sandrylene | 2025 Books Roundup (Reply)

Stats
Number Of Books You Read: 103. Fewer this year than in other recent years, still totally happy with that. Though if there were a way to track how much fanfic I've read, I kind of suspect that's where the rest of my usual reading went. I was super self-indulgent this year, particularly after I swapped jobs in May.

Authors were 86.79% female, 6.60% male, 5.66% non-binary, 0.94% anthology/mixed.

Number of Re-Reads: 7

Shortest & Longest Book You Read In 2025?

Shortest: Megan Derr - Wildflower

Longest: A reread of a compilation of Nalini Singh books (again - self-indulgent)

Average Length for the Year: 312 pages

Superlatives

Best Book You Read In 2025?

Malka Ann Older - The Potency of Ungovernable Impulses

Katherine Addison - The Tomb of Dragons

Ilona Andrews - The Inheritance

Martha Wells - The Emelie Adventures

Adrian Tchaikovsky - Service Model

Book You Were Excited About & Thought You Were Going To Love More But Didn’t? Kaliane Bradley - The Ministry of Time. I feel like I heard a lot of good things about it in advance. We bookclubbed it. I think we pretty much all were like "wait, so why was this hyped again, exactly??" The romancey bit of this had me physically trying to not see the pages I hated it so much.

Most surprising (in a good way or bad way) book you read in 2025? Well, I was certainly surprised when Neal Stephenson's Polostan ended with what functionally was like "to be continued! Return next time for our newest episode!" He's usually way more self-contained per book than that, and I'd no idea this wasn't standalone coming into it. Whoops.

Book You “Pushed” The Most People To Read (And They Did) In 2025? I don't think this happened this year

Best series you started in 2025? Sharon Shinn's Uncommon Echoes series. I like her stuff generally, and I thought this was a pretty novel concept to put in a fantasy world. Best Sequel of 2025? Katherine Addison - The Tomb of Dragons. Have been really enjoying this series, always happy to read more in it. Best Series Ender of 2025? Most of the series I read this year I actually don't think they've finished. Uh. Uncommon Echoes might be the only thing where I've read the most recent in that series and it's actually ended.

Favorite new author you discovered in 2025? I'm going to cheat slightly with an author I first read in December of 2024, because I'm not sure I have someone new for 2025. So Patricia Briggs. Between December of 2024 and 2025 I've now read 22 of her books. It's not profound, or whatever, but they're fun.

Best book from a genre you don’t typically read/was out of your comfort zone? KJ Charles - All of Us Murderers, which I took a chance on because I love KJ Charles, but unlike I think last year where I branched out on Nalini Singh for another genre, this one I quite liked. This is gothic and murdery, but I found it enjoyable anyhow.

Most action-packed/thrilling/unputdownable book of the year? Let's say Martha Wells - The Emelie Adventures. This is I guess technically two books, but both were exciting and engrossing action, IMO.

Book You Read In 2025 That You Are Most Likely To Re-Read Next Year? I don't know. I'm planning on re-reading Witch King, I think, because I got out Queen Demon in December and was like "wait, what all is happening again?" but I read that in 2024, so I dunno that it counts. No other ideas, though.

Favorite cover of a book you read in 2025? No idea.

Most memorable character of 2025? Heh, maybe this is recency bias, but Lord Thomas Cromwell, the cat in C. M. Waggoner's The Village Library Demon-Hunting Society, who is absolutely ridiculous, is in the body of a cat, is clearly some sort of immortal supernatural being, and claims to be Lord Thomas Cromwell. As you do.

Most beautifully written book read in 2025? I'm going to say Malka Ann Older - The Potency of Ungovernable Impulses. I love this series *so much*, and love what the author does with the languages of the book, and that just continues to be the case.

Most Thought-Provoking/Life-Changing Book of 2025? For thought-provoking let's say Service Model. This spent a lot on the nature of humanity via the lens of what the robots they've created had done. Perhaps apt lately. /:

Book you can’t believe you waited UNTIL 2025 to finally read? Well I think I have to say My Man Jeeves - P. G. Wodehouse, if only because we bookclubbed it a couple years back, and I read the first maybe half of it and felt like I didn't need to read any more to discuss it. It's a miracle I went back and finished it, honestly.

Favorite Passage/Quote From A Book You Read In 2025?

