Unputdownable books

[rosyday]

Hello everyone 👋🏻

I have a new year's reading resolution for 2025- I would like to read (at least!) one book a month throughout the year.

Please can you share with me your unputdownable book recommendations? The books which kept you hooked and you couldn't wait to get back to reading? Can be any genre/age- all suggestions welcome!

Thanks so much 🙏🏻❤️

Well, It's not exactly an earth shattering classic, but I absolutely loved a book called Last One at the Party, about a woman who appears to be the only person who survives a global pandemic. It's really readable - I couldn't put it down!
I Who Have Never Known Men is equally fascinating and just heartbreakingly sad.

Thank you! I haven't heard of either of those- but they sound really interesting 🙏🏻

Big Little Lies by Liane Moriarty
Noughts and Crosses by Malorie Blackman
How to Kill Your Family by Bella Mackie
Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin

Classics wise:
Any Agatha Christie
Tess of The D'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë
East of Eden by John Steinbeck

I just finished The Other Bennet Sister. It was a lot better than I was expecting and even made me cry at one point.

I've read a fair few books this year. I usually read fantasy, crime or horror. My favourites this year.

I sped through the Tokyo ghoul and Deathnote manga books. I'm going to read the girl from the otherside next and then attack on titan.

Legends and lattes by travis baldree. I've got the second book ready to read after I've finished my current to reads!

The girl who fell beneath the sea by Axie Oh.

Bitten by Kelley Armstrong (plus the whole otherworld series) I am on my second reread of the series!

Heartstopper by Alice Oseman (my daughter was upset I had read her sisters Manga so I read these at her recommendation and found myself addicted! We then watched the Netflix series together!) Next year I plan to read the novels.

I usually have 3+ books on the go at a time to fit with my mood and how long I have to read at that time 🤣

I also recommend the storygraph app, you can set yourself challenges, see recommendations based in your reading and follow friends etc. The basic version is free. I didnt realise how many pages I had read this year or how many books! And I do love the pie graph and stats of my most read genres 🤣

Cuddy - Benjamin Myers, an absolute joy, especially if you love, or are from, or live in the north east of England. I listened to the audiobook, which meant I could enjoy the local texture through the accents. It's also one for the history buffs, even if you know very little about pre-modern English history.

Yes to Noughts & Crosses - Malorie Blackman

A very different genre, but A Day Late and A Dollar Short - Terry McMillan is one of my favourite books.

Been a long long time since I read for pleasure and is something I want to prioritise.

Ah I really want to like tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow (listening to the audiobook) but halfway through and I'm finding it a bit depressing. Does it get better?!

Currently stuck in All the colours of the dark by Chris Whittaker, cannot put it down!

I loved A Man Called Ove.

Following with interest.

I can recommend Project Hail Mary!

Adding to my watch list so I can do a slow start to January and just read every day

Rachel's holiday by Marian Keyes
(Heartwarming and very funny)

Trust Me by Lesley Pearce
About two little girls post ww2 who get sent from the uk to Australia on the promise of a better future. It's a long book but I literally couldn't wait to see what was going to happen next.

We Need to Talk about Kevin, Such a good book that explores the whole nature v nurture argument.

The Silver Linings Playbook, This has also been made into a movie but the book is better, We need to talk about Kevin is also been made in to a good movie.

The most unputdownable reads of my year were the following books:
The Observations by Jane Harris.

Poor Things by Alasdair Gray. So much better than the film.
Nightingale Wood by Stella Gibbons. A 'modern' retelling of Cinderella (written in the 1930s).

This. By far the best book of 2024.

@tappitytaptap it's not an upbeat read, no. But I really loved the characters and their relationships with one another. I wanted to know where their lives took them and that's what made it unputdownable for me.

The Bee Sting by Paul Murray for an epic character-driven book about an Irish family.

I felt like this when I first started reading it and then lost interest half way through 😬🙈

The book that made me miss my stop on the bus by quite some way was Girlfriend in a Coma by Douglas Coupland. It was about 25 years ago though!

And then there were none by Agatha Christie

Tracy Chevalier Remarkable Creatures, it's about the friendship between Mary Anning & Elizabeth Philpot. Both were fossil hunters in Lyme Regis but with very different backgrounds.

Octavia Butler Kindered - it's time travel with a twist. If you can get past the slightly dated writing style, I'd say a real little gem!

S.A Chakraborty Divabad Trilogy. It's Persian mythology and phantasy... not much more to say except that once you get stuck in, you really want to read all 3 books in one go!

Georgia Howell Queen of the Dessert: The extraordinary Life of Gertrude Bell
It's a biography of an remarkable woman, who was an advocate for the Arabs / Bedouin after WW1 ... reading her biography will definitely give some insight to the troubles in the middle east today.

I like fantasy (among other things) and this year my unputdownable book was Curse of Chalion by Lois McMaster Bujold.

It's an absolute delight, funny, well built world that was easy to understand. The main character is adorable.

If you enjoy it there are other books in the same universe but they stand alone so you don't need knowledge of the others.

I also really enjoyed the First Law Trilogy by Joe Abercrombie.

@tappitytaptap they had Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow on BBC Sounds, podcasts. Less painful than the book itself.

Mamut Hunters by Jean Auel.. but it's the 3rd.in a series. I love the others too but MH is one I just love.

A History of Glue by A D Hesive.