At this time of year, we generally spend time reflecting on the year behind us and hoping for the best in the New Year. I always think back to the books I read that year.

Since 1997, Greg and I have been compiling a list of all the books we've read. Here are my numbers:

• 1997 - 48 books read
• 1998 - 42
• 1999 - 53
• 2000 - 49
• 2001 - 59
• 2002 - 2 (so far)

Here are some of the books that I would recommend:

• Guns of the South - Harry Turtledove - great alternate history
• Demon-haunted World - Science as a Candle in the Dark - Carl Sagan - illuminating and sometimes frightening look at how science is perceived in modern culture
• Flatland - Edwin Abbot - a world where not everything is three-dimensional; his mathematical depiction of women is particularly amusing
• Harry Potter series- J.K. Rowling - good fun which gets darker as the series progresses
• The Twelve Caesars - Suetonius - the world's greatest soap opera really happened
• Doomsday Book - Connie Willis- really great SF set during the Plague
• Expendable - James Alan Gardner- people with deformities? Let's make them our soldiers.
• Towing Jehovah - James Morrow- God is dead, and his corpse is in the ocean
• Tigana - Guy Gavriel Kay- the power of a name
• On Writing - Stephen King- a glimpse into the life and thoughts of a genius
• Household Gods - Judith Tarr & Harry Turtledove - great depiction of everyday life in Roman times from the viewpoint of a modern woman
• Sabriel - Garth Nix - necromancy and magic in a world close to our own
• War for the Oaks - Emma Bull - who'd have thought that Minneapolis could be magical?
• Foxtrot collections - Bill Amend - gotta love Jason's sheets
• Calvin and Hobbes collections - Bill Watterson - I will never forgive this man for retiring