In 2009 for the first time I kept a note of all the books I read, with a view to completing the 50-book challenge. This was one of my objectives for the "101 things in 1001 days" project, which I began on 1 January 2009. In fact I read 50½ books, as I still had to finish one that I had begun in December 2008. I finished my last book on 29 December 2009.

For 2010, instead of having a target of reading a fixed number of books, I'm going to make a list of particular books I want to read, and try to alternate between books that are on the list and books that aren't. Now that I'm a full-time student, I'll have a lot of individual chapters of academic books to read, which makes it hard to rack up whole books, so I don't think another 50-book challenge would be a good idea!

Here is the list of my 2009 books – I'd be glad to hear your opinions on any of them. FYI, brackets means I began the book in a different month to when I finished it, and the square brackets are for a time when I slightly messed up my record-keeping and am not sure in which order I read the two books.

Happy New Year, and good luck in your reading plans for 2010, whatever they are!

January (3.5)

(Never Let Me Go – Kazuo Ishiguro)
Storm Front – Jim Butcher
The Book of Illusions – Paul Auster
The Tales of Beedle the Bard – J.K. Rowling

February (5)

(Lolita – Vladimir Nabokov)
The Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow – Jerome K. Jerome
Lord of Light – Roger Zelazny
The Player of Games – Iain M. Banks
The Sparrow – Mary Doria Russell

March (4)

Night Watch – Sergei Lukyanenko
Use of Weapons – Iain M. Banks
The Time Traveler's Wife – Audrey Niffenegger
The State of the Art – Iain M. Banks

April (5)

The Kindly Ones – Neil Gaiman
The Wake – Neil Gaiman
(These Old Shades – Georgette Heyer)
The Shadow of the Wind – Carlos Ruiz Zafón
[Excession – Iain M. Banks]

May (4)

[(Selected poems 1923-1958 – E. E. Cummings)]
(Inversions – Iain M. Banks)
Fool Moon – Jim Butcher
Feersum Endjinn – Iain M. Banks

June (5)

Look to Windward – Iain M. Banks
Dali's Mustache – Salvador Dalí and Philippe Halsman
The Masqueraders – Georgette Heyer
The Remains of the Day – Kazuo Ishiguro
The Eye in the Pyramid – Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson

July (4)

(Three Men in a Boat (To Say Nothing of the Dog) – Jerome K. Jerome)
Grave Peril – Jim Butcher
A Canticle for Leibowitz – Walter M. Miller, Jr
Espedair Street – Iain Banks

August (4)

(The Gone-Away World – Nick Harkaway)
Unspeakable Desolation Pouring Down From The Stars – Frank Key
The Golden Apple – Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson
Baudolino – Umberto Eco

September (2)

Leviathan – Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson
Un Lun Dun – China Miéville

October (3)

Family (Law Basics) – Elaine Sutherland
1066 And All That – W.C. Sellar (Aegrot: Oxon) and R.J.Yeatman (Failed M.A., etc. Oxon)
Don'ts for Husbands – Blanche Ebbutt

November (5)

Pawn of Prophecy – David Eddings
The Last Hero – Terry Pratchett
The Reluctant Fundamentalist – Mohsin Hamid
A Pig at the Wheel – Michael Bland
Queen of Sorcery – David Eddings

December (6)

(Thomas Jefferson: American Humanist – Karl Lehmann)
Magician's Gambit – David Eddings
Contract Law in Scotland – Hector MacQueen and Joe Thomson
Summer Knight – Jim Butcher
Foucault's Pendulum – Umberto Eco
Castle of Wizardry – David Eddings