2023 Reading Stats

It's that time of year again to look at some reading stats! I always look forward to doing this post every year because I just love numbers and graphs and charts! Is that weird? Probably 😆

In 2023 I read a total of 90 books (23,050 pages), that's 5 more books than the previous years, but about 880 pages less. Lol. And I actually read 5 LESS full-length novels than in 2022, but 5 more novellas, and 5 more graphic novels. Listen, I was trying real hard to catch up on my reading challenge 😂 And in 2022 I DNFd 3 books, but in 2023 I only DNFd 1!

Even though there were less re-reads this year, there were still quite a few.

Last year I feel like my reading was a little more steady throughout the year, and I really think it was thanks to the 52 books in 52 weeks challenge. I didn't do it in 2023 and there were a couple of weeks where I didn't read anything, so the line is looking a little more up and down this year. I especially had a rough time in October, which kinda sucked. But in 2024 I'm doing the 52 books in 52 weeks challenge again and I'm excited!

And here's a little bit more of an accurate representation of what my reading was like throughout the year.

SO many novellas and graphic novels this year 😅 But like most other years, my most-read books remain in the 300- and 400-page range. But last year my longest books were in the 500-page range, and this year I had a couple in the 600- and 700-page range!

This year I read 5 more ARCs than last year!

And this year I read a little more physical books than last year, about 7% more. However, in recent years I have been reading a lot more ebooks because they're just quicker to access. And as a mood reader, that's pretty important to me because I never know when my mood is going to shift. Lol.

This chart is relatively similar to the one from last year, except that this year I read over 10 more books that I purchased myself. I'm still using my library a lot, and this year I actually got more books directly from authors.

This is a new chart this year. I wanted to see how good I was at actually reading my backlist, but it looks like I'm better at reading books I got during that year. Lol.

This chart is actually pretty much the same as last year. I love series, what can I say. Lol.

And this chart shows what number in the series said books were. Lots of beginning-of-the-series books.

And this is the in-between novellas. And I made a separate chart for no other reason than they wouldn't have all fit on one chart. Lol. Lots of prequels this year!

I'm happy with this chart. I started 5 LESS series this year, but finished 5 MORE than last year!

This chart I'm also pretty happy with. Last year it was a little more staircase-y, so I had more 5-star reads than 4-star. But this is okay too. I prefer what the chart looked like last year, but I'll take this one too! No 1-star books and only one 2-star read!

This one is significantly different from last year! This year I read WAY more books published in the 2020s, and about half as many books published in the 2010s. And I also got a couple reads in from the 2000s (Fear Street) and the 90s (also Fear Street lol).

And here is more of a breakdown of those years. In recent years I've been doing better at reading those new releases.

This year I read about 15% MORE indie-published books!

And here is a breakdown of that. IPH Media is the name Julia Huni uses to publish her books, so it's still indie. And Parachute Press published some Fear Street books, which I read a couple of this year. And Delacorte Press... idk. I guess I just really like their book. Lol.

This year I read about 15% more books by male authors... I'm telling you, those Fear Street books really do change the numbers around here. Lol. In 2022 I didn't read any Fear Street books, and it showed. Lol.

This one is looking a little better this year! I read 2 more books by a POC author. But this is a category I need to get better at.

And this one I didn't do as great at either. Lol. I read about 10% LESS new-to-me authors in 2023.

And this one is relatively similar. Though I did read more books with a male POV, and even more that were mixed.

This one is a little more even than it was last year. Last year I read almost 10% more books with a single POV.

This one is also relatively similar. However, I read about 5% more 1st person POV and about 4% less 3rd person POV.

This one is also a bit more even than it was last year. Last year I read I 10 LESS YA books. And this year I read 2 less MG books as well.

This year I read 2 less non-fiction than last year. But 4 is still a lot more than my usual. Lol.

This is one of my favorite charts to look at every year! This one is a little shocking this year though. I love urban fantasy, it's typically always my number one, but this year it's sci-fi! And honestly, that makes sense. Lol. UF came in second, and horror was close behind, which is expected. What wasn't expected was all the high fantasy and contemporary romances this year! Those are two genres I don't read a lot of... though at this point maybe I should talk about that in past tense. Lol.

This one is similar in that most books I read were books I had added to my TBR within the last year. But this year I also read quite a few books that had been on my TBR for over 10 years! That feels pretty good 😌

This chart shows when I got the books, whether I bought or borrowed them from the library. And this one was also pretty similar. And I'm pretty happy with the bump in the middle, reading those books I've owned for 4-7 years.

And this last image is the total value of the books I read vs what I actually paid. This year I ended up paying about $100 more than last year.

And that's it for this year's reading stats. I love numbers, so this is always fun for me to do. I just hope it's at least marginally interesting to read about 😅