The Year In Books: 2016

Posted on January 1, 2017 by Susie

2016. That was a year. A year of a few personal highs and so many communal lows.

Anyway as I’ve done for several years now, I kept a list of all the books, audiobooks, comics and so on that I read over the year. It’s my way of keeping a record of the year, based on the stories I’ve consumed.

Now on to the numbers.

I read:

111 books in total

63 print books

48 audiobooks

10 Ebooks

39 comic books (I count trade paperback collections and single issues read as a full arc together, but not single issues read month to month as they’re released)

11 short story collections or novellas (don’t count single short stories read outside of collections)

16 borrowed from the library

25 borrowed from friends

1 read for critique

37 YA

15 Middle Grade

Favorite reads:

Nimona, Noelle Stevenson

The Raven Cycle books 2 through 4, Maggie Stiefvater (I read book 1 in a previous year)

Kindred Spirits, Rainbow Rowell

The Girl With All the Gifts, M.R. Carey

Honorable mentions:

The New Moon’s Arms by Nalo Hopkinson

Dumplin’ by Julie Murphy

Rose Under Fire, Elizabeth Wein

Black Out and All Clear, Connie Willis

The Lunar Chronicles Books 2 through 4.5, Marissa Meyer

The Paradox Trilogy, Rachel Bach

Favorite author numbers:

Suzanna Clarke 1

Noelle Stevenson 5

Neil Gaiman 2

Jasper Fforde 1

Maggie Stiefvater 3

Gene Luen Yang 2

Rainbow Rowell 1

J.K Rowling 1

G. Willow Wilson 5

Marissa Meyer 5

Jonathan Carroll 1

Connie Willis 2

Sarah Vowell 2

Lish McBride 1

Carrie Fisher 2 (I’m still processing her loss)

Holly Black 2

Book related highlights:

Viable Paradise 20 was undoubtedly the best thing I did all year. It was incredible. I wish I could do it all over again. Thank you thank you to the instructors, staff, and fellow students for the amazing week.

There was also Wiscon. I participated in their one-day critique workshop. Went to panels, readings, and signings from the likes of Nalo Hopkinson, Charlie Jane Anders, and John Scalzi (who made a surprise appearance at the sign out). I ate breakfast for dinner with the Geek Girl Brunch Crew and geeked out about The Force Awakens.

Sadly I missed what was probably the last Nerdcon Stories because it conflicted with VP.

I read a story at the annual MinnSpec Reading.

And in March I went to London and Ireland for two weeks. It was a lovely trip. The book related highlights of the trip were taking a tour of the Globe Theatre, and the Harry Potter Studio tour. Though there were plenty of times where just walking the streets and riding the tube brought up associations with books. Neil Gaiman’s Neverwhere and Connie Willis’s Oxford time Travel series in particular.

Hey look it’s the Sorting Hat!

Hey look it’s a phoenix.

Hey look it’s Shakespeare’s Globe.

Hey look it’s Saint Paul’s Cathedral. Mr. Dunworthy’s team must have figured out how to save it after all!

Finally, I’ll leave you with a picture of my to-read shelves. It’s kind of out of hand and doesn’t even include the audiobooks, ebooks, and comics.

So many books.

These are the ones I plan to read first.

2017 please be gentle with us.

Lots of photos plus a video.

Posted on December 9, 2016 by Susie

This October I attended the Viable Paradise workshop on Martha’s Vineyard. It was incredible. I learned so much and bonded with my class of fellow authors. I feel like I could write thousands of words and not really capture the feel of it. So instead I’ll post some photos.

First is the class photo with the instructors. I love everyone in this picture. Except for Jamie. (He knows what he did.)

Kind of cool fun fact, 19 of the 24 students this year were women. I am so proud to have been a part of this class. Pay attention to these names, you will be seeing them in magazines and bookstore shelves not too long from now.

In other news: Martha’s Vineyard is gorgeous. I did a terrible job capturing it. As shown here.

My classmates Fred G. Yost and Karen Osborne did a much better job.

See? So pretty! Also shockingly like Stars Hollow.

And here are a couple of mementos I came away with.

That would be a pile of feedback for my submission novella.

Not shown: a newly written story, an idea for another, a mug, a tee shirt, and a green rubber snake.

So to wrap up I would 100% recommend Viable Paradise to all aspiring spec-fic writers.

And here is a video taken last month of me reading the beginning of my novella at Word Brew 2016 (while wearing my VP shirt).

Reading to an Audience: in which I read to an audience.

Posted on July 23, 2014 by Susie

This weekend I participated in a workshop put on by the MinnSpec authors group about reading to an audience. Something I have very little experience with. So I signed up to read an excerpt.

I did not expect to be as nervous I was. My history with Improv pretty much wiped out any fear I once had about public speaking. But there is a difference between acting out a scene you’re making up on the fly, and reading a piece you’ve spent months obsessing over every word choice. In the former, if you say or do something stupid it’s the character who did it, and you were just making it up anyway. In the latter, you’ve had time to rehearse so any mistakes can’t be waved away as no time to prep, and you have to portray all the characters, and maybe you’ve put in too many multisyllabic words that’ll make you tongue tied, and not to mention that the audience is all other writers who will know that you’re a hack who writes in cliches…

So anyway, when I stepped up to the mike my nerves responded with the full body shakes. I got through it somehow, and I don’t think the shaking was that obvious (though I haven’t watched the video to confirm) (oh yes, there was video). In fact the audience seemed to enjoy it, and gave some very good feedback, and when I read the passage again to implement the notes there was no shaking at all. I did have the advantage of going third so I could take advantage of the tips given to the first two authors.

So without further ado, here is the video of me reading a short excerpt from Tooth or Consequence. Actually I read it twice, pre and post notes.

Tooth or Consequence reading

The Year in Books

Posted on December 30, 2012 by Susie

For the last couple of years I’ve kept a running list of the books I’ve read over the course of a year. My slightly compulsive brain likes having a record. This year’s list is a little shorter than past ones. I attribute that to working on three separate manuscripts (two completed, plus major rewrites) an editing class, querying agents, and a busier social life, taking up some of my reading time.

2012 by the numbers

Grand total
25 books read since January. (That doesn’t include single issue comics or the many picture books I read to my insatiable niece.) – 11 graphic novels/12 novels/1 short story collection

24 audiobooks listened to. (Coincidence that it’s equal to the number of books.

Breaking it down by category
6 read on my Kindle

4 of the 6 Kindle reads were unpublished manuscripts reviewed for my critique group. (I’m not counting the many times I read and reread my own work as I edited.)

4 books I’d read in the past and wanted to revisit.

5 borrowed from friends

3 from the library

16 young adult – 5 books/10 audiobooks

7 middle grade – 4 books/3 audiobooks

4 nonfiction – 4 audiobooks

Favorite Author numbers
2 Neil Gaiman – 1 book (Fragile Things)/ 1 audiobooks (The Graveyard Book, one of the revisited)

2 Jane Austen (Mansfield Park) (Emma, one of the revisited)

1 Jasper Fforde (the Last Dragonslayer)

2 Brian K. Vaughan (False Faces) (Ex Machina vol.9)

1 Douglas Adams (the Salmon of the Doubt)

Currently, I’m reading Bumped by Megan McCafferty and listening to Cold Days by Jim Butcher. But I’m only counting the books I finished before the end of the year. Alright 2013, show me what you got!

Edited: I finished Bumped this morning so I went back and added to the totals.

Susan Taitel

Tag Archives: reading

The Year In Books: 2016

Lots of photos plus a video.

Reading to an Audience: in which I read to an audience.

The Year in Books