26ish books 2025

[Tinkhasflown]

A shiny new thread for 2025.

All welcome and note 26 is just a number. Everyone can set their own target and you are welcome here even if you only read 2 books a year.

I personally count the larger novel style books I read to my children and audio books I listen to. Others don't and there are no rules.

I look forward to all your suggestions again this year.

@ExtraDisorganised
I felt exactly the same about Death at the Sign of the Rook.

Her characterisation was, as ever, brilliant but it was about the characters I wasn't as interested in!

Here's hoping for a new and better Brodie soon.

I hope so, but she seems to be making him older very rapidly, in my mind he should still only be about 55.

Oh that's great news, I'll keep an eye out for dates. I'm hoping they tour it or record it for NT At Home.

7: Crow Lake by Mary Lawson
I really liked this one. Canadian fiction.

8: The Five by Hallie Rubenhold
Such an interesting book about the lives of the five women killed by Jack the Ripper. A really enlightening look at the social history of working class women at the time.

Enjoying Saltblood by Elizabeth del Torres at present. Fabulous 18th c tale of a real female pirate.

Now that does sound good!

10, Orbital - Samantha Harvey

This year's Book Winner and I think it's been quite divisive (on this thread too) but I really loved it. I hd to keep reading it though in disruptive places like public transport so I think I might try to make time to read it again but try for a quiet day somewhere and read it in one sitting. I just loved how meditative and unstructured it was

6 I Am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot by the Taliban, Christina Lamb and Malala Yousafzai.

Goodness, what an inspiring young woman.

I’ve got this in my TBR pile, must get it out and read it

Oh, yes, do. I obviously knew about Malala and Mr Breathmiller had seen her speak but I had no idea how young she was when she started her life's work or the history of her particular area of Pakistan, the beautiful Sway valley. Very inspiring and I loved her story of family and ordinariness of life woven through, squabbling with her brother and being with her friends in amongst a very extraordinary life.

1. Wishful Drinking - Carrie Fisher

A short read from a woman who really did live on the edge a lot. Some very serious subject matters at times that she manages to write about in a way that made me laugh out loud.

That was one of my recent reads too @Breathmiller .

The Mercies by Kiran Millwood Hargrave.

Ahhh...a book I'd looked forward to reading for a long time, much lauded on MN.

I liked it very much but can't say that I loved it! I feel like I've read a lot of books about historical witchcraft over the past couple of years...
On that subject, I preferred Weyward by Emilia Hart.

But of course, All the Colours of the Dark is IMO a very hard book to follow!

Book 7: Spiked by Caroline Campbell 7/10
There are real Women’s VAWG stories in this book but also a lot of dark humour. Definitely read this if you haven’t already!

Book 8: Maggie Cassidy by Jack Kerouac 7/10
Based on Kerouac’s first love affair as a teen with Maggie. Very poetic prose, beautifully written but from the brutally frank mind of an adolescent boy.

Book 9: Commonwealth - Ann Patchett 8/10
Loved this book! I think it’s only the 2nd Ann Patchett book I’ve read so I’ll definitely be reading more.

About to start A Pocketful of Happiness by Richard E. Grant. Not sure if it's a good idea while grieving, can always shelf it if it's not.

8 : The Other Side of the Bridge - Mary Lawson

Very much enjoyed this. I had a bit of a quiet spell of reading last month but this reeled me in.
Two stories a generation apart in a farming community in Canada, alternative chapters for each.

I always think highly of these authors that can grip you in one chapter so much that you don't want to swap to the other story in the next chapter But within a page you are engaged again with the one you're reading.

Highly recommend for an interesting but easy read.

Sorry to hear you are grieving Totoro if you need to shelve a book til later then nothing wrong with that.

i am interested in the Jack Kerouac book, I've never read it although I was a bit obsessed with all thing Beat in my early twenties. Have you read Off the Road by Carolyn Cassidy? I had the opportunity to meet her through a book researcher and I was too shy and said no. I was a little in awe of her and couldn't quite bring myself to go. One of my biggest regrets.

Thanks @Breathmiller
I’ve not read Off the Road, but will add it to my list. I loved On the Road, it will be interesting to hear from a Woman’s perspective. It’s been over 25 years since I read On the Road!!

8 The Ghost Road by Pat Barker. Third in the Regeneration Trilogy, read straight after second book because I enjoyed that and wanted to know what's next, I wanted more...but I really didn't get on with this at all. It kept going off into big sort of reveries about one of the two main characters past and it just did not work for me. It was when he was off spending time with a tribe of head hunters and I don't think any of that was referred to in the earlier books, which were all set around hospital / army / war and British society such as class. These in the past sections just felt wedged in for the sake of it and the remaining present day narratives were unsatisfactory. I got a bit cross and started skipping the memories bits so possibly I am doing the book a big disservice, given I didn't read every word...and it won the Booker Prize so some people liked it.
To me it felt like losts of ideas that didn't hang together very well and plot points that were worked in to bring the trilogy to a neat conclusion but loudly clanged "I'm a neat plot point" as they did so.

@Breathmiller Oh I loved Other Side of the Bridge, I keeping to read more of her books

I'm sorry for your loss @Totorosfluffytummy I know one or two people who found a helpful book when in a similar situation but of course everyone's different and you can always come back to it.

I just had 4 nights away totally on my own which included 7 hours of train travel there and back to worked through 3 short books

Book 10: Orbital - Samantha Harvey.
I think this has been a bit divisive on this thread so far but I really loved it, I actually wish I hadn't read it on the journey and had dedicated solid sitting down with a view of the waves to read it in one sitting

Book 11: The Instant - Amy Liptrot
Such a disappointment after The Outrun, just really self indulgent and navel gazing

Book 12: Child of God - Cormac McCarthy
Awful but brilliant, I haven't read a McCarthy in a few years and I love what he does with language and place, his books always feel so claustrophobic, but this is one of the most disturbed of all his characters. Took me a minute to get into it but I read it all on the journey home so wasn't too distracted!

Treacle Walker by Alan Garner

I don't think I'm intelligent enough to 'get' this book?! I found it pretty hard going and ended up skim reading parts of it just to get through it. (It's only short and I didn't notice want to finish it). It reads like a fable or a myth - magical and mysterious, about a young boy and a rag n bone man. It was longlisted for the Booker Prize so there must he something in it... just not for me. 2 out of 5.

9 : My Cousin Rachel - Daphne Du Maurier

I was gripped from start to finish as I was by Rebecca. Loved it.

10 : Orbital - Samantha Harvey

I also loved this. It felt almost like poetry, it summoned up great visions of what they saw and what was happening to the Earth. I kind of feel like I was cocooned in it and would happily see if I can get the audio version on Spotify and be read it. I'd quite like to be in bed and have someone read it to me.

I do think I need to read it again at some point and absorb more of it. Slow down and take in each word. I thought it was beautiful.

exactly how I felt about it

4: World Without End - Ken Follett. A sequel to Pillars of the Earth, another saga set in the fictional city of Kingsbridge in the 14thC, earls, serfs, monks, nuns, the story starts with four children meeting a stranger in a woods and follows them into middle age as their paths cross time and time again in love and hate amidst the Black Death. 45 hours long, but a great listen, perhaps not quite as good as PotE, a bit less dramatic and a bit less real history background but I really enjoyed it. Going to have a break from the series now and try something shorter.

6 The Silence Project - Carole Hailey this was great, a real page turner I’ve binged it in one sitting with a day off work today!