book lists – Escape Reality, Read Fiction!

While we’re all still reeling that 2023 is in the rearview mirror, it’s time to take a look at what’s coming up in this new year of 2024. Or at least the books I think I’m planning to read in 2024 – as no plan survives contact, etc., etc., etc.

Which is why I also take this post as a chance to look back at what I thought I was looking forward to this time last year and see if I got to them, or, for that matter, whether they got to me. Sometimes books don’t arrive when it was intended that they would, and some books don’t grab me when or the way I thought they would.

So, since I AM keeping score, sorta/kinda, I read 21 of the 23 books I was looking forward to this time last year. The two that I didn’t manage this year were Cassiel’s Servant by Jacqueline Carey and The Ghosts of Trappist by K.B. Wagers. I’m still intending to get to both of them – I even have audiobooks for both titles. But they’re both long and the ’round tuit’ slipped out of my hands when I got to them.

And, unlike the Best Books List which I try to keep down at least NEAR to 10, this is a list that grows each year. At least so far, as it has the potential to get rather unwieldy if it keeps on going. Still, at the end of the year looking back on what actually happened, it’s not unreasonable to keep the list to a reasonable number. Or that’s the theory.

From the perspective of looking forward upon the year that’s just barely begun, considering that I generally read about 300 books in a year, I’m predicting less than 10% of the books I will likely read this year. I’m not in a position (mostly) to say whether these books will be good, GREAT or terrible – just that I’m eager to find out.

Hopefully, some of these books – or at least their covers – will set your reading senses a-tingling as well!