Tuesday, March 28, 2006

ADULT WINTER READING PROGRAM 2006 STATS

I only retrieved 24 of the logs from this year's program, so what was reported read may not be exactly typical for all who participated. Nevertheless...

Participants were to read 3 books, one set in the past, one in the present, and one in the future--a Time Travel theme. Of the 24 books set in the Past, none were duplicated. Two were by the same author, David McCollough, 1776 and Truman. Several books were updates/treatments of Greek myths and gods, particularly Margaret Atwood's The Penelopiad: The Myth of Penelope and Odysseus and Sara Douglas' The Troy Game series [didn't say which one]. A couple of the books dealt with the fairly recent past, Dennis L. Breo's The Crime of the Century (about Richard Speck) and Bill Brooks' Bonnie and Clyde: A Love Story . As usual, some people reported on books that didn't quite fit the theme, like Who's Buried in Grant's Tomb?: A Tour of Presidential Gravesites [based on a C-Span series], which sort of covers Past and Present. The rest were primarily romances, Westerns, and mysteries.

Of the books reported for the Present, two books were mentioned by two readers each, Malpractice in Maggody by Joan Hess and Marker by Robin Cook. Actually Hess probably qualifies for a third book as someone just wrote Maggody for a title. Only one book was non-fiction, Richard A. Clarke's Against All Enemies: Inside America's War on Terror. One author, Christina Dodd, had different books mentioned in both the Past list--My Fair Temptress--and the Present list--Close to You. The rest were primarily mysteries or suspense titles.

From the Future lists, one author had seven different books listed, J.D. Robb (aka Nora Roberts); all were from her ...in Death series. One of them, the most recent, Memory in Death, was reported on by three readers, the most of any book. Robin Cook's Terminal was on two people's lists. Most of the other items reported were Science Fiction or Fantasy, except for Steven D. Levitt's Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything--not quite fitting in with the theme.

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