I started sharing my annual reading lists in 2023 (and of course did so again last year) – and now here’s my list of the *49* books that I read in 2025!
This year was a good bit slower reading-wise than last year because with, ya know, moving and everything, I had a LOT going on. Also how annoying to me personally that I was just ONE book shy of 50, ha! But that said, here’s a little key to the full list below:
– A book with 3 stars marks my absolute favorite books of the year
– A book with 2 stars means it made it into my top 12 books of the year
– A book with 1 star is a read that didn’t make it into the top 12 but that I still really enjoyed
– A book with “~DNWTF~” after it means that, completionist that I am, I finished reading it even though I didn’t want to, ha
– Underlined titles are re-reads
– Bolded titles mean I read a physical copy
– Italicized titles denote audiobooks that I listened to
…and FYI, if a book has no stars, that doesn’t mean I straight up didn’t like it, I just didn’t want to try to dig any deeper into star ratings than what’s listed above.
I would say that my ultimate favorite book this year was Hollow Kingdom by Kira Jane Buxton; and despite my only putting the first of The Casquette Girls series by Alys Arden in my top 12 for the year, I’d still give the series as a whole (four books total, including The Casquette Girls, The Romeo Catchers, The Cities of Dead, and The Gates of Guinée) my ‘favorite new series of the year’ honorific. (And honestly considering that I also started – and LOVED – the Locked Tomb series by Tamsyn Muir this year, it wasn’t easy for me to choose a ‘best new series’!)
NOVELS/NOVELLAS
Son of a Witch – Gregory Maguire
Dead Reckoning – Charlaine Harris
Deadlocked – Charlaine Harris
Dead Ever After – Charlaine Harris
* Wind and Truth – Brandon Sanderson
After Dead – Charlaine Harris
A Lion Among Men – Gregory Maguire
This City and Its Uncertain Walls – Haruki Murakami
Out of the Easy – Ruta Sepetys
Out of Oz – Gregory Maguire
A Confederacy of Dunces – John Kennedy Toole ~DNWTF~
** The Casquette Girls – Alys Arden
* The Romeo Catchers – Alys Arden
The Sound of Building Coffins – Louis Maistros
* The Cities of Dead – Alys Arden
Elphie – Gregory Maguire
** Sunrise on the Reaping – Suzanne Collins
* The Gates of Guinée – Alys Arden
The Sum of All Writers – Anthology ~DNWTF~
** The Scandalous Confessions of Lydia Bennett, Witch – Melinda Taub
*** Hollow Kingdom – Kira Jane Buxton
** Feral Creatures – Kira Jane Buxton
Gothikana – RuNyx
The Echoes of Old Books – Barbara Davis
Midnight Sun – Stephenie Meyer
* Skippers of Fortune – James Castellaw
Problematic Summer Romance – Ali Hazelwood
The Last Lumenian – S.G. Blaise ~DNWTF~
** City of Refuge – Tom Piazza
*** Gideon the Ninth – Tamsyn Muir
I Capture the Castle – Dodie Smith
The Identicals – Elin Hilderbrand
** Isles of the Emberdark – Brandon Sanderson
Throne in the Dark – AK Caggiano
All Adults Here – Emma Straub ~DNWTF~
A Flicker in the Dark – Stacy Willingham
The Dictionary of Lost Words – Pip Williams ~DNWTF~
Summoned to the Wilds – AK Caggiano
** Harrow the Ninth – Tamsyn Muir
Eclipse of the Crown – AK Caggiano
The Twelve Topsy Turvy Very Messy Days of Christmas – James Patterson & Tad Safran ~DNWTF~
*** Nona the Ninth – Tamsyn Muir
Brigands & Breadknives – Travis Baldree
** The Dream Hotel – Laila Lalami
“REAL LIFE”
*** Nine Lives – Dan Baum
1 Dead in Attic – Chris Rose
Katrina: After the Flood – Gary Rivlin
Emily Dickson’s Poems: As She Preserved Them – Edited by Cristanne Miller
New Orleans Voodoo: A Cultural History – Rosary O’Neill & Rory O’Neill Schmitt