2018 on Goodreads

Close enough to the end of the year for me to have a crack at this.

Some “Best of the Year” books I have read:

Best Travel - Anywhere But Here, by Peter Pinney. A tightly contested category this one, as 90% of my books fit in here.

Best History - The Road to Ubar, by Nicholas Clapp.

Best Military - Guerilla Surgeon, by Lindsay Rogers. Closely contested by The Barbarians, by Peter Pinney, and The Desert Column, by Ion Idriess.

Best Biography - Men of the Jungle, by Ion Idriess. Closely contested by The Dolphins Tooth, by Bruce Kirby and Elephant Bill, by JH Williams.

Best Nautical - Lone Dhow, by Adrian Conan Doyle.

Best Photography - Desert, Marsh & Mountain, by Wilfred Thesiger.

Best Published by The Travel Book Club - Indians on Horseback, by Gustav Bolinder. Closely contested by Four Faces of Peru, by Wilfred Byford-Jones.

Best New Zealand Authored - Nairn Bus to Baghdad, by JS Tullett.

Best Nonfiction Short Story Collection - Ox-Travels.

Nearly there.

Best Fiction - A Burnt-Out Case, by Graham Greene.

Best Fiction Short Story Collection - Shades of Greene, by Graham Greene.

Best Ebook or online read - Our King and His Court, by Rich Larsen.


Some Statistics - Read 115 books this year (probably one to come yet), at just under 29,500 pages. I tried a lower target number of books this year to encourage me to read some longer books, but this year was busy at work, and home, and I am down around 4000 pages on previous years.

My average rating for books is a health 3.8 stars.

Longest book: 1Q84, by Haruki Murakami.

Of the 115 Books I rated:
26 books 5 stars
48 books 4 stars
38 books 3 stars
3 books 2 stars

So these are the five star books from the year:
The Shadow of the Sun, by Ryszard Kapuściński.
Lone Dhow, by Adrian Conan Doyle.
The Desert Column, by Ion Idriess.
Prospecting for Gold, by Ion Idriess.
The Dolphins Tooth, by Bruce Kirby.
Four Faces of Peru, by Wilfred Byford-Jones.
Our King and His Court, by Rich Larsen.
Nairn Bus to Baghdad, by JS Tullett.
Struwwelpeter , by Heinrich Hoffmann.
Samarkand and Beyond, by James Howard Wellard.
Trainspotting, by Irvine Welsh. (My only re-read of the year.)
Skagboys, by Irvine Welsh.
Indians on Horseback, by Gustav Bolinder.
Desert, Marsh & Mountain, by Wilfred Thesiger.
The Road to Ubar, by Nicholas Clapp.
High Adventure, by Sir Ed Hillary.
Elephant Bill, by JH Williams.
Anywhere But Here, by Peter Pinney.
Guerilla Surgeon, by Lindsay Rogers.
Blood Against the Snows, by Jonathan Gregson.
Men of the Jungle, by Ion Idriess.
My Kenya Days, by Wilfred Thesiger.
In Arabian Nights, by Tahir Shah.
A Burnt-Out Case, by Graham Greene.
Lady with A Spear, by Eugenie Clark.
The Barbarians, by Peter Pinney

Thanks to those who labour through my reviews, and bear with my obscure reads.