What I (Re)Read in 2015

Since 2008 I've vowed to read 52 (for-pleasure) books every 52 weeks. Usually, I keep it.

This year I also promised to re-read some of my favorite books, to remember why I loved them and better learn how they worked.

And I did! ...But I couldn't stick to strictly rereads. There's just too much out there in the world that I need to get my hands on.

All in all I reread fewer books than I first-time read. But I do plan to keep returning to beloved books in 2016.

I put away 65 book this year. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't proud.

My Top 10 Reads from 2015
1. Euphoria - Lily King
2. The Chronology of Water - Lidia Yuknavitch
3. Twenty Fragments of a Ravenous Youth - Xiaolu Guo
4. The Turner House - Angela Flournoy
5. Bad Girls, Honey: Poems about Lana del Rey - Megan Falley
6. Breathing Machine: A Memoir of Computers - Leigh Alexander
7. Dirt: The Ecstatic Skin of the Earth - William Bryant Logan
8. Mary Oliver forever, just everything, always.
9. The Star Side of Bird Hill - Naomi Jackson
10. Between the World and Me - Ta-Nehisi Coates


2015 Rereads
Eva Luna - Isabel Allende (fiction)
The Tiger's Wife - Tea Obrecht (fiction)
Body Bereft - Antje Krog (poetry)
Room - Emma Donoghue (fiction)
Sabriel - Garth Nix (fantasy)
Before I Forget - Andre Brink (fiction)
White Oleander - Janet Fitch  (fiction)
Saga, Vol. 1 - Brian K.Vaughan and Fiona Staples (graphic novel)
Saga, Vol. 2 - Brian K.Vaughan and Fiona Staples (graphic novel)
Saga, Vol. 3 - Brian K.Vaughan and Fiona Staples (graphic novel)
Saga, Vol. 4 - Brian K.Vaughan and Fiona Staples (graphic novel)

The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao - Junot Diaz (fiction)

The World Shared - Dariusz Sosnicki (poetry)

From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler - E.L. Konigsburg (children's fiction)

The Phantom Tollbooth - Norman Juster (children's fiction)

Sula - Toni Morrison (fiction)

The House on Mango Street - Sandra Cisneros (young adult fiction)

Maniac Magee - Jerry Spinelli (young adult fiction)

Cavedweller - Dorothy Allison (fiction)

The Red Tent - Anita Diamont (fiction)

One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez (fiction)

One Day - David Nicholls (fiction)

Daytripper - Fabio Moon Gabriel Ba (graphic novel)

The Bonesetter's Daughter - Amy Tan (fiction)

The Vampire Lestat - Anne Rice (fiction/horror)

The Queen of the Damned - Anne Rice (fiction/horror)

Dream Work - Mary Oliver (poetry)