Then she looked around for her cat. There was no sign of him. Of course there wasn’t. He was a cat, and she wanted to find him, so obviously he was nowhere to be found. “Lord Thomas?” she said aloud, feeling, as ever, self-conscious over the fact that she was speaking to her cat. “Lord Thomas Cromwell?” A moment later a little orange head pushed itself out from under the sofa. “May I be of some assistance, Mistress Pinkwhistle?” She smiled. She couldn’t help it. “What were you doing under the sofa, Lord Thomas?” “I was at my repose,” the cat said with enormous dignity.
C. M. Waggoner - The Village Library Demon-Hunting Society

Joyce’s love for her is unconditional, Joanna knows that, but, really, unconditional love has a huge flaw. If you love me no matter what, who I actually am doesn’t matter. If someone loves your essence, your very being, what can you do to make them love you more or love you less? Nothing: there is no space. So the only option left to you is to continually prod at that unconditional love, to test it and stretch it, to mock it even. And it’s not just that. There is a further problem with unconditional love, isn’t there? Because what if you don’t love yourself? What if, like Joanna, you obsess over your flaws and weaknesses, you constantly update the balance sheet of your own personality and find it wanting? Well, then the unconditional love of a parent is a sign that they simply don’t know you. If they truly knew you, their love would be peppered with caveats. “I love you, but…”
Richard Osman - The Impossible Fortune

“If you’re going to tell me how many great houses were built or rebuilt or filled with wonderful art on the profits of slavery, I already know. Bram and Hawley don’t agree on much, but they would both tell you that Art justifies suffering. The existence of a beautiful building filled with beautiful things is worth any number of nameless, unimportant lives lost on a plantation or down a mine. Our wealth might have come from regrettable origins, but that’s all in the past and there’s no point making a fuss.” “You don’t agree?” “If people want to achieve greatness through suffering, it should be their own damn suffering,” Zeb said. “And even if I did believe art justifies inflicting pain and misery on people, which I do not, Lackaday House is trite, cliched, and horrible. I’m not suggesting it would be all right if the house was beautiful,” he added. “Just that this ludicrous Gothic rubbish is whatever the opposite of icing on the cake is. The shit on the shoe.”
K. J. Charles - All of Us Murderers

Book That Shocked You The Most. This is dumb, but. I didn't see the outcome in Richard Osman - The Impossible Fortune coming. In retrospect I really, really should have. I feel like I am often too credulous a person and a reader, and this was another of those moments.

OTP OF THE YEAR (you will go down with this ship!). I think this'll be another year with nothing in this category.

Favorite Non-Romantic Relationship Of The Year. Uncharles and The Wonk is a fun dynamic. (From Adrian Tchaikovsky - Service Model.)

Favorite Book You Read in 2025 From An Author You’ve Read Previously. I'll say Casey McQuiston - The Pairing. I was surprised how much I enjoyed this.

Best Book You Read In 2025 That You Read Based SOLELY On A Recommendation From Somebody Else/Peer Pressure. I think someone recommended Heather Fawcett - Emily Wilde's Map of the Otherlands. I'm struggling to remember who. Cute and enjoyable, though.

Newest fictional crush from a book you read in 2025? Definitely none.

Best debut you read? ...I haven't read many debuts this year. I think the only book Rhaina Cohen has written is the one I read, The Other Significant Others: Reimagining Life with Friendship at the Center. I'm going to say that counts and move on.

Best Worldbuilding/Most Vivid Setting You Read This Year? I'll say Martha Wells - The Emelie Adventures. It's a weird world setup, but definitely I'd say it felt vivid to me.

Book That Put A Smile On Your Face/Was The Most FUN To Read? Ilona Andrews - The Inheritance. It's a fun adventure where I was cheering for the protagonist the whole time.

Book That Made You Cry Or Nearly Cry in 2025? ...wow. I'm not remembering any. What a weird year. I strongly suspect earlier in the year I had some, like I *think* Alexis Hall - Rosaline Palmer Takes the Cake was one, but I read that in February. Who remembers crying 10+ months ago?

Hidden Gem Of The Year? Let's say Celia Lake - Harmonic Pleasure. In a bunch of ways this is Sandry-bait, so YMMV, but the bits with music intertwined with magic, the bits exploring London underground a bit, and the low stakes romance part of it are all up my alley. I don't think Celia Lake is well known, but I find her stuff tremendously readable, typically, and this was one I liked quite well this year.

Book That Crushed Your Soul? Huh. My soul was uncrushed this year, books-wise, I think.

Most Unique Book You Read In 2025? Well. Margaret Atwood - Payback was unlike anything else I read this year. I am not saying that's a good thing. It had some interesting points. I'm not sure I enjoyed it as a book all together.

Book That Made You The Most Mad (doesn’t necessarily mean you didn’t like it)? Well. P. G. Wodehouse - My Man Jeeves is at *many points* deeply annoying in a way I expect it's supposed to be. Which is to say you get all these deeply privileged idiots living stupid lives and getting bailed out constantly by their working class butlers or valets or whatever. This is supposed to be funny and sometimes it is, but a nontrivial amount of the time I also just want to smack everyone upside the head.

Huh. I suspect, based on how this came out, that I really was *too* self-indulgent this year. This reflection makes me weirdly a tad concerned about what my brain is up to.

On the plus side, for books I finished despite hating them, I think I probably count Ministry of Time and nothing else, so that's something!