A Data Dive into my Bookshelf

Decoding Reading Patterns: A Whimsical Data Visualisation of My Literary Odyssey

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Let's talk readables, shall we?

I have been tracking my reading habit since 2014 on an Airtable. The spreadsheet tracks the book, the author, the genre, the number of pages, cost, personal rating, GoodReads rating, the reason for buying, the duration of reading and the bookstore I purchased it from.

The books unpicked or unfinished midway are tracked so I can someday stop buying books I know I will not read.

Tracking the nationality and gender of the author helps me ensure I read books from diverse authors.

I would have never put a book down until Wuthering Heights took me five months to finish in 2017.

The following chart depicts the books completed in pink and the ones left unfinished in grey. As the book stack grew, so did the number of books I finished, only because I left the ones that became hard to pick up.

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These graphics were crafted by hand in Figma instead of using any other information visualization program. It was fun watching as the bookshelf became itself bit by bit instead of appearing instantaneously.