2015 First-Time Reads
Saga, Vol. 4 - Brian K.Vaughan and Fiona Staples (graphic novel)
Logicomix - Aposotolos Doxidas (graphic novel)
Euphoria - Lily King (fiction)
Ex-Machina, Book 1 - Brian K. Vaughan (graphic novel)
Clariel - Garth Nix (fantasy)
Woods and Chalices - Tomaž Šalamun (poetry)
A Worldly County - John Ashbery (poetry)
The Chronology of Water - Lidia Yuknavitch (memoir)
Walking - Henry David Thoreau (essay)
Freud - Corinne Maier and Anne Simon (graphic novel)
Scott Pilgrim, Vol 2: Scott Pilgrim vs. the World - Bryan Lee O'Malley (graphic novel)
The Blind Assassin - Margaret Atwood (fiction. I put it down after 100 pages. Woof.)
Twenty Fragments of a Ravenous Youth - Xiaolu Guo (fiction)
Leviathan Wakes - James S.A. Corey (science fiction)
Native Guard - Natasha Trethewey (poetry)
Save Twilight - Julio Cortazar (poetry)
The Girl on the Train - Paula Hawkins (mystery)
The Merchant of Venice: A Graphic Novel adapted by Gareth Hinds (graphic novel)
Crazy Rich Asians - Kevin Kwan (pretty trashy fiction SUE ME)
Adulthood Rites - Octavia Butler (science fiction)
Breathing Machine: A Memoir of Computers - Leigh Alexander (essay/memoir)
The Turner House - Angela Flournoy (fiction)
Caliban's War - James S.A. Corey (science fiction)
The Star Side of Bird Hill - Naomi Jackson (fiction)
Scott Pilgrim Vol 3: Scott Pilgrim & the Infinite Sadness - Bryan Lee O'Malley (graphic novel)
Scott Pilgrim Vol 4: Scott Pilgrim Gets It Together - Bryan Lee O'Malley (graphic novel)
Reinventing Yourself: Overcome you anxiety and fear when faced with life's problems and challenges - Mario Alonso Puig (self-help)
Saga Vol. 5 - Brian K.Vaughan and Fiona Staples (graphic novel)
Bad Girls, Honey: Poems about Lana del Rey - Megan Falley (poetry)
The Savage Detectives - Roberto Bolaño (fiction)
All the Light We Cannot See - Anthony Doerr (fiction)
Dirt: The Ecstatic Skin of the Earth - William Bryant Logan (creative nonfiction)
All are Welcome Here - Elizabeth Berg (fiction)
Naming the World: And other exercises for the creative writer, edited by Bret Anthony Johnson (essay collection)
Versed - Rae Armantrout (poetry)
In Light of India - Octavio Paz (nonfiction/essay)
Storyteller: The Authorized Biography of Roald Dahl - Donald Sturrock (biography)
Between the World and Me - Ta-Nehisi Coates (creative nonfiction/essay)

What I Read in 2014

I read a lot of poetry this year. Possibly this makes me very crazy.

It's that time again: If I finish everything I'm reading right now, I will have read 60 books in 2014. I beat my number for 2013!

For six insane months in 2014, I had three part-time jobs. I still tried to carve out time for reading and writing... I did the best I could. Getting lost in a good graphic novel felt especially welcome this year.

I think I read more poetry than I ever have, most notably because I turned July 2014 into Poetry Month. I only read and wrote this genre. (The first bit of fiction I read after the month ended was Ayiti by Roxanne Gay. I was so happy to be reading anything other than poetry I nearly went into an ecstatic state.)

My list is a weird mix of everything I'm into: mod poets, Beat poets, comics, literary fiction, young adult series, and some nonfiction/diarist work. I'd do it all over again--although, somehow, I'd try to squeeze in more Mary Oliver.

My Top 10 of 2014

Blue Hole Back Home: A Novel – Joy Jordan-Lake

SAGA!!!

