2021: A Year In Books || new favourites, goodreads statistics and ranking my top ten reads of the year

 Hi Everyone! 

The end of 2021 is upon us and I just wanted to take this opportunity to think about the books that have made this year so special and share that with you all. So I am sharing my top ten books of the year, with 5 classics and 5 YA books! I think it will be interesting to compare this to the top ten of the first half of the year too. You can read that post by clicking here! Firstly, I just wanted to reflect on the goals I set myself at the end of last year.

At the end of 2020, I wrote the following:

In 2021, I hope to read the last Paper And Hearts Society book which will be so sad and discover more classics. Hopefully I will read at least one other Gaskell book and read my first Jane Austen. I will also continue with my school book club and work through Alice Oseman's books (post coming soon!). 

I definitely completed the last paper and heart's society book, which was so sad (post linked here) and I read many classics this year! I also read Mary Barton by Elizabeth Gaskell, which ticks that one off and I not only read my first Jane Austen but also my second and some of her letters and juvenilia, so that goal is definitely ticked off as well! I  read all of Alice Oseman's books this year which was amazing, and you can view that post here!

My goal for this challenge is to read 12 classics (one a month) but I may well read more.

In total, I read 22 full length classic novels (including rereads) and  28 classics in total (including short stories). This surpassed all my expectations!

According to Goodreads I read 80 books. This amounts to 23730 pages! The shortest book I read was The Tell-Tale Heart by Edgar Allen Poe with 48 pages and the longest was Great Expectations at 571 pages. My average book length was 302 pages and my average rating 4.4, which is amazing! My aim was to read 50 books and that is what I aim for every year and to have got much higher is just incredible.

I don't read for a number on a screen and I don't want any of you to feel like I've read so much and you haven't or I've read so little and you've read so much more! This isn't what I want to show. I just think it's really interesting to see what I have achieved and if any of you want to share how many books you have read this year or which ones were your favourites, that would be amazing!

Now I present you with the top 10 books of the year! They are ranked but the top 3 share the top spot- there was no way I could decide!

Honorable mentions:

I just wanted to mention these, without giving much detail! These so nearly made it into the final 10 but I did have to make a choice in the end.

• As Good As Dead by Holly Jackson - review linked here!
• Anne Of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery- review linked here!
• Cilka's Journey by Heather Morris - review linked here!
• Letters To A Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke- review linked here!

10. I Was Born For This by Alice Oseman

I discovered Alice Oseman this year and this was my favourite of her novels (not including Hearstopper- more on that later!). It's funny because this wasn't a book I heard about and immediately thought I would enjoy, in fact I thought it would be my least favourite of her books! However, I was completely taken into this universe and enjoyed every second of my time with this book. It is about Angel, a huge fan of a successful boyband called 'The Ark'. It is also written from the perspective of the lead guitarist of the band, Jimmy, as he deals with the pressures of fame. When they are unexpectedly thrust together, they both have to work together and find themselves again, especially when a friend is in danger...

This was just incredible, just thinking about it makes me want to reread it so badly!

9. Rebecca by Daphne Du Maurier

This book is an all time favourite and I just love it so much! It is actually my current book club book but I've decided not to reread it, as I have so many other books I want to read! I don't really know what to say about this book apart from the fact that it is so chilling and sent shivers down my spine on multiple occasions.

In my review of it (linked here), I wrote that 'It is a chilling tale told from the perspective of an unknown narrator who meets a rich but widowed man called Maxim de Winter. They hastily marry and Maxim brings the narrator back to England and his home, a beautiful stately place called Manderley. But Manderley houses dark secrets, in the form of Maxim's first wife, Rebecca...'

I already have that whole post about it so if you want to know more then I encourage you to follow the link!

8. Afterlove by Tanya Byrne

THIS BOOK. I LOVE IT. 

I don't want to say much because I have special plans for it, but I did want to mention it because it is very firmly on this list! You will be hearing much more about this book in the new year but for now, all you need to know is that IT'S AMAZING.

I know...I felt like being mysterious...

7. All The Things We Never Said by Yasmin Rahman

I think this is such a special book. It deals with extremely tough topics in such a beautifully mature and calm way. It really impacted me and the friendship that these characters have is just perfection. This is about Cara, Mehreen and Olivia who in moments of individual struggles, sign up to a suicide website. They are paired together but as they meet up, start to realise that life is worth living and begin to support each other. But the website has a few more tricks up it's sick and twisted sleeve and won't let them stop, pushing their new-found stability to breaking point. My review goes into more detail and you can view it here.

I seem to find myself rereading this book a lot and I also read Yasmin Rahman's other book last summer which just made me want to read everything she ever writes so let's hope she has another book on its way!

6. Heartstopper by Alice Oseman (whole series)

WE ARE NOW IN THE TERRITORY OF BOOKS THAT MAKE MY HEART FLUTTER WHEN I THINK ABOUT THEM.

I have reread this series SO MANY TIMES since reading it for the first time. I was so unsure about the graphic novel format but I thought I could give it a go and I am so glad I did! This is such an amazing series, and they just get better as they go along! I am absolutely devastated that Volume 5 will be the final one but I just love them so much and I can't wait to be able to read another installment.

This was originally a webcomic, though now printed, about teenagers Nick and Charlie as they meet and start dating. To me, it sounded cheesy and predictable but it really isn't and approaches so many important topics. They are the sweetest and their friends (TARA AND DARCY) are just THE BEST!!! I introduced Heartstopper to two of my friends and they both loved it so much, and now we just gush about it all the time (and proceeded to make a group chat called Heartstopper Gushing)!

5. Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

One of my biggest goals for 2021 was to read Pride and Prejudice and I loved it so much! This book is so well-known and there is a lot of pressure to like it, and I was so happy that I really did. I wrote a very long review of it back in January, which you can read here. 

