I really liked how the graphics came out I used to analyze my first 25 TBR jar picks, so I have been keeping track of my reading months ever since. This post is about the full twelve months of 2016… No covers in the title this time, because there were just too many. 😉
First of all some quick facts. In the twelve months of 2016 I have read no less than 194 books with a total page count of 62.168 pages (not counting 2 rereads); an average of about 320 pages per book. The average rating is 3,54 stars, which is quite a good average considering it also includes three 0 star ratings (DNF). 41 books had a 4,5 or 5 star rating and 32 books received a rating below 3 stars… Which means I enjoyed reading about 84% of the books this year, not bad! Another fun fact: 55 of the 194 books I’ve read were actually ARCs; about 28% of the total.
And now some graphics for those who like them as much as I do.😉
Like I said above, I gave only 32 books or 17% of the total a rating below 3 stars, which makes me really happy if you ask me. The most popular ratings have been 4, 3,5 or 3 stars and 21% of the books received one of the highest ratings. All in all a great year!
I’m pleasantly surprised I ended up reading more Adult books than YA this year, because I had been neglecting the Adult reads a lot in 2015. I love reading YA, but that doesn’t take away I enjoy reading other books as well… I know I don’t read a lot of Middle Grade though, so that low percentage is no surprise.
I feel so bad that the percentage of female authors is so much higher than male authors… I never base my choice of books on the gender of the author, so this number is quite a surprise. I really should focus on reading more books by male authors in 2017.
The main genre is basically the most dominant genre I think each book belongs to. There is no surprise here are a lot of mystery/thriller and fantasy reads on this list since they are two of my favorite genres. The other well represented genres are contemporary romance and (realistic) fiction. I actually don’t really like romance in general, but apparently I have been reading a lot of books belonging to the genre anyway.
This graphic is a huge surprise! I’ve calculated the average rating for each genre, and even though Mystery/Thriller and Fantasy are two of my favorite genres, they didn’t score that well with 3,49 and 3,36 stars respectively. Contemporary Romance didn’t have a high rating either with 3,40 stars…But that might just be because it’s not really my genre in the first place. Historical Fiction, another favorite genre, scored quite low as well with 3,53 stars average. Non Fiction/Memoir and Science Fiction/Dystopia were the best scoring genres with 3,96 and 4 stars respectively.
One of my unnamed goals of 2016 has been reading more stand-alones, so I’m quite happy with this number. I have tons of unfinished series though, so I will be trying to finish more of them this year.
Boy do I feel bad about this graphic! I made a promise to myself over two years ago to read more books published before 2000, and so far I have been doing a lousy job with only roughly 6% of the total. To make things even worse, 74% of the books were published in 2014, 2015 or 2016!
Last graphic: it seems that most books I’ve read have between 300 and 399 pages, which seems to be a pretty good number and a sign of a story that’s not too short and not too long. There are exceptions of course; some stories are just too complex to be told in under 400 pages… I really need to try and read longer books as well though, since so far it’s been only 17% of the total.
Tired of numbers yet? I know I am! That’s it for this 2016 review…
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I love your charts and pies; you’ve taken a lot of trouble with them. I hope you’ll forgive me mentioning it but the fact that you’ve allocated 4 or more stars to about half your reads (48%) as in the first pie doesn’t seem to square with your column chart. Which genres are getting the high score (4 and above)? Or am I missing something?
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The relatively ‘low’ rating per genre is mostly due to the fact that each genre has both high and low ratings… The lower ratings are quite evenly distributed over the different genres, explaining why no genre has received an average rating over 4 stars.
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I really enjoyed reading your post, it’s great to see your stats. I’ve actually just started a spreadsheet for my 2017 reading and am already enjoying seeing the numbers as I add the books I read or buy. I hope you have a wonderful reading year in 2017.
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Yay that’s great to hear! Last year was the first time I took the time to keep up with my stats, and I’m loving the results so far. Have a wonderful year as well! ❤
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I loved this! How do you develop your charts? Do you use a specific program, or do you make them yourself?
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I’m keeping an Excel spreadsheet during the year and use the charts option in Excel to create them. 🙂
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Awesome stats you had for 2016! I’m also starting a spreadsheet for the books I’m reading for 2017, although I’m still struggling with trying to create a graph with my book information.
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I can send you a copy of my 2016 spreadsheet if you want? It doesn’t have the graphics, but it does have the formulas.
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Thanks! I would really appreciate that!
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Here you go! https://melovebooks.files.wordpress.com/2017/01/2016readingstatsspreadsheet.xlsx
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Thanks!
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Great stats!! I started a spreadsheet found on the Internet for 2017, I love seeing the numbers and details.
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Thanks! Last year was my first experience with keeping a spreadsheet, and I’m addicted now! 😀
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I wanted one last year but I’m terrible at spreadsheet and couldn’t find one online. The one I use now is a bit complicated and I might mess it up, haha, but we’ll see!
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I actually made my own last year, not that complicated at all even though it isn’t perfect… 😉 I’ve added a link to my 2016 spreadsheet in a reply to RabbitEars comments if you want to see it?
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I’ll check it, thanks !😘
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