26ish books 2025

I havent been active on this thread much, i will try harder next year! I thought id woefully failed my reading goal - i thought Id said 18. Im just finishing book 13 and a quick scroll back shows my goal was 12 to 15 so im happy with that!

@DiggoryVenn to be fair I think I’m in a minority! Most people seem to think it’s really good

@yuja I have just been given The Artist for my birthday, but I probably won't start it until next year now.

I realised I misnumbered my last one which should have been 28, so:

29: Butter by Asaka Yuzuki
Absolutely loved this one, the combination of food descriptions and the intrigue just really worked for me.

30: Death in the Holidays by Kitty Murphy
I liked this but nowhere near as much as the second one in the series. They are murders set around a close knit group of friends at a drag club in Dublin.

1. I haven't been entirely honest with you, Miranda Hart
2. The Cracked Mirror, Chris Brookmyre
3. Fairy Tale, Stephen King
4. Storm Child, Michael Robotham
5. All the other mothers hate me, Sarah Harman
6. There are rivers in the sky, Elif Shafik
7. A Killer's Wife, Victor Methos
8. Guilty, Martina Cole and Jacqui Rose
9. Apt Pupil, Stephen King
10. The Silent Guest, Sally Rigby
11. The Surgeon, Tess Gerritsen

28 - The Artist - Lucy Steeds
I thought this was beautifully written and a good debut, but as a story I thought it was just okay. All the ‘twists’ I felt were predictable and a bit trite. I do think Lucy Steeds is a good writer though and perhaps one to watch for the future.

30 Gone with the Wind - what a book! I loved it. It was written in such an immersive way, a war book, a love story, extraordinarily engaging. It was hard to put down and at places hard to start because what had happened and was about to be described was just too awful. A great portray of various characters that are pretty unusually written, two anti heros that the reader should hate but I didn't. A great portray of the societal constraints on females. Written from slave owners perspectives so of course it is racist but it gives an insight into many different forms of racism and how it permeated America. I could read it all again straight away, all 1058 pages of it.

26 Gilbert Filbert and his big MAD Box by Ian Gilbert & Andy Gilbert

The story of one boy's desire to make a difference and help his mother find her smile again.

More of a self help / thinking toolkit than anything but could be read as a simple, sweet story. I enjoyed it - and it got me to my 26 books in 2025!

3 stars out of 5

27 - The Predicament - William Boyd - the follow up to Gabriel’s Moon, reviewed below. Just as compulsive - I hear there’s a 3rd coming next year so I’m looking forward to that

Gabriel’s Moon - William Boyd. I picked this up in a charity shop yesterday morning and binged it over the last 24 hours - so good! Really loved it and will be being myself the sequel today as an early birthday present to myself 😅

24. Antarctica by Clare Keegan. A series of short stories by this amazing author. Enjoyed lots and as ever I was in awe at how much she packs in to such few pages. It’s quite dark, some more so than others, a couple especially leave you with chills!

25. Chocolat by Joanne Harris.
    I really did not enjoy this at all. I really have no idea why I just DNF it as it took me so long to read ( through boredom)

25 Yeonnam-dong's Smiley Laundromat by Kim Jiyun

A Korean bestseller.

'Situated at the heart of a rapidly gentrifying district of Seoul, the laundromat is a place where the extraordinary stories of ordinary residents unfold'

Im not sure if this got a bit lost in translation but I found it a bit too whimsical and it didn't quite flow. An easy light read though.

2.5 stars out of 5.

25 - Heartwood Amity Gaige this was a brilliant read, some beautiful writing and about more than you would think from reading the blurb. It’s about a missing hiker and the search for her, but more deeply it’s an exploration of mother-daughter relationships. Recommended

24 - stone yard devotional - Charlotte Wood I downloaded this on kindle this morning and finished it just now. It was so beautifully written - a slow moving, quiet book but an intelligent read about grief, forgiveness, atonement, human connection and other themes. I hadn’t read much of last year’s booker last other than the winner so I’m glad I got to this

31. Broken Country by Clare Leslie Hall. I had a job getting hold of this and it turns out it's been one of Reese Witherspoon's book club choices and apparently had a fair bit of social media buzz . I can see why because it's great. I was gripped from the off and for me it didn't flag or misstep at all. I don't want to give much away because it's carefully plotted. There are things I wondered about that came true but I think that's more careful seeding (sp?) than predicable clunkiness.

