Blogocentric Formulations

2014 Reading List

Back in my "2013 Reading List"  blog post, I said that hitting my goal of averaging a book a week was my "white whale," and I'm happy to report that this is the year Moby Dick has been spotted and conquered! I finished exactly fifty-two books this year (fifty-six if you ask Goodreads, because it considers each novella in METAtropolis a separate book while I consider the collected edition one book), in addition to a bunch of other reading and listening. I doubt I'll listen to or read anything to completion today, so here's the final list for my 2014. I've taken a cue from Tornado Dodger and coded some of these for your reference:

= one of my favorites of the year
= other highly recommended reads

FICTION
         Age of Innocence, The by Edith Warton
         Between Two Thorns by Emma Newman
         Blue Monday by Nicci French
         Confederacy of Dunces, A by John Kennedy Toole
         Deadlocked by A.R. Wise
         Divergent by Veronica Roth
         Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk
         Flood by Andrew Vachss
         Godwulf Manuscript, The (Spenser Book 1) by Robert B. Parker
         Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn
         Heroes, The by Joe Abercrombie
         Informationist, The by Taylor Stevens
         Juliette Society, The by Sasha Grey
         Looking for Alaska by John Green
         Low Town by Daniel Polansky
         Martian Chronicles, The by Ray Bradbury
         METAtropolis by Jay Lake, et al
         Mistborn: The Final Empire by Brandon Sanderson
         Naked in Death by J.D. Robb
         Prince of Thorns by Mark Lawrence
         Promise of Blood, The by Brian McClellan
         Quick Bite, A by Lynsay Sands
         Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry by Mildred D. Taylor
         Secret Lives of Married Women, The by Elissa Wald
         Seven Days of Service by Hatsuda
         Short Stories by C.S. Lewis
         Spirit Thief, The by Rachel Aaron
         Steelheart by Brandon Sanderson
         Storm Front by Jim Butcher
         Until Proven Guilty by J.A. Jance
         Vicious by V.E. Schwab
         Warded Man, The by Peter V. Brett
         Way of Kings, The by Brandon Sanderson

         GENTLEMEN BASTARDS SEQUENCE:
         Lies of Locke Lamora, The by Scott Lynch
         Red Seas Under Red Skies by Scott Lynch
         Republic of Thieves, The by Scott Lynch

         KINGKILLER CHRONICLE:
         Name of the Wind, The by Patrick Rothfuss
         Wise Man's Fear, The by Patrick Rothfuss

         HUNGER GAMES TRILOGY:
         Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins
         Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins


NONFICTION
         Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking When Stakes are High by Kerry Patterson
         Game Frame: Using Games as a Strategy for Success by Aaron Dignan
         How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big by Scott Adams
         Leadership and Self-Deception: Getting Out of the Box by The Arbinger Institute
         Madboy: Beyond Mad Men: Tales from the Mad, Mad World of Advertising by Richard Kirshenbaum
         Masters of Doom: How Two Guys Created an Empire and Transformed Pop Culture by David Kushner
         Nerdist Way: How to Reach the Next Level (In Real Life), The by Chris Hardwick
         Penguin and the Leviathan: How Cooperation Triumphs over Self-Interest, The by Yochai Benkler
         Pixar Touch: The Making of a Company, The by David A. Price
         Sticks and Stones: Defeating the Culture of Bullying... by Emily Bazelon
         When Helping Hurts: Alleviating Poverty Without Hurting the Poor... And Ourselves by Brian Fikkert
         Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future by Peter Thiel


COMICS
         Action Comics #1-8, #23.3
         Atomic Robo #1
         Batgirl #1-6
         Batman #608-619
         Batman #1
         Batman and Robin #1
         Batman Black & White #1
         Batman: The Dark Knight #1-9, #23.2
         Batman: The Killing Joke
         Batman: The Long Halloween
         Batman/Supergirl #1
         Bedlam #0-8
         Birds of Prey #1
         Catwoman #1-12
         Chaos #1-5
         Chastity #1-3
         Danger Girl: May Day #1
         Danger Girl: Revolver #1-4
         Danger Girl: The Chase #1
         Danger Girl: Trinity #1
         Deathstroke #1
         Detective Comics #23.1-23.2
         Evil Ernie #1-6
         Final Crisis #1
         G.I. Joe #1
         Hawken #1
         Infinity #0-1
         Infinity Gauntlet #1-6
         Justice League #1-6
         Justice League of America #1
         Locke & Key #1
         New Mutants #1-3
         Nightwing #1-7
         Planetary #1
         Purgatori #1
         Red Hood Outlaws #1
         Red Ten #6
         Rising Stars #1
         Sensation Comics #1
         Sex Criminals #1-7
         Suicide Squad #1-7
         Superman: War of the Supermen #1
         Teen Titans #1
         Terminal Alice #1
         The Killer #1
         Thunderhead Underground #1
         Transformers: All Hail Megatron #1
         Uncanny X-Force #1-4
         Uncanny X-Men #138-143, #244
         Voodoo #1
         Wanted #1
         X-Force #1-25
         X-Men #1-4
         X-Men: Legacy #208-218, #231-234
         X-Necrosha #1


