2024 Reading Wrap-Up

With the start of 2025, I’m looking back on my reading year. It was a great reading year, 2024. I exceeded my reading goal again, read from some amazing new-to-me authors and revisited some favorite authors. Here are my 2024 reading stats (thanks to StoryGraph).

I read 86 books, where my goal was 65. I read 23.026 pages. The first book of the year was “The Hunting Party” by Lucy Foley. A book my dad picked as my first read of the year. I didn’t really like it, it’s my least favorite Lucy Foley book so far. My last book of the year was a lot better, and was a big surprise: “The Lies You Told” by Harriet Tyce.

I read most books and pages in May, which was the month I participated in Escape the Readothon by Lexie. It was a month long readathon, which was so much fun. I also had a week of this month, so more time to read as well. In January I read the least amount of books, easing into the new year I guess. But it was November were I read the least amount of pages. I read some shorter books and listened to audiobooks primarily as well. That might explain this.

To no surprise, thriller was my most read genre this year. I still love this genre the most, together with mystery. Which is in second place. I read a lot more horror this year. Which I’m very happy about. And I’m surprised to see contemporary up there as well, together with crime. I do want to read more different genres, trying to read more diverse genres in 2025.

“It” by Stephen King was my longest book this year, with over 1100 pages. Can’t believe I read that book. My shortest book was under 100 pages, being “Find Her” by Tessa Bailey. Funny enough “It” ended on my favorites list and “Find Her” is probably the worst book I read in 2024.

 I spend an average of 8 days on each book, which was the same as last year. The average amount of pages was 361 pages. I read “Heartstopper Volume 1” in one sitting. I did that with more books this year. From the top of my head “Heartstopper Volume 2”, “The Christmas Guest” by Peter Swanson’ and “Find Her” by Tessa Bailey. Basically because they were either novellas or graphic novels. “Out There Screaming” took me 35 days to finish. It’s a horror anthology, so I read a story here and there when I had some extra time.

My most read authors were Peter Swanson and Janice Hallett, each with three books. I also read two books by Simone St. James, Holly Jackson, Freida McFadden, Stephen King, Jessie Sutanto, Riley Sager Iain Reid and Blake Crouch. I had read from them in 2023 as well, Peter Swanson was also on this list last year. Blake Crouch, Jessie Sutanto and Iain Reid were all new-to-me-authors.

Of all the books I read, the average rating was a 3,6, which is a pretty good average. Lower then last year, but I think I’m more critical now. I had definitely more 1 and 2 stars this year. I gave out the most 3 and 4 star ratings and 16 books were a 5 star. Among them was one reread.  

Even though I read the least amount of pages in November, it was my highest rated month. The year didn’t start well, I started with 2 and 2,5 stars in January. And again, in May was Escape the Readathon, so I got a lot of reading done, which means lots of books and pages got read that month. 

Based on popularity on StoryGraph, “Beach Read” by Emily Henry, is the book that is shelved the most. I don’t really get the hype, but I finally what the fuss is about. “Murder by the Seaside” , a short story collection of murder mysteries, was the least shelved by readers. I was not surprised to see “The Women” by Kristin Hannah as the highest rated. It’s a super popular book and I also really loved it. 

I explored a bunch of new authors as well (I have read from Bram Stoker and Mary Kubica before though, before I started using StoryGraph). Iain Reid is definitely a new favorite author for me. Other new-to-me authors that I really enjoyed were Blake Crouch, Josh Malerman, Paul Tremblay, Abby Jimenez, Benjamin Stevenson and Bonnie Garmus.

I didn’t realize I read so many books that were part of a series. Apparently I read 18 books that were in a series. There are some series I’m sure of that I won’t be continuing: The Obsession series (“Obsession” by Jessie Q. Sutanto), The Housemaid series (“The Housemaid’s Secret” by Freida McFadden), The Castle Knoll series (“How to Solve Your own Murder” by Kristin Perrin). Some I might consider continuing in: Six Crimson Cranes (“Six Crimson Cranes” by Elizabeth Lim), Green Greek series (“Wolf Creek” by T.J. Klune), Vera Wong series (“Vera Wong’s Unsollicited Advice for Murderers” by Jessie Sutanto), Indian Lake Trilogy (“My Heart is a Chainsaw” by Stephen Graham Jones) and A Rabbits Nvoel series (“Rabbits” by Terry Miles). The Appeal series by Janice Hallett is finished, as far as we know now. But I definitely do want to continue in these series: Bird Box series (“Bird Box” by Josh Malerman), Wayward Pines series (“Pines” by Blake Crouch), The Thursday Murder Club series (“The Last Devil to Die” by Richard Osman), Hearstopper series (“Heartstopper Volume 1 + 2” by Alice Oseman), Ernest Cunningham series (“Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone” by Benjamin Stevenson, Part of Your World series (“Part of Your World” by Abby Jimenez), Legend & Lattes series (“Legends & Lattes” by Travis Baldree) and the Hercule Poirot series (“Death on the Nile” by Agatha Christie).

I DNF’ed more books, but still only 6, which is not that bad. “Homecoming” by Kate Morton, “How to Kill Your Family” by Bella Mackie, “Oranges Aren’t the Only Fruit” by Jeannette Winterson, “Nine Perfect Strangers” by Liane Moriarty and “Death Comes at Christmas” (a short story collection). I also DNF’ed “We Sold Our Souls” by Grady Hendrix, but I will try this one again when I’m more in the mood for it. I was think of eventually reading “Nine Perfect Strangers” as well, but I saw the TV show and I’m definitely not interested anymore.