I loved the descriptions of life on the farm and the close knit family, the character observations and diologue. Her descriptions of children were particularly believable.

Main character Beth lives on a farm in a small village and her rich, posh first love returns and throws her off kilter. We also know from the off that she ends up watching a court trail, but not the details of who or why. I know that makes it sound like chick lit but it's really not!

10 - The girl with the louding voice (Abi Dare). It is a YA, and it shows; but I really enjoyed anyway especially the end. I thought it was all obvious, but I was wrong :-)

11 - Currently devouring "The Glassmaker" (Tracy Chevallier). Not sure how good it is....but is certainly a page turner!

24 The Alarming Palsy of James Orr by Tom Lee
James Orr awakes one morning to find himself quite transformed...
A short - and disturbing - read.
I really enjoyed it but it is quite haunting.
3.5 out of 5

23 - All the Broken Pieces - John Boyne taken me a long time to get to book 23. Forget how much I love John Boyne - a very sad and interesting novel exploring guilt

Murder Most Haunted. Little bit spooky cosy crime. Really funny and an easy read. Cover looks great too!

30. Middle England by Jonathan Coe. Third in the Rotter's Club series. Same characters and some new ones. Time frame is from the riots after the killing of Mark Duggan to post Brexit. Touches on elections, Olympic opening ceremony, cancel culture, gay marriage. Characters of differing ages/ backgrounds/ politics. It's ok - well plotted, clearly designed to use events as a means to portray views from a range of perspectives on these significant cultural and historical moments, and engaging enough. Some funny parts. Not sure what I would have made of it as a stand alone novel without the backstory. Suspect I would have found it rather laboured, but still enjoyable and quite amusing.

As a social document of that period in time it is very worthwhile. I felt I captured the Brexit divide particularly well.

29 Plough over the bones of the Dead - Olga Tukarczuk
This was recommended on the Literary Books Recommendations thread. It has Olive Ketteridge vibes of being written from the view point of a slightly strange older women. It is interesting, I liked the parts about the Polish scenary and it has some profound passages but I didn't love it. I do not know if it was the translation but I didn't love the writing. I could guess the end which I do not really mind as I spend most or reading guessing the end. I think it will stay with me but it is not one I would say is amazing. It is less than 300 pages and if it was a long book I do not know that I would have got through it.

23 The Most by Jessica Anthony
'It takes only one day to unravel a lifetime'.
Longlisted for the national book award, this was a short but powerful read.
3 stars out of 5.

29: Gilead by Marilynne Robinson
Another book that I had high hopes for but was disappointed. I was not going through the best time whilst I was reading it which may have influenced it.

1. I haven't been entirely honest with you, Miranda Hart
2. The Cracked Mirror, Chris Brookmyre
3. Fairy Tale, Stephen King
4. Storm Child, Michael Robotham
5. All the other mothers hate me, Sarah Harman
6. There are rivers in the sky, Elif Shafik
7. A Killer's Wife, Victor Methos
8. Guilty, Martina Cole and Jacqui Rose
9. Apt Pupil, Stephen King
10. The Silent Guest, Sally Rigby
11. The Cut Throat Trial, the Secret Barrister

29. Neon Roses by Rachel Dawson. This was great, I was really keen to get back to it and see what happened next. Set in the 1980s, main character Eluned is obsessed with music and fashion, not long out of school and working in a shoe shop. She lives with her family in a small mining village in Wales and the strikes are well underway. Everyone is skint. Her relationship with her sister is becoming strained as she is dating a policeman. A Lesbian and Gay activist group from London organises fundraising for them and visit to drop the money off, and with their visit Eluned's world gets opened up and turned upside down.

I would say if you enjoyed the film Pride, liked Jonathan Coe's Rotter's Club and used to tape the top 40 off the radio then you'll probably enjoy this. There are some graphic sex scenes (not at all gratuitous though, imo) just mentioning in case anyone was thinking it might be a good gift for someone. Which it definitely would.

14: The Hallmarked Man by Robert Galbraith. The next instalment in the Strike series and another superb case investigation with lots of twists and turns and a great ending.