glad that I did. This has to be one of my favorite series of all time at this point. I would never say that these books are perfect, but they're pretty darn close, in my opinion. 

A book that did NOT live up to the hype?

    Oof, plenty of books that I read this year would fit this question, but I think I'll go with How to Sell a Haunted House by Grady Hendrix. I've decided that he just isn't the author for me. I've read four of his books at this point (Southern Book Club, My Best Friend's Exorcism, and Horrorstor) and I didn't particularly enjoy any of them. So many people were hyping up How to Sell a Haunted House and saying it was their favorite Hendrix book yet, but it fell sooo flat for me. Also Pupkin was the worst monster I think I've ever read about. So, yeah. No more Grady Hendrix for me.

Book that felt like the biggest accomplishment?

    Probably The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov. This book took me the longest to read, I think a total of six months? 181 days to slog through this classic. And even though at the end of the day I felt pretty mid about it, I still felt a huge sense of relief and accomplishment for finishing it and getting it off my "Currently Reading" shelf.

Favorite character?

    There have been a few stand-out characters this year, but if I had to choose one, it'd be Dalinar from The Stormlight Archive. It was really hard to decide between him and Kaladin (also from The Stormlight Archive) but at the end of the day, I was drawn more to Dalinar at the beginning of the series. Though I will say that Kaladin has one of the best character arcs I've ever read, so really it's the both of them. 

Least favorite character?

    Ugh, can I just give you a list? Because I have a list.

    Pupkin, from How to Sell a Haunted House. That goddamned puppet needed to be set on fire and then thrown into a woodchipper.
    Moash, from The Stormlight Archive. He kept hurting my baby Kaladin and that is unacceptable behavior, honestly.
    June from Yellowface. Ohoho, I wanted to slap her so many times. But then again, that was the point of her character, so this is a sort of nonanswer.

Most shocking book/moment?

    This one is a no-brainer for me: definitely The Dark Forest by Cixin Liu. Specifically the last two hundred pages of that book. A certain thing happened and it had my jaw on the floor in pure horror. Up until then I was kind of bored by the story, but holy crap did I eat my words after that. 

Favorite couple/OTP?

    Now we all know I'm not a romance reader, nor do I care about romances in other genre novels. However I will say that Yona and Hak from Yona of the Dawn by Mizuho Kusanagi are kind of perfect, even if they aren't an established couple (at least where I am in the series). I guess I can also mention Shallan and Adolin from Stormlight, even if they're both annoying to me. They bring out the best in each other, and that's all we can really ask for in a healthy couple, right?

The best written book you read this year?

    I read a lot of really well-written books this year, so this was another question that I struggled to narrow down. In the end I pick Mammoths at the Gates by Nghi Vo, which is the fourth novella in her Singing Hills Cycle. Everything in the writing of this novella was so good, from the pacing to the emotion. I've always thought that Nghi Vo is a super talented writer.

Book that you pushed the most people to read in 2023?

    I'm aware that my platform is super tiny and that I don't reach a ton of people, so I'll look at my family and friends and see what I told them to read. 
    I definitely pushed Heartstopper on a lot of my friends, mostly the ones who started watching the show. A lot of them weren't aware that it was a graphic novel series before a TV show.
    After I finished If We Were Villains, I shoved it into my mom's hands and kind of hyperventilated to show her that she absolutely needed to read it. She hasn't read it yet, but that's just because she's been in a bigger reading slump than me this year. But I'm not going to let it go until she picks it up.
    I know I also pushed Yona of the Dawn on my best friend. She's one of my only IRL friends that reads manga (we've bonded heavily over Haikyu!! and My Hero Academia) and I told her that I need someone to scream about Yona and Hak with. I don't know when she'll pick the series up, but I'm looking forward to it.

Favorite book cover of the year?

    My favorite 2023 book cover is without a doubt A Day of Fallen Night by Samantha Shannon, I think it's just gorgeous and it fits so well with Priory of the Orange Tree. My favorite backlist book cover is probably The Girl Who Fell Beneath the Sea by Axie Oh, which I know was a lot of people's favorite cover from last year.
    Also, just for funsies, my favorite book cover that I bought this year is The Tatami Galaxy by Tomihiko Morimi. It scratches my brain in just the right way.

Favorite book adaptation?

    I didn't want a ton of TV this year, but I feel like the answer has to be pretty obvious. Clearly it's the Percy Jackson and the Olympians TV show on Disney+. I've only watched the first few episodes (since that's all that's been released so far) but I'm loving it, and I think it's a really faithful adaptation to the books.
    Also I have to shout out Heartstopper season two, because yes. It's so adorable, and it really helped me get through a very depressing time this year. 

What book made you cry the most?

    I didn't actually cry a lot this year. Well, at books. I didn't cry at books this year. Without bogging this down with personal shit, I'll just say that I'm going through an emotional renaissance and so I haven't been feeling things very strongly lately. The closest I got to crying was my eyes misting a little bit, and that was from I'm Glad My Mom Died by Jennette McCurdy, The Sun and the Star by Rick Riordan and Mark Oshiro, and from Rhythm of War by Brandon Sanderson. The rest of my reading was kind of apathetic, if I'm being entirely honest. 

What book made you laugh the most?

    If you thought getting me to cry over a book was hard this year, then getting me to laugh was even harder. I don't tend to find a lot of humor in books funny, and I also avoid books that have purposefully funny characters because I'm more likely to think they're annoying. The only thing that I can really think of is Dawnshard by Brandon Sanderson. It's one of the Stormlight novellas and it follows Lopen, who is one of the funnier characters in the series. Being in his head and reading about how he sees the world definitely boosted my mood enough that I'm going to count it.

A new favorite author you discovered this year?

    I have a few, hooray!
    As I said before, Selby Wynn Schwartz. I want to be her friend, truly. I think we'd have some very memorable conversations.
    I'm also going to be watching Moniquill Blackgoose pretty closely from now on. I really loved her debut, and the fact that it's a series makes me really excited for what's to come. 
    Lastly, Vaishnavi Patel. I read Kaikeyi this year and really enjoyed it, and I know her sophomore novel is coming out in 2024, and it's on my most anticipated list. I know that the rest of the bookish community might be getting sick of the mythology retelling train, but I could ride that train for the rest of my life and not get tired of it, so I hope she keeps writing Hindu mythology books, because I'll keep reading them. 

What is the best nonfiction book you read this year?

    I mentioned this in my "Best Books of 2023" post, but I can mention them again. I read three really outstanding nonfiction books this year: I'm Glad My Mom Died by Jennette McCurdy, Isaac's Storm by Erik Larson, and 1177 B.C.: The Year Civilization Collapsed by Eric H. Cline. I will also mention Cleopatra: A Life by Stacy Schiff, because I thought that it was also quite good.

What is the best manga you read this year?

    Ending on a strong note! By far my favorite manga this year was Yona of the Dawn by Mizuho Kusanagi. I read 26 volumes of this manga, and I'm very excited to continue with it. My goal is to catch up to the current volumes in 2024. We're in the 40s now, so I think it's very doable. I truly love everything about this manga; the characters are adorable, the plot is engaging, and the political intrigue really ties it all together. It wasn't a great year for me, manga wise, but Yona saved it for me.

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And that's all for the survey! I'm so happy I got to do this before the end of the year. And I'd love to see your answers, too! DM me on Instagram if you decide to make your own video/blog post, because I'd really love to hear how your reading year went. 

Until tomorrow!