Last Wednesday’s post was the 100th book review published on this blog. Eight were of my own books and one (Book Review (not really), A Prayer for Owen Meany, John Irving) was, as the title proclaims, not really a review of the actual book. Still, that leaves 91 legitimate reviews of books I didn’t write and that’s many more than I anticipated when I posted the first review in November of 2011. The blog was just about three months old then. The About page says that the most likely subjects of books reviewed are “…those related to something I personally like such as old roads or cars.” That first review (Ghost Town of Route 66) clearly fits and I think the 100th (Walking to Listen) does too. It’s not about a particular road but it is about being “on the road” which seems close enough. Besides, the phrase is “such as old roads or cars” not “exclusively old roads and cars”. The truth is anything “I personally like” is fair game.

When I wrote that “old roads or cars” line, I expected the bulk of my reviews to involve one or the other but that has not been the case. An imprecise classification effort found only 5 reviews of books about or featuring cars. There were 32 about roads which means that 63 were about neither.

I was not surprised to see that only 9 of the books I reviewed were fiction. Books are either fiction or not but they can appear in more than one of my arbitrary subject categories. Those counts are:

• 37 – history
• 32 – road
• 25 – memoir
• 16 – photo
• 15 – guide
• 12 – travelog
• 5 – cars
• 1 – physics

I won’t even attempt a “Best of” lists but I do have some “Most Memorable” picks. That I picked several photo books did not surprise me but seeing that three of my picks involved motorcycles was unexpected. No Room for Watermelons tells of Ron Fellowes’ ride through fifteen countries on a 1910 motorcycle. Hues of my Vision, by Ara Gureghian, and The World from My Bike, by Anna Grechishkina, visually document their authors’ life on the road over several years. Living on 3 wheels (a sidecar carried his dog) ended for Ara when back problems made it impossible to ride. Anna’s travels were interrupted when her homeland was invaded and she returned to Ukraine to help in its defense. I hope with all my heart that there is a sequel.

I clearly have a weakness for photo books but these two are also road books. In 2004, Joe Hurley took the steps and Travis Lindhorst took the pictures for Ten Million Steps on Route 6. Three of Route 66’s finest (Shellee Graham, Jim Ross, and Jerry McClanahan) collaborated on Route 66 Sightings which might be the best advertisement for a decommissioned highway you’ll ever see.

Every member of the trio responsible for Route 66 Sightings turns out plenty of exceptional solo work. Most of it is connected to Route 66 but this book from Jim Ross is an exception. It’s the story of his time in Vietnam. In my review, I said of Jim that, “What he does do is bring veteran skills to the telling of a rookie’s story.” I think that’s why this book is so memorable to me.

This is one of the five “car books” I counted. The car is a 1926 Model T that carries Darlene Dorgan and her friends on some wonderful adventures in the 1930s. Darlene’s Silver Streak tells of those adventures as well as the car’s modern-day restoration and display. I bought the book when I first saw the car on display which is probably part of the reason I find it memorable.

The count will not stop at one hundred, of course. In fact, a couple more are already in the works. One is sort of about a road. The other is not. I really see no reason to expect the mix of topics to change much in the future except for a probable decrease in the number of physics books reviewed.