It's the end of 2022, which means it's time to review all the reading and listening I've done over the past calendar year. Here's how 2022 breaks down:
= favorite
= also really enjoyed
Books (click to expand full list) ▼
FICTION: SCI-FI/FANTASY
Zeroes by Chuck Wendig
The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman
Breakout (Space Outlaw #1) by Dominique Mondesir
Tropical Punch (Bubbles in Space #1) by S.C. Jensen
Hypertek (Skiptracer #1) by Micky Neilson
Skyward (Skyward #1) by Brandon Sanderson
Starship Freedom (Starship Freedom #1) by Daniel Arenson
Out of the Silent Planet (Space Trilogy #1) by C.S. Lewis
Backyard Dungeon by Logan Jacobs
Scholomance: The Devil's Academy by Logan Jacobs
Sinister Magic by Lindsay Buroker
The Hallowed War (Hallowed War #1) by T.E. Bakutis
The Arrival (Annihilation #1) by Joshua T. Calvert
Assassination Protocol (Cerberus #1) by Andy Peloquin
Star Bounty: Absolution (Interstellar Bounty Hunter #1) by Rick Partlow
Wild Wastes (Wild Wastes #1) by Randi Darren
The Acheron (Acheron #1) by Rick Partlow
The Mongrel (Hunter's Moon #1) by Walt Robillard
B.O.B.'s Bar #1 by various authors
B.O.B.'s Bar #2 by various authors
Saving Supervillains #1 by Bruce Sentar
Exiles by Ashley Saunders & Leslie Saunders
Drop Zone (Sever Squad #1) by A.R. Knight
Supremacy's Shadow (Insurgency Saga #1) by T.E. Bakutis
Star Guardian (Star Guardian #1) by GJ Ogden
Sentienced to Death (Space Team #11) by Barry J. Hutchison
The Hunt for Reduk Topa (Space Team #12) by by Barry J. Hutchison
Descendants of War (Descendants of War #1) by GJ Ogden
Legend Rising (Galactic Guardians #1) by Jonathan Yanez
Robber Barrons (Robber Barrons #1) by Nanci Schwartz
Noor by Nnedi Okorafor
Saving Supervillains #2 by Bruce Sentar
Super by Lindsey Ernie
The Best Girls (Disorder #1) by Min Jin Lee
Loam (Disorder #2) by Scott Heim
Ungirls (Disorder #3) by Lauren Beukes
Anonymous (Disorder #4) by Uzodinma Iweala
The Beckoning Fair One (Disorder #5) by Dan Chaon
Will Williams (Disorder #6) by Namwali Serpell
The Prince and the Troll (Faraway #1) by Rainbow Rowell
Hazel and Gray (Faraway #2) by Nic Stone
The Princess Game (Faraway #3) by Soman Chainani
The Cleaners (Faraway #4) by Ken Liu
The Wickeds (Faraway #5) by Gayle Forman
Entanglement (The Belt #1) by Gerald M. Kilby
The Blade Itself (The First Law #1) by Joe Abercrombie
Pirate Bounty (Space Hunter War #1) by Rick Partlow
FICTION: MYSTERY/THRILLER
The Tenth Justice by Brad Meltzer
Family Money by Chad Zunker
Agent in Place (Gray Man #7) by Mark Greaney
Sandstorm (Sigma Force #1) by James Rollins
Like Me by Hayley Phelan
Unmasked (Blake Brier #1) by L.T. Ryan
An Equal Justice by Chad Zunker
Still Life (Chief Inspector Gamache #1) by Louise Penny
Her Name is Knight (Nena Knight #1) by Yasmin Angoe
Mission Critical (Gray Man #8) by Mark Greaney
The Kremlin's Vote (Jayne Robinson #1) by Andrew Turpin
Trigger Point (Gabriel Wolfe #1) by Andy Maslen
The House Guest by Mark Edwards
Open Carry (Arliss Cutter #1) by Marc Cameron
The Perfect Marriage by Jeneva Rose
The Housemaid by Freida McFadden
Dark Horse (Orphan X #7) by Gregg Hurwitz
The Cipher (Nina Guerrera #1) by Isabella Maldonado
Lost Hills (Eve Ronin #1) by Lee Goldberg
Unmissing by Minka Kent
Kismet by Amina Akhtar
In the Pines (Columbia River #3) by Kendra Elliott
A Familiar Stranger by A.R. Torre
August Origins (Mackenzie August #1) by Alan Lee