PODCASTS
         Chicks Who Script (22 episodes)
         Freakonomics Radio (21 episodes)
         Grammar Girl (66 episodes)
         Hollywood Bound & Down (2 episodes)
         Nerdist (12 episodes)
         Nerdist Writer's Panel (15 episodes)
         The Q&A (1 podcasts)
         Scriptnotes (57 episodes)
         Serial (12 episodes)
         Slate Political Gabfest (19 episodes)
         TED Radio Hour (12 podcasts)
         Unofficial WdC Podcast (2 episodes)
         Writing Excuses (119 episodes)


SCREENPLAYS
         0 Produced Movies & TV Pilots
         11 Unproduced Scripts

TOTALS: 52 books, 202 comic books, 360 podcasts, and 11 screenplays.


Sex Criminals and Catwoman were easy picks for my favorite comics of the year. The former was such a weird and creative concept; basically this girl discovers that when she has an orgasm, time freezes for a while... and then she meets a guy who has the same condition, and together they battle the loneliness of living in a frozen world for hours at a time (not to mention pulling all the pranks they can on people who are none the wiser when the time stream resumes). And the New 52 version of Catwoman was a great interpretation of the character.

For nonfiction, Crucial Conversations and Zero to One were the big winners in my book; the first included advice and information for having difficult conversations that I still reflect on and use even months later, and the second was chock full of great business insights from one of the most successful entrepreneurs of the tech sector. I highly recommend Crucial Conversations for absolutely anyone - it covers difficult discussions everywhere from asking for a raise at work to criticizing a spouse to resolving a heated argument. It's one of the few "self-help" books that I can honestly say are actually meaningful and helpful. And any prospective entrepreneur looking to start their own business should read Zero to One for some great insights by a very successful tech guy.

And it was an embarrassment of riches when it comes to fiction reading this year. Steelheart was right up my alley in terms of being a creative and unique take on superpowers, and I think Patrick Rothfuss' Kingkiller Chronicle is going to end up being one of the best fantasy series in the past fifteen years... but I'm withholding judgment until the final (in progress) book comes out in a year or so. In the meantime, I'm giving my favorite fiction of the year pick to Scott Lynch's Gentlemen Bastards series. Even though that's unfinished too, he has multiple books left to write, so I feel justified in picking it since I'm not waiting on the imminent release of the final installment of a limited series. Lynch's books hit pretty much every touchstone for me... a little bit of fantasy, a little bit of crime, a great mix of humor and action, lots of unexpected twists and turns... they were really great reads for anyone who enjoys fantasy or crime novels... and especially those who like both.

My "other highly recommended" selections were just books that really struck a nerve either as I read them or after... works that I think really set the bar high and achieved it or were just so damned entertaining that I found myself still thinking about them or considering going back to reread them after I was done. Many of the ones I didn't call out specifically were also very good, but as I said earlier it was a year with an embarrassment of riches in terms of good material to read and I had to draw a (subjective) line somewhere.

Overall, while I'm very happy that I finally met my book-a-week reading goal, I'm a little disappointed that I read so few screenplays. Even though this was the year where I got my first screenplay produced and did a lot of production rewrites on that project, it was a year where I didn't focus too much on screenwriting as a whole. It was nice to have a little break and focus on novels and comics, but I need to get back to focusing on screenwriting in the new year. I'd also like to read more WdC novels in 2015. I'm sure I'll read plenty of already-published stuff (it's kind of hard to find novels in progress on audio for the commute ), but I'd really like to spend my at-home and on-plane reading time checking out prospective novels and offering feedback to those who are looking to get published.

So for 2015, I'm not going to give myself any hard and fast goals in terms of reading a set number of books or scripts or whatever... instead I'm just going to see where my reading muse takes me and try to make an effort to read some new stuff, help some writers out with feedback, broaden my horizons, and refocus on the kinds of works that I'm really looking to succeed at myself in the coming years.