2011 Reading

I’ve been writing an end-of -the year synopsis on my perusal of books  for the past couple of years (i.e. ever since I started this blog) but this time I missed on it and haven’t posted anything about my 2011 reading. It’s not because I forgot about it or just been busy or lazy. In fact, I wanted to do something different for 2011 and I unwittingly set an ambitious task for myself. Inspired by the statistics course and visualization workshop I attended during the last semester,  I wanted to present the statistics of my reading in the form of attractive visuals. While the first part is fine, it’s the latter one which posed a challenge to me. Being untrained in visualization techniques and having made no significant efforts to acquire the required skills, the exercise took on a “delayed indefinitely” status. Finally today, I decided to present whatever crude things I came up with in my initial attempts this time and save the lofty goal for the next year. So beware of what’s coming next.

Here are a few graphs, which are (I suppose) self-explanatory:

I read 75 books in total, of which most of them are fiction(69). As you can see, I read very few non-fiction in 2011 and all of them are Indian and in English. It’s interesting to note that though I read the print material most of the time, reading in the electronic mode isn’t too insignificant. I attribute this to my dear Sony Reader. Another observation is that I own most of the books I read in 2011 and given the fact that I’m not an active member of any library currently, it’s  surprising to see that I’ve managed borrowed a considerable number of books. Given the space constraint in my house, I should actually do this more. Though my selection in 2011 largely favored Indian literature, I indulged myself in a variety of  writings from different nations. I’m usually so careful and systematic about picking my reads that there will be little chance for disappointment or frustration and this is evident from the ‘rating” chart. You can see that most of them were rated 3-5.

I prepared an excel sheet with various attributes like title, category. Author, language, country of origin, ownership status, mode (print/electronic), type (novel, short stories etc), translation, rating and remarks. Couldn’t come up with anymore interesting things. I created these graphs from Tableau Public. Being a free offering, it didn’t provide much flexibility and I couldn’t figure out how to show the percentages in the pie chart. I could have produced better analysis and presentation, but as I confessed earlier, I didn’t really give it my best shot.

Wait, there’s more to come, but not this time. I have bigger and more colorful plans for my reading data. I’ve been keeping track of the books I read for 5 years and this means I can do a time-series analysis to identify the trend(s). It would also be interesting to do some data mining (which I’m learning this semester) on it and explore for any hidden patterns (I know the data is not huge, but still, I can fantasize, can’t I?) and the ultimate objective would be to predict what I’ll be reading next. Wow, that would be really cool! Just thinking about it gives me a shiver of excitement. (You know me! I like being dramatic sometimes.)

Caught up in the enthusiasm for all the new thoughts that emerged in this context, I want to now introduce the tradition ( ) of announcing the best picks of the year. Here they are for 2011:

• Best Short Stories – Telugu: Seela Veerraju Kathalu by Seela Veerraju
• Best Novel – Telugu: Rachayitri by Ranganayakamma
• Best Short Stories – English: Short cuts by Raymond Carver
• Best Novel – English: Gone With the Wind by Margeret Mitchell
• Best Non-fiction: Mother Pious Lady: Making Sense of Everyday India by Santosh Desai

Interlude?

I’ve been reading books steadily and voraciously for about 5 years now and there were a lot of moments during this period when I wondered when my interest in reading fades out. Not that I wanted to. On the contrary, I love reading like anything and often see myself devouring more and more books. My favorite dream of my future is me relaxing in a small house in a scenic place with endless time for me to enjoy my books.

Well, why then I sometimes feel that there is an end for my cherishment just around the corner? I’ve had several hobbies and interests since my childhood and almost all of them abated gradually and finally died out. So, all through these years I’ve had the subconscious thought that the same would happen sometime to my reading too. I’m putting too much time and energy into this activity that by logic the tide should recede. But the only problem with this kind of reasoning is that I can’t imagine myself without books and have no clue what takes their place thereafter.

The reason for this sudden contemplation is that my reading right now has hit the lowest point of all these five years. I’ve been pursuing the same book for the past 3 weeks or so, reading hardly a page or two per day. It’s not that the book is boring. I feel lethargic to settle down to read and these days am not very keen to snatch away snippets of time here and there to indulge in my current read. No interest to pick up another book or even buy a new flick. (Aravind Adiga’s Last Man in Tower poses a slight temptation but even as I dwell on the idea I realize that I’m in no hurry to read any stuff.) The insatiable hunger for books doesn’t exist now and I feel passionless, preferring to spend my idle time watching the idiot box or doing some mundane things. While I stare blankly at my shelf of unread books, I puzzle over my current predicament.

I truly hope this is just a brief interlude meant to only recoup my energies. While on one side I’m impassive to reading now, on the other side I’m kind of missing it too.

Addictions

It has been almost a week since Numaish, the 71st Annual Industrial Exhibition of Hyderabad has begun and my feet are twitching to go there as soon as possible. I always loved the gay atmosphere surrounding the exhibition. When I was little, I used to marvel at the vastness of it. For many years, I couldn’t cover the grounds – I used to get exhausted even before I wander through half of it. Only recently had I been fortunate enough to conquer it all. It always seems like a magical place with so much offer.

Even now, I get excited at the mere thought of it and await its arrival every year with much anticipation. I especially like apparels from Lucknow and Kashmir. Well, let me not get too much into it. Otherwise I drift off endlessly. This drooling over  got me thinking about my recent obsession – Shopping. Gosh, sometimes it makes me sick but still am not able to refrain from it. It sure turned into an addiction.