The Second Secret (Mackenzie August #2) by Alan Lee
Lie to Me by J.T. Ellison
The Stroke of Winter by Wendy Webb
One of Those Faces by Elle Grawl
Over Her Dead Body by Susan Walter
FICTION: OTHER
Embers on the Wind by Lisa Williamson Rosenberg
Schooled: A Novel by Ted Fox
Call Us What We Carry by Amanda Gorman
NONFICTION
Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman
Flow: The Psychology of the Optimal Experience by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
How We Decide by Jonah Lehrer
Be A Triangle by Lilly Singh
The Biggest Bluff: How I Learned to Pay Attention, Master Myself, and Win by Maria Konnikova
Tiny Habits: The Small Changes that Change Everything by BJ Fogg
Showrunners: The Art of Running a TV Show by Tara Bennett
When We Cease to Understand the World by Benjamin Labatut
Seven Things I Wish Christians Knew About the Bible by Michael F. Bird
Transforming the Difficult Child: The Nurtured Heart Approach by Howard Glasser and Jennifer Easley
Empowered: Pastoral Perspectives on Life and Leadership in the Spirit by Josh Harrison
The Undoing Project: A Friendship that Changed Our Minds by Michael Lewis
Jesus and Dirt: A Fresh Look at the Parable of the Sower by Michael Stover
re.CLAIM.ing: A Handbook for Developing a Restorative Culture in Your Church by Pete J. Tackett
The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry: How to Stay Emotionally Healthy and Spiritually Alive in the Chaos of the Modern World by John Mark Comer
Atomic Habits: An Easy and Proven Way to Build Good Habits and Break Bad Ones by James Clear
Damn Fine Story: Mastering the Tools of a Powerful Narrative by Chuck Wendig
Hiding in the Bathroom: An Introvert's Roadmap to Getting Out There (When You'd Rather Stay Home) by Morra Aarons-Mele
So You Want to Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo
Red Carpet: Hollywood, China, and the Global Battle for Cultural Supremacy by Erich Schwartzel
The Holy Bible (ESV) by various authors
The Kick-Ass Writer: 1001 Ways to Write Great Fiction, Get Published, and Earn Your Audience by Chuck Wendig
For the eighth year in a row, I've averaged reading 100+ books a year and, honestly, I'm not sure I'm going to continue. Back in "
2020 Reading List"
I told myself I was going to scale back in 2021 and then promptly read 100 books again anyway
, but this year I'm really going to try to hold myself to it. That sounds weird to have a resolution be "read less" but my Kindle and physical bookshelves aren't overflowing with titles, and I feel like I'm at a place where I either need to expand my reading goal, or make room for a different non-reading goal in my life. I'm going to choose the latter because the reason I read 100+ books a year is in no small part thanks to a bunch of really mediocre genre fiction that I pass the time by reading. And while there's certainly a place for that, I also have to wonder if I'm spending time reading that I should be spending on another hobby (like, oh say, actually writing books!). At the end of 2023, I'd rather say I read 20 genre fiction novels for fun and wrote one of my own (or read some other things) than that I read 80 of them and finished writing nothing. I'm also going to try to pivot to focus a little more on nonfiction next year than I typically do... ultimately, I want my reading goals to supplement and enhance my writing goals, not replace them.