Ayiti – Roxanne Gay

Dream Work – Mary Oliver

Batman: The Long Halloween

Curves and Angles – Brad Leithauser

The Madonnas of Echo Park – Brando Skyhorse

Play It As It Lays: A Novel  – Joan Didion

Small Victories – Anne Lamott

Yes Please! – Amy Poehler

What I Read in 2014

1.  Now Is the Time to Open Your Heart – Alice Walker (fiction)

2.  Blue – Pat Grant (graphic novel)

3. Remedies – Kate Ledger (fiction)

4. The Eye of the Heron – Ursula K. le Guin (fantasy/fiction)

5. Blue Hole Back Home: A Novel – Joy Jordan-Lake (fiction)

6. The Patchwork Girl of Oz – L. Frank Baum (children’s fiction)

7. The Godfather – Mario Puzo (fiction)

8. The Lowland – Jumpha Lahiri (fiction)

9. The Rings of Saturn – W. G. Sebald (fiction)

10. The Collected Poems of Theodore Roethke (poetry)

11. A Dance with Dragons (A Song of Ice and Fire) – George R.R. Martin (smutty fantasy WHY DO I DO THIS TO MYSELF?!)

12. Woman Hollering Creek: And Other Stories – Sandra Cisneros (YA fiction/short story collection)

13. Gerard Manley Hopkins: The Major Works (poetry)

14. The Sociopath Next Door – Martha Stout, PhD. (nonfiction)

15. Catching Life by the Throat: How to Read Poetry and Why – Josephine Hart (nonfiction/lit theory)

16. The Yarn Whisperer: My Unexpected Life in Knitting – Clara Parks (nonfiction/essays)

17. Saga, Vol. 1 – Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples (graphic novel)

18. Sixty Odd – Ursula K Le Guin (poetry)

19. Pretty Dead – Francesca Lia Block (YA fiction)

20. Beat the Reaper: A Novel – Josh Bazell (fiction)

21. Kafka on the Shore – Haruki Murakami (fiction)

22. Indigo – Alice Hoffamn (YA fiction)

23. Dream Work – Mary Oliver (poetry)

24. Batman R.I.P. – Grant Morrison and Tony S. Daniel (graphic novel)

25. Are You My Mother?: A Comic Drama – Alison Bechdel (graphic novel)

26. The Eternal City: Poems – Kathleen Graber (poetry)

27. The Gift: Poems by Hafiz – Translated by Daniel Ladinsky (poetry)

28. Batman: The Dark Knight Returns – Frank Miller (graphic novel)

29. Batman: The Long Halloween – Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale (graphic novel)

30. Selected Poems of Langston Hughes (poetry)

31. The World Shared – Dariusz Sośniki (poetry)

32. Curves and Angles – Brad Leithauser (poetry)

33. A Thousand Mornings: Poems – Mary Oliver (poetry)

34. Horoscopes for the Dead: Poems – Billy Collins (poetry)

35. Ayiti– Roxanne Gay (fiction)

36. Scott Pilgrim, Vol. 1: Scott Pilgrim's Precious Little Life – Bryan Lee O’Malley (graphic novel)

37. Saga, Vol. 2 – Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples (graphic novel)

38. Batman: Hush – Jeph Loeb and Jim Lee (graphic novel)

39. The Madonnas of Echo Park: A Novel – Brando Skyhorse (fiction)

40. Clabbered Dirt, Sweet Grass – Gary Paulsen (nonfiction/essay/memoir)

41. Hustle – David Tomas Martinez (poetry)

42. Tik-Tok of Oz – L. Frank Baum (children’s fiction)

43. Bless Me, Ultima – Rudolfo Anaya (YA fiction)

44. Death Comes for the Archbishop – Willa Cather (fiction)

45. Written on the Body – Jeanette Winterson (fiction)

46. Phenomenal Woman: Four Poems Celebrating Women – Maya Angelou (poetry)

47. Play It As It Lays: A Novel – Joan Didion (fiction)

48. Not My Father's Son: A Memoir – Alan Cumming (memoir)

49. Saga, Vol. 3 – Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples (graphic novel)

50. Small Victories: Spotting Improbable Moments of Grace – Anne Lamott (nonfiction/essay)

51. Looking for Alaska – John Green (YA fiction)

52. Yes Please! – Amy Poehler (nonfiction/memoir)

53. A Little Lumpen Novelita – Roberto Bolaño (fiction)

54. Alistair Cooke: The Essential Letters from America: The 1940s & 1950s – Alistair Cooke (nonfiction/essay)

55. Catching Fire – Suzanne Collins (YA fantasy)

56. The Poem She Didn't Write and Other Poems – Olena Kalytiak Davis (poetry)

57. Learning To Love: Exploring Solitude and Freedom – Thomas Merton (nonfiction/journal)
58. Mockingjay -- Suzanne Collins (YA fantasy)
59. Hallelujah Blackout -- Alex Lemon (poetry)
60. Trickster's Queen -- Tamora Pierce (YA fantasy)