This year I’m going to try and read another 25 books… Got a great stash to start the year with!

Book 1: The measure, by Nikki Erlick

Category: A book recommended by a librarian

I really enjoyed this – interesting concept, with some well-fleshed out characters.

Book 2: At night all blood is black, by David Diop

Category: A book where someone dies in the first chapter

This was excellent but also very dark and depressing. A short and brutal account of war at it’s most savage. I was torn over the category as it fits into several. The narrator is unreliable, but also it’s a horror book by a BIPOC author and a book from a genre I would typically avoid (books about war), AND a book with a title that is a complete sentence.

Book 3: Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow, by Gabrielle Levin

Category: A book about video games

This was really excellent – loved it!

Book 4: Cursed Bread, by Sophie Mackintosh

Category: A book with an unreliable narrator

This one was rather odd. Short but confusing. Very unreliable narrator and not always totally clear what is happening.

Book 5: The 13 and a half lives of Captain Bluebear

Category: A book about pirates

This was.a BEAST of a book – over 700 pages! It was fun and silly but got quite slow in places – definitely could have been edited down substantially. Complete nonsense fantasy but fun and relatively easy to read. Only technically has pirates at the beginning but I’ve put it into that category anyway.

Book 6: You took the last bus home, by Brian Bilston

Category: A collection of at least 24 poems

I love Brian Bilston and this is one of his best collections of poetry. It’s light-hearted and fun and silly.

Book 7: Dirty Laundry, by Disha Bose

Category: A book with at least 3 POVs (point of views)

This was an easy read, bashed through it in a day or two! Bit of a gossipy murder-mystery.

Book 8: Ariadne, by Jennifer Saint

Category: A book with magical realism

This was good but a little slow in places. A nice and interesting re-telling of some classic greek myths from the female perspective.

Book 9: This could be everything, by Eva Rice

Category: A bildungsroman, a coming of age story

This was good, lots of interesting small twists and good characters. An easy read but kept my interest well.

Book 10: The Bee Sting, by Paul Murray

Category: A book recommended by a bookseller

This was really good – long and saga-like but really brilliantly written and quite gripping.

Book 11: How high we go in the dark, by Sequoia Nagamatsu

Category: A book set in the future

This was unlike most books that I usually read, but I really enjoyed it. It was a strange saga spanning hundreds of years, veering from pandemic to sci-fi future.

Book 12: The man who died twice, by Richard Osman

Category: A book with a title that is a complete sentence

I enjoyed this one much more than the first one! I think the characters are really growing on me.

Book 13: The Dictionary of Lost Words, by Pip Williams

Category: None

I really enjoyed this one – not usually a fan of historical fiction but this was well-written with good characters and a very interesting plot – around the making of the first Oxford English Dictionary and how the words that are selected or excluded depend on the gender and class of those creating it. Some sub-plots around suffragettes and feminism and women’s rights too.

Book 14: Mad Honey, by Jodi Picoult and Jennifer Finney Boylan

Category: An LGBTQ+ Romance

Classic Jodi Picoult book. Enjoyable and quick read.

Book 15: The Hike, by Lucy Clarke

Category: A book set in a travel destination on your bucket list

This was a quick and easy whodunnit and I have always wanted to go to Norway (though not hiking alone in the woods!)

Book 16: Cat out of hell, by Lynne Truss

Category: A book from an animal’s Point of view

This book was STRANGE. And also WEIRD. Did I like it? I honestly don’t know.

Book 17: The family upstairs, by Lisa Jewell

Category: A book about a 24-year old

I have cheated slightly here as the main character is in fact 25 and her age is a key plot point so I thought it should count! This was a good quick easy read, lots of drama and an interesting twist of narrators.

Book 18: One Perfect Morning, by Pamela Crane

Category: A book with a main character who’s 42 years old

This was extremely cheesy and frankly quite bad. The characters were pretty unlikeable and not very believable, and it was a quick and easy read but also possibly the worst book I’ve read this year.

Book 19: This time tomorrow, by Emma Straub

Category: A book about a writer/author

This started off slow but got really good and interesting. I do like a time travel book and this one was good.

Book 20: Whistling for Elephants, by Sandi Toksvig

Category: A book that was published 24 years ago

This was wonderful – I really enjoyed it! Interesting characters, strong feminist undertones (and overtones!) and elephants. What’s not to love?

Book 21: Yellowface, by R. F. Kuang

Category: A book that came out in a year that ends in “24”

This was gripping but I genuinely can’t decide if I liked it or not. The main character was extremely unlikeable, but then she was meant to be, and as she was also the main narrator it was hard to tell how trustworthy her version of events were.

It had a very interesting premise and covered lots of things like the cutthroat world of publishing and the struggle for writers to get recognised, how quickly new stars rise and fall, and lots of issues around ethnicity and race.

Book 22: Friends of Dorothy, by Sandi Toksvig

Category: An LGBTQ+ romance novel

Although technically I have already used this category, this fits into it very well. It’s a lovely, inclusive book with great characters, mildly amusing and also very sweet. I love Sandi Toksvig and her books don’t disappoint.

Book 23: Doubt, A parable, by John Patrick Shanley

Category: None

This was very good, and very short. Simple premise, only 4 characters, and very well thought out ones at that. It was very powerful.

Book 24: The Quickening, by Talulah Riley

Category: None

This was an interesting take on the dystopian female-led future. Similar to The Power and Vox, but this one was a little harder to believe. It was a little too simplistic and the characters were harder to figure out – none of them quite had the depth you would want to see. I liked the premise but the delivery lacked something. I did however whizz through it quickly and easily.

Book 25: Project Hail Mary, by Andy Weir

Category: A book set in space

This was my last book of the year and I LOVED it. It was gripping, thoughtful, suspenseful and brilliant. I loved The Martian as well but I think I actually liked this one more.