... And some more statistics

Jan 8
2 min read

Updated: Jan 9

I guess you can add as many statistics as your fantasy reaches. I have read many of your statistics and most are amazing in their details. Not so much here, but I wanted to add a few more interesting takes on my reading.

New to me authors and the countries they are from

I have never looked att new authors that I have read earlier, so I have nothing to compare it to. Of the 120 books read, I have read 62 authors for the first time. They represent 15 countries. I can imagine that is rather a lot of new authors. Please correct me if I am wrong.

Swedish - 21

Erik Eriksson - Tina Frennstedt - Birgit Th. Sparre - Marit Furn - Tony Samuelsson - Sara Önnebo - Joakim Zander - Johannes Anyuru - Birgitta Petrén - Marika Cobbold - Andreas Marklund - Annelie Sylvan - Helena Kubicek Boye - Mikael Parkvall - Frida Skybäck - Bo Ericsson - Erik Petersson - Katarina Harrison Lindberg - Anders Sundkvist - Kerstin Berman - Stig Wallerman - Per Nygren

American - 13

Hernan Diaz (Argentine) - Mary Kubica - J.T. Ellison - Gertrude Stein - Andrew Turnbull - Diane Gaston - V.E. Schwab - Ann Patchett - Eleanor Herman - Karleen Koen - Shirley Jackson - James Baldwin - Riley Sager

United Kingdom - 10

Daniel Hurst - Meriel Schindler - Saskia Walker - Stephen Clarke - Nancy Mitford - Helena Merriman - Jonathan Buckley - Ian McEwan - Tamara Talbot Rice (Russian) - Rafael Sabatini (Italian)

Australia - 2

John Baxter - Geraldine Brooks (US)

And one each from the following countries - 11

Simone St. James, Canada / Walter Kempowski, Germany / Sicho Matsumoto, Japan / László Krasznahorkai, Hungary / Mariléna Karabatéa, Greece / Tove Jansson, Finland / Han Kang, South Korea / Shahnaz Habib, India / Paul Verlaine, France / Irène Némirovsky, Ukarine / Paride Rombi, Italy

For 2026 I would like to read more authors from countries I usually don’t read from. I have a list of the countries of the world, and so far I have filled in 27 countries och the 195 on the list. Far too few. I will make an effort to read authors from less read countries this year.

What about you? Are you varying your reading to cover countries all over the world?

4 Comments

Deb Nance at Readerbuzz

Jan 22

I have read books from 106 countries but I include adult fiction and nonfiction as well as children's books.

Lisbeth @ The Content Reader

Jan 29

Replying to

Well, Deb, that is far more than I have read. I was surprised that I have read so few books from all the countries in the world. I don't think the number will be higher if I include nonfiction. There I tend to stay in a narrow lane with British, American and Swedish authors, since I read mostly about history. I do have some books from authors in the Middle East, and thinking of it, I will try to read them this year. I find Middle East an interesting area and it is interesting to see how these historians see their own country and history.

Liz Dexter

Jan 10

I tend to read widely across the world and I will pick up a book if I think it's a new country, but I don't go looking for them on purpose, if you can see what I mean. I concentrate more on reading by people of a variety of ethnicities, Indigenous peoples, etc., I think. I've never counted who is new to me, it's an interesting one for sure!

Thank you Liz, I have never really thought about new authors to me either. However, you get inspired by the blogging community. I would not go looking especially for authors from certain countries. But, I think it is a good thing, at least for me, to look for more varied reading. That is, reading about other cultures. I tend to stay with the cultures that interests me, and looking for authors living in other areas and cultures, will help me widen my horizon. It seems you do the same when your reading about a variety of ethnicities.

I am planning my reading focus for 2026, and I will have to take a lot of varieties into consideration. I hope to…