At the end of June, at the half year mark of 2026, I had read 98 books, a total of 37 583 pages.That’s a lot of books, a lot of pages, a lot of enjoyment. I tried to translate that to hours > work days (8h), but it looked kinda rediculous. I mean, with an average of 40 pages/h it would make 120 work days (out of what, 176 days total?), with the average of 50 pages/h, 95 work days. Though, I DO read an average of 4,5h per day, so calculating with that, I have spent 99 work days (792h) reading, which makes 47 pages/hour. So ok, accurate, I guess.
I don’t have a life, I have multiple.
I’m generally no good at ranking anything – I mean, how does one REALLY choose a best of so many somethings that are all different and touch and delight me each in their unique way?
Still, I always try to somehow pick some favorite books to showcase in my yearly wrap-ups (blog posts), just to highlight some out of the mass. For the yearly review, I usually make several categories for this, but now, for the first time, I attempted a simple Best of H1/2026 ranking by selecting one for each month and narrowing it down from there.
I can tell you even THIS was NOT easy! Out of an average of 16 books per month, almost 100 books. I tried to go with a “If I had to choose only one of these to reread…” approach and this is what I got.
The winner is: The Impossible Garden of Clara Thorne, by Summer N. England.
System Failure for the Masses 