Recently, I read an article in The Hindu about the “social additions” which are rampant in the society now. These include watching TV, browsing the Net, shopping, playing video games, involving in a string of relationships, overeating and the like. Well, the author says that the reason people are susceptible to such compulsive behaviors is the “fear” factor. Given the fact that indulging in such repetitive actions (passive or active) numbs our brain, the author suggests that unpredictability and chaos in life in general is what pushing us over the edge. And to get hold on ourselves at the right moment, we need to combat “the fear” within us.  Wow, isn’t this enlightening?

Coming to me, what addictions are lurking around to seize my sanity? Well, the worst of all is obvious – Reading. Yes, you read it right. I read a lot and take immense pleasure in tossing off finished books and picking up new ones. I spend almost every free moment of mine with books and whenever I find myself away from them even for a few minutes, I feel an actual physical pain. A quick Google search revealed that there are countless other people who are in my shoes and ironically a whole lot of books were written on the subject.  I was especially struck dumb by one paradoxical prescription: “the best cure for bibliomania is simple – just  one more book”. Incredible!

Next in the line is surfing the Net. I check my e-mail daily (multiple times at that), even though nothing interesting comes up very often into  my inbox. Socializing in Orkut is another fad for me. Thank God, there has been some breathing space since I closed my Facebook and Twitter accounts. Most of the times, I just idle away the time on the Net with nothing productive or satisfying about it. Well, it might not be too much considering the present standards but I do believe that I could use that time and energy elsewhere.

According to the author of the above article, each one of us is an addict waiting to happen. So, what is your list of contenders?

My reading in 2010

The count this year is a modest 60. Not much change in the statistics. The same <20% still holds good for non-fiction. But, to my satisfaction, I’ve tried various subjects – from self-help (Nine Rooms of Happiness) to travelogues (The Lost Continent); memoirs (Angela’s Ashes) to pure technical stuff (Business Intelligence) and more.

I read more number of Telugu books this year compared to the previous one. I tried a few authors for the first time this year – Mohammad Khadeerbabu (Poleramma Banda Kathalu), Chilikamarti Lakshminarasimham (Ganapathi) and Bhanumathi Ramakrishna (Athagari Kathalu). I loved them all.

If I have to name a book from this year’s list, which I’ve liked the most, it would undoubtedly be The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. It touched me, surprised me, and above all shook me. I read only a few mysteries (by James Hadley Chase) but more than a few  thrillers, which include The Millennium Trilogy by Stieg Larsson and techno-thrillers (Timeline, The Terminal Man, Pirate Latitudes) by my favorite Michael Crichton. I felt that the Millennium trilogy was ok – new and interesting.

I also covered a few family dramas and those, which I guess cannot be called pure chick-lit – Amy and Isabelle by Olive Kitteridge fame Elizabeth Strout, Letter from Peking by Pearl S Buck, Hundred Secret Senses by Amy Tan and a few by Maile Meloy. Each and every one of them left me thinking more about the lively characters.

I tried horror (Raven Stole the Moon by Garth Stein) for the first time and I have to admit that the experience was far from being pleasant. I deliberately avoided reading it during the nights and had to gather my courage many a times in order to continue with the book.

Another heart-felt book I was fortunate to read this year is The Museum of Innocence by Orhan Pamuk. It was simply amazing. The author had left me awestruck. Looking forward to read more of him. In fact, I just started his My Name is Red.

Coming to the Short Stories, I had better luck in Telugu compared to English. While Alice Munro’s (Too Much Happiness) and Maile Meloy’s (Both Ways is the Only Way I want) were just fine, it was Tagore’s collection of stories, which cast a deep impression on me. They were just brilliant.

Other books, which I cherished this year include – The Curious Incident of a Dog in the Night Time by Mark Haddon, The Secret of Laughter by Susha Guppy (Magical Tales from Classical Persia), Traffic by Tom Vanderbilt (Non-fiction), and Kane & Abel by Jeffrey Archer.

I feel blessed and I hope to read better, if not more, books next year.

Me and my 2009 reading

I have seen this on a book blog – Book Bath. Looks like it’s going around a lot. Just thought – “why not give it try?”

Using only books you have read this year (2009), answer these questions. Try not to repeat a book title. It’s a lot harder than you think!

Describe yourself:  The Reader (Bernhard Schlink)

How do you feel: Yellow on the Outside, Shame on the Inside (Anson Chi)

Describe where you currently live:  Revolutionary Road (Richard Yates)

If you could go anywhere, where would you go:  The Bridges of Madison County (Robert James Waller)

Your favorite form of transportation:  Blink (Malcolm Gladwell)

Your best friend is:  Sister of my Heart (Chitra Divakaruni Banerjee)

You and your friends are:  Everyone Worth Knowing (Lauren Weisberger)

What’s the weather like:  Hardboiled and Hardluck (Banana Yoshimoto)

You fear:  White Tiger (Aravind Adiga)

What is the best advice you have to give:  Not a Penny More, Not a Penny Less (Jeffrey Archer)

Thought for the day:  Chicken Soup for the Soul (Jack Canfield & Mark Victor Hansen)

How I would like to die: Murder at the Vicarage (Agatha Christie)

My soul’s present condition: Never Let me Go (Kazuo Ishiguro)

This one definitely made me think – lots of fun!