Books: Your personal year in review for 2025

Some of my favorite reads from this year include:

River of Doubt by C Millard - nonfiction about former president Theodore Roosevelt exploring a river in the Amazon jungle.

Stoner by John Williams, - the life of an academic at a rural university,

The Nickel boys by Colson Whitehead, A young black man finds his way into being an inmate at a terrible reform school.

A fine balance by Mistry - Several families in India find their lives intertwined. It's a brilliant portrait of the political emergency after partition. I cried.

The 13 clocks by James Thurber is a brilliant modern fairy tale.

A fever in the heartland by Tim Egan. Nonfiction US history about the rise and fall of the second ku Klux klan. It's a dramatic tale of hubris and courage.

There eyes were watching God by Zora Hurston. African American classic about several stages of a woman's life.

The Traveling cat Chronicles by Arikawa, a poignant story through the eyes of a cat.

The tea girl of hummingbird lane, about a woman from an ethnic minority in China.

It was a good year for reading. I finished about 70 books. The book club selections provided excellent variety.

I had a pretty good year for reading, I am currently at 63 total books with an original goal of 56 which is twice what I finished last year. I also try to read at least 1 nonfiction book out of 5, and I’m currently at 21% with two nonfiction books in progress.

At the start of the year I was really getting into China Mieville who I discovered at the end of last year and is now on my list of favorite authors. I read Elder Race by Adrian Tchaikovsky for the book club and have been devouring his books, another favorite author. Looking back the last few months I’ve read more westerns than I ever have.

Some of my favorite books I read this year, in no particular order:
Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy
You Can’t Win by Jack Black
Elder Race by Adrian Tchaikovsky
Alien Clay by Adrian Tchaikovsky
The Blacktounge Thief by Christopher Buehlman
Monstrilio by Gerardo Sámano Córdova
Semiosis by Sue Burke
Necroscope by Brian Lumley
The Luminous Dead by Caitlin Starling
The Twisted Ones by T Kingsfisher
The Hollow Places by T Kingsfisher
Waiting for Godot by Samuel Beckett

This year has been big for series. With everything going on in the real world, I've been finding a lot of comfort in escaping into a fictional world I've grown familiar with.

The Murderbot series made an early appearance. I'd heard a lot of mentions before, but dismissed them because the name sounded so silly and flippant. Then, I read a Tildes comment that painted it in a more nuanced light and was persuaded to check it out. It was nice being able to complete the series before I watched the show (also good!).

I've been blowing through as many Discworld audiobooks as I can get my ears on. I initially read the Von Lipwig books last year on the recommendation of a Tilderinoas an easy entry to Pratchett's style. I've since finished the Watch storyline, the 2 gods-related books, and I'm a couple books into the Witchy storyline.

I also listened to Absolution, the 4th of the Southern Reach trilogy. I enjoyed some sections more than others but overall it was fun revisiting that setting.

Most recently, I listened to the City of Last Chances (Adrian Tchaikovsky). As much as I liked the very short Elder Race for the book club, Tchaikovsky seems to be much more in his element with the space of a full novel. I either didn't realize or forgot it was a series, so it was a happy surprise finishing it and being able to pick up the next one (currently midway through). By chance, I read this immediately after Small Gods (Pratchett), and it was amusing to continue the theme of main characters with tiny cranky gods by two different authors.

I've read and liked others, but when I look at the year as a whole, this trend is what really jumps out at me.

I read several novels this year (and admittedly a bunch of graphic novels ... been one of those years). Here are a few things worth mentioning.

Books I liked:

The Martian - Coming off of listening to the audiobook of Project Hail Mary towards the end of 2024, I decided to start 2025's audiobook playlist with this one. I'm glad I did.

Beneath a Scarlet Sky - Based on the true story of an adolescent coming of age in Fascist Italy. His choices, and his family's choices, take him to the unlikely crossroads of being the chauffeur to Germany's highest-ranking officer assigned to Italy. The audiobook does not have my favorite narration, but it's read authentically to the writing (I started with a freemium version of the audiobook and finished by reading the paperback, which I already owned).

Books I disliked:

West with Giraffes - Historical fiction based around a true story, but I just couldn't get behind it. The prose didn't stand out; the characters were, well, characterized but flat; and fiction like this is difficult to see how much effort the author put into research to make things feel period-correct and authentic.

Miscellaneous Mentions:

I'm about 250 pages into Shantaram and love it. Been a long time since I've loved a book as much as this and I read from a pretty broad selection of genres. I'm glad it has been made into a TV show, but I doubt the show will do the book justice. I'll have to find out after I finish reading.

The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare isn't going to be finished by the end of the year, but not for any fault of its own I just don't have the time (and I enjoy WW2 history). I started it a few months after finishing Rogue Heroes by Ben MacIntyre, a competitor of sorts in that genre. I prefer the writing of the former over the latter.

I read a Japanese mystery/thriller called Strange Pictures. It's an interesting take on the genre, though it's style may not appeal to everyone (it's not written for western audiences). I can see why it has become something of a modern cult classic in Japan, but I do wish there were a bit more depth across the board. I'll give the next book by this author a try at some point, but for casual reading I'll stick with my "mysteries" written by Rex Stout.