What I read in 2024

Now that the new year is upon us, I'm taking one last look back at the books of 2024: I've been keeping track of what I read on social media (chiefly on Bluesky and Facebook).

I had a goal of 52 books to read this year, and came up short: I was only able to finish 42 before the end of the year, but that was better than last year, where I only got to 38. That's okay though: I've spent less time stressing about hitting that number, and focusing more on the books that I'm enjoying.

My 10 favorite reads of 2024

If there’s a thread that connects these reads, it’s the idea of power and how characters contend with it

Transfer OrbitAndrew Liptak

Here are my lists from 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, and 2023.

Here's what I read:

1. The Bald Eagle: The Improbable Journey of America's Bird by Jack E. Davis
2. The Mysteries by Bill Watterson
3. Blood in the Machine: The Origins of the Rebellion Against Big Tech by Brian Merchant
4. Baking Yesteryear: The Best Recipes from the 1900s to 1980s by B. Dylan Hollis
5. Locklands by Robert Jackson Bennett
6. The Tusks of Extinction by Ray Nayler (Review)
7. The Art and Soul of Dune: Part 2 by Tanya LaPointe and Stefanie Broos
8. Dune: Messiah by Frank Herbert
9. American Flannel: How a Band of Entrepreneurs Are Bringing the Art and Business of Making Clothes Back Home by Stephen Kurutz (Review)
10. The Three-Body Problem by Cixin Liu, translated by Ken Liu
11. Starling House by Alix E. Harrow
12. System Collapse by Martha Wells
13. Homegrown: Timothy McVeigh and the Rise of Right-Wing Extremism by Jeffrey Toobin
14. Eruption by Michael Crichton and James Patterson
15. Soon I Will Be Invincible by Austin Grossman
16. When Among Crows by Veronica Roth
17. The Warm Hands of Ghosts by Katherine Arden (Review)
18. Fight Me by Austin Grossman (Review)
19. The Bright Sword by Lev Grossman (Review)
20. Untethered Sky by Fonda Lee
21. Moonbound by Robin Sloan (Review)
22. Godzilla and Godzilla Raids Again by Shigeru Kayama, translated by Jeffrey Angles
23. Nuclear War: A Scenario by Annie Jacobsen (Review)
24. The Future Was Now: Madmen, Mavericks, an the Epic Sci-Fi Summer of 1982 by Chris Nashawaty
25. The Mercy of Gods by James S.A. Corey (Review)
26. Squire by Sara Alfageeh and Nadia Shammas
27. Navola by Paolo Bacigalupi (Review)
28. Challenger: A True Story of Heroism and Disaster at the Edge of Space by Adam Higginbotham (Review)
29. A Natural History of Empty Lots by Christopher Brown (Review)
30. Agony Hill by Sarah Stewart Taylor
31. American Scary: A History of Horror by Salem to Stephen King by Jeremy Dauber (Review)
32. Annihilation by Jeff VanderMeer
33. Star Wars: The Rise and Fall of the Galactic Empire by Christopher Kempshall (Review)
34. Stories are Weapons: Psychological Warfare and the American Mind by Annalee Newitz
35. S.Q.P.R.: A History of Ancient Rome by Mary Beard
36. Constituent Service by John Scalzi
37. The Mountain Crown by Karin Lowachee
38. Unexploded Remnants by Elaine Gallaher
39. Horror Movie by Paul Tremblay
40. Livesuit by James S.A. Corey
41. Pilgrim Machines by Yudhanjaya Wijeratne (Review)
42. Old Man's War by John Scalzi
    

Now that we're a couple of days into 2025, it's time to reset the clock. Let's see if I can hit 52 reads in the next 12 months.

What did you read this year? What books stuck with you, and what are your plans for this year? I've listed the books I'm looking forward to in 2025, and I'm hoping to actually spend more time thinking and writing about what I read this year. Stay tuned!