Podcasts (click to expand full list) ▼
Argument, The - 28 episodes
Ask N.T. Wright Anything - 32 episodes
Dare We Say - 13 episodes
Dead Pilots Society - 12 episodes
The Ezra Klein Show - 63 episodes
Freakonomics - 31 episodes
The Gray Area f.k.a. Vox Conversations - 35 episodes
How Did This Get Made? - 3 episodes
How I Built This - 8 episodes
Imaginary Worlds - 16 episodes
Movies I Love That No One Talks About - 3 episodes
Offline with Jon Favreau - 37 episodes
Pod Save America - 115 episodes
Pod Save the World - 54 episodes
Prime Video Presents - 2 episodes
The Q&A - 12 episodes
The Rewatchables - 14 episodes
Positively Dreadful - 25 episodes
Scriptnotes - 19 episodes
Seminary Dropout - 2 episodes
Six Figure Authors - 17 episodes
Slate Political Gabfest - 59 episodes
TED Radio Hour - 8 episodes
Untitled Female Driven Podcast - 16 episodes
Weeds, The - 21 episodes
What A Day - 232 episodes
The Wilderness - 7 episodes
Write On - 4 episodes
Writer's Panel - 5 episodes
Remarkably, I listened to almost the exact same number of podcasts as last year... just six more! Like last year, I've become much more comfortable with skipping podcasts episodes that don't interest me. This coming year, I'm curious whether the 900-ish podcasts I listened to the past two years is going to end up being a sort of equilibrium, or if it'll change significantly. Part of me wants to cut way down on podcasts to create more space for other things, but they really appeal to my natural affinity for learning things; listening to an hour-long podcast about a random topic is just enough to get the gist of something without investing the full time to read a book on the topic. Over the past couple of years I've been cutting down on a lot of "repetitive" podcasts (e.g., I don't need to listen to three different daily news podcasts, or half a dozen different politics podcasts), so there might be some room to further curate what I'm listening to so there isn't a lot of overlap or same information. My favorite podcast of the year continues to be Pod Save America because it's political/current events from hosts that share my left-leaning sensibilities, so it's nice to know that I'm not just in disbelief or confused or outraged by some nonsense in a vacuum... there are other people who are feeling the same way.
Comics (click to expand full list) ▼
Moon Knight (2014-2015) #1-17
Doctor Strange: The Oath #1-5
Ms. Marvel (2014) (year) #1-5
Mark Dawson's Beatrix Rose: Vigilante #1-3
I read eleven more comics than last year. Not a huge leap, and it's certainly making me rethink my Marvel Unlimited subscription if I'm just not using it all that much to read comics. Most of the reading I did this year was work-related, or at least related to the work I was doing (I wanted to read some of the popular storylines from my favorite characters of the year to see how their film and television counterparts measured up. I really do hope to read more comics next year, because I really enjoy the medium. Maybe if I focus less on books and a little more on other types of reading, I'll add to this list in 2023.
Scripts (click to expand full list) ▼
PRODUCED
PANIC ROOM by David Koepp
NIGHTCRAWLER by Dan Gilroy
COLLATERAL by Stuart Beattie
HACKS (Pilot) by Lucia Aniello & Paul W. Downs & Jen Statsky
WEREWOLF BY NIGHT by Heather Quinn and Peter Cameron
SHE-HULK: ATTORNEY AT LAW (Pilot) by Jessica Gao
UNPRODUCED
PERFECT HARMONY (Pilot) by Tim Long
FUN FOR THE WHOLE FAMILY (Pilot) by John Quaintance
THE THING ABOUT LULU (Pilot) by Elena Crevello & Jonathan Groff
GREATEST AMERICAN HEROES (Pilot) by Andy Bobrow
HOW TO BE A COUPLE (Pilot) by Naomi Ekperigin & Andy Beckerman
LIZA'S SECOND CHANCE by Bob Saenz
LENNY (Pilot) by Lucas Hazlett & Alex Herschlag
MOSTLY DEAD THINGS (Pilot) by Brian C.Brown & Jessica Lee Williamson
ELECTRIC YOUTH (Pilot) by David Iserson
PEAK EVE (Pilot) by Lon Zimmet
VALLEY TRASH (Pilot) by Niki Schwartz-Wright
DEAR AMERICA, WE'VE SEEN YOU NAKED (Pilot) by Scotty Landes
BLACK PANTHER: WAKANDA FOREVER by Ryan Coogler & Joe Robert Cole
THE GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY HOLIDAY SPECIAL by James Gunn
I only read about twenty scripts this year compared with forty-four last year. Part of that is because I had fewer projects that I had to read for work, but a big part of it is also that I've found myself really struggling with screenwriting lately. The film and television industry isn't in a great place from a writing perspective, and I've been really discouraged lately. I haven't written a thing in terms of my own screenplays which has meant there's been less of a need for me to read what else is out there to compare and keep up. I'm hoping to get back into screenwriting at least a little bit next year as part of a general effort to write more, so I'm curious if that will cause my script reading numbers to rebound again next year.
TOTALS: 105 books, 891 podcasts, 30 comics, 20 scripts
According to Goodreads, my book reading resulted in the following stats:
Total Pages Read: 27,381
Average Pages Per Book: 260
Shortest Book: 20 pages
Longest Book: 1,846 pages
That's it for my 2022 reading... time to see what 2023 has in store!