I adored the characters, especially Elizabeth (who doesn't!) and fell in love with the whole Bennet family, their home, Pemberley...just all of it brings me such joy! There is so much in this book to love: the friendship between Lizzy and Jane, the intertwining love stories, the regency dance parties...It all comes together to form a wonderful story! Instantly, it became a favourite and I now have multiple editions of it to read from! 

4. Bookishly Ever After by Lucy Powrie

For those of you who have been following me for a while, you may know that I have just a small obsession with Lucy Powrie! It all started one fateful day when I picked up The Paper and Hearts Society in Waterstones. I loved it and a few years later when I got a phone, I looked up her channel on YouTube, where I found out all about her love of classics and skipping forward a few months, started wanting to read a few and as you can tell by this list, that blossomed into a love for so many incredible books!  

This was the final book in the series and I was SO SAD to say goodbye to these characters! They are my best friends and whenever I reread any of these books I am laughing, crying and smiling as if it was the first time I read them all over again! To have this last book with them was so special and I loved every second of reading it. 

 This one follows Ed and he starts working in an independent bookshop, Woolf and Wilde. There he meets Hannah, who he is determined to impress with his excellent bookselling skills. But things don't run as smoothly as he first thinks, especially when his Mum starts dating again and his Dad shuts him out. 

There are many more book club meetings that never fail to bring a smile to my face and so many hilarious cat, Shakespeare and donut related jokes that just bought me so much joy. 

You can read my review for it here and a post about why I love this series so much and to celebrate publication day by clicking here.

The next three books are joint top because I just can't choose! The Paper and Hearts Society will always be my favourite contemporary book so you could say that one is top too and these are my top three classics. Anyway, these are all on the same level, which is a change from my top ten books of the year so far because Jane Eyre now has not only one but two equals!

1. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte

This book remains one of my favourite books EVER and I just love it so much! It is so passionate, so empowering and makes me so happy! I love it so much and I've already talked about it a lot so I won't bore you with too much more! With that said, I do want to say that this book appears so intimidating: it's long, it's Victorian, it's so renowned for being one of the best books ever written. But it is such an incredible story and that's what I see it as. Yes, it's a masterpiece but at it's heart it is just another book with a powerful protagonist and an unlikely love story. You can see my original review for Jane Eyre here, where I go into much more detail!

1. A Welsh Witch by Allen Raine

I read this for Victober and I can't believe it is so forgotten! It has such magnificent descriptions of the natural world and I love how it is different from other Victorian books I've read but still carries the same themes such as industrialization which I love reading about. These characters are just so incredible and I just loved this SO MUCH! It is about a community of people living in a rural coastal town in Wales called Treswnd during the late 1800s. There is a beautiful love story woven in too and so much more that I don't want to spoil! There are four main characters: Goronwy, Yshbel, Catrin and Walto. Just thinking about them makes me so happy! Something that I was very surprised about is how it never felt long, even though I read it for nearly two weeks and it lasted 435 pages! I NEED more Allen Raine books, though  I doubt they will beat this one! You can read about my experience in my Victober diaries by clicking here and more about the plot and everything in my halfway Victober update by clicking here! I'm sure you've heard of Jane Eyre and Wuthering Heights and you may have even read them, but please read this book too! It deserves so much recognition!

1. Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë

I am so happy that I finally got to this book! I had been wanting to read it for AGES and I finally got to it in November! This is a book many people either love or hate, and I love it! The setting is just perfection and the characters so well-crafted. I don't really know what to say that's different from my review so I'm just going to quote it! I wrote: The descriptions of Wuthering Heights itself were so vivid and completely transported me into this setting. In pretty much every review of Wuthering Heights people mention this and now I finally know what they mean and how wonderful it all is when it comes together. I love how isolated Wuthering Heights is and the way they live such lonely lives as well, coupled with the descriptions of the bleak moors...This book is so unique too! There was this one moment when I didn't love it so much but I think that's also what this book does to you: it roots up everything you had and turns it on it's head, bringing you along in a roller coaster of emotions. This is Emily Bronte's only novel, which I am very sad about but I can still read her juvenilia and poems. This book took me on a whirlwind journey, and I LOVE IT. Again, if you want to know more, you can read my review, linked here!

 In researching the Brontes, I found this blog and I just wanted to share it in case any of you are interested. It is a whole blog about the Bronte sisters, their writing, pets and home. It concentrates mainly on Anne Bronte though. You can view it by clicking here or by entering annebronte.org into the searchbar. 

There they all are...what an amazing
selection from this past year!

This year, I have read so many incredible books and I can't believe how much I've read and how mind-blowing these books have been. I love them all so much and there have actually been very few books I haven't liked this year which is great! I've also written SO MANY blog posts! The month I wrote the most was May, getting a total of 12 posts, with September and October ranking not far behind on 10 posts each. It's not about a number and I know that but it feels amazing to think that I've written so much and best of all had an incredible time doing it! Writing my summer diaries was also wonderful and it's definitely something I'll do again! 

There are a few goals that I have for the new year, such as reading 12 classics which may sound low compared to how much I read this year but I don't want to put pressure on myself! There are a few titles I have in mind, which are in a separate post coming soon! I want to read lots more YA too though including possibly even some ARC books, if I can get them in physical form in the UK. It will be a challenge to keep up with YA Book Of The Month but I'm really excited for what it will bring!

Lastly, THANK YOU. For reading my posts, commenting, subscribing...it's amazing and I hope you will continue to enjoy my content in 2022! 

I hope you will read some great books in the new year and I wish you all the best for the year ahead!

Happy Reading!

What are your favourite books of the year?

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