2021 Statistics

We all know I’m a nerd: books, video games, writing, LOTR, dragons, it all fits the bill. But, I’m also a huge nerd when it comes to statistics–something I didn’t expect, but once I discovered it, I realized it’s definitely fits into my niche. Last year, I shared some blogging statistics, but this year, I wanted to share some general, nerdy 2021 statistics related to a few of my passions and hobbies.

If you’re into this type of thing, too, come take a look!

Alright, friends! Let’s talk data. But, a quick caveat, first, related to everything you’re going to read: if you share any of these hobbies and you feel the itch to start comparing, stop. Stop right there. I share these numbers because I think it’s fun to look, using them as tools to help inform new efforts, applaud growth and recognize hiccups. But, I’ve fallen into the comparison trap many times, especially with blogging (particularly with following plenty of bloggers who have much higher stats than myself). It’s easy to compare and find yourself lesser and thus assign an aspect of your worth in relation to numbers.

That’s bullshit.

Hard stop.

So, before anyone tries, I want that to be very clear. This is all for fun and is not to meant to make anyone feel lesser (including myself). So, let’s give ourselves all grace, shall we? 🖤

Blogging Statistics

So, this here ole blog. This year marked the 10th (!!) year of Thoughts Stained With Ink’s existence. I’m really proud of this blog. It’s come a long way and it’s showing no signs of slowing down yet!

In 2021, I:

• Published 135 posts
• Had 9,000+ views and 4,000+ unique visitors
• Have 921 followers (43 new followers this year; welcome!)
• Wrote 111,000+ words (just slightly less than a thousand from last’s year word count)

From those posts, I broke it down by category, as shown in the graphic below (generated using the amazing Kal @ Reader Voracious’s spreadsheet).

I break down my categories into a handful of different sections: Discussion Posts, Book Reviews, Writing Posts, Personal Posts, Allyship Round-Ups, Book Tags and Book Blogging miscellaneous posts. I don’t think it comes to anyone’s surprise that the Book Blogging category wins at 27% of my posts, with discussions coming in second at almost 18%, with personal at 15%.

In terms of how people response to these types of posts, you can see that data from the graph below:

Similarly to the number of posts I write (not shockingly), bookish blogging posts, discussions and personal posts receive the most views, comments and likes. I would like to see my allyship content and my writing content increase in terms of popularity (and reviews, too, might be nice!), but overall, I’m pretty stoked and proud of this blog!

Reading Statistics

Reading, however, is where things get a little more depressing. 😅 As you know if you’ve been following along this year, I’ve hardly read any books this year. Okay, that’s a bit of a lie. I did manage to read 30 books this year, despite feeling like I never read at all, with multiple months where I didn’t read a single thing. But, with 6 of those books being required for class (and hardly any my cup of tea), we’re really looking at 24 books.

Out of those 30 books, here’s how my genres break down:

No one is surprised that half (exactly!) came from the fantasy realm. Most surprisingly is the almost 20% of poetry. Unfortunately, my interest in poetry did not spike. I had to read those books for a graduate class I took this year and I counted them because I wanted my stats to look better than they actually are. 😂

I read a healthy blend of ARCs (that I am still desperately behind on, shush), backlist books and books published this year.

Some other stats not captured in graph form:

• 43% (13 out of 30) books I read were by BIPOC or queer writers
• 20% (6 out of 30) were self-published fantasy
• I read a total of 10,000+ pages, with 26% (8 of 30) books over 500+ pages each
• My average rating was 3.65 gems

Next year, I hope to read more diversely, more in general and better balance overdue ARCs with reads I just want to read.

Since I can’t use Kal’s spreadsheet for every aspect of my life (unfortunate for me), the rest of my stats don’t have fun graphs to accompany them (since I, uh, have no idea how to make them). But, I thought it’d still be fun to share some highlights, since the next two categories are both important aspects of my life.

Freelance Editing Statistics

I started freelance editing in August of 2019, so this past August marked a full two years into freelance editing as a second job. Here’s a fun little breakdown to show how I’ve grown:

Honestly, typing that all out makes me a bit chuffed. Like, damn, I put in some work. And got to work on some incredible stories and some wonderful writers, to boot!! Definitely excited to continue to grow and work with more writers in 2022 (and plan to have a post highlighting services and details next week).

Writing Statistics

Similar to reading, my writing stats were nowhere near where I wanted them to be. But, I figured a quick highlight of what I did manage to accomplish in this dumpster fire of a year is in order:

• Edited draft nine of BLOOD PRICE
• Wrote/edited 113,000 words in BLOOD PRICE and roughly 10,000 in short stories
• Started 10,000 words in new UNTITLED fantasy romance WIP
• Added another 20,000+ words to various outlines and supporting documents

Definitely room to grow here, but I edited a book (like, deep, restructuring and rewriting level of edits) during the second year of the pasta linguine, so I think I should give myself more credit than I actually am, honestly (go figure).

In Sum

Okay, that post was way too much fun to write. 😅 I hope you all enjoyed my 2021 statistics just as much as I did putting them together! It’s been a really strange year–a hard year, in many ways. But, I am proud of the work I’ve put in amongst these endeavors. And I’m truly excited about the opportunities I have to grow!

Thanks for being on this journey with me. ❤