Last year I read 30 books, so was hoping to go at least one better.

I failed.

I ended up reading 29 books – I think I may have read a few more teenage fiction last year and also had to drag myself through a couple of long books this year – but I’m happy.

The stats…

Another good year with a good selection of different books.

My favourites, according to my arbitrary 5 star rating, all got 4 stars:

• ‘You Are Here’ by David Nichols – favourite of the year – probably deserved more than 5 stars!
• ‘When Our World’s Collided’ by Danielle Jawando – teenage fiction last year- three teenagers all witness a stabbing
• ‘Everyone Here is Lying’ by Shari Lapena – really liked this – crime thriller
• ‘The Accomplice’ by Steve Cavanagh – read a couple of his this year
• ‘The Book with No Name’ by Anonymous – not my usual read but absolutely loved it
• ‘My Sister, the Serial Killer’ by Oyinkan Braithwaite – great read
• ‘The Beresford’ by Will Carver – had to be a Will Carver – I love him!
• ‘Ducking Long Way’ by Mark Akinson – best running book of the year!

So another successful reading year, definitely targeting 31 books in 2025.

‘We Solve Murders’ by Richard Osman

Having read a couple of ‘The Thursday Murder Club’ it was recommended I have a read of his Osman’s latest book.

It’s not ‘The Thursday Murder Club’ but it is remarkably similar – hence my overall opinion being – it was alright.

‘Take No More’ by Seb Kirby

I did not buy this. In fact, it was one of a bundle of three books by Seb Kirby that I won at the village quiz raffle.

On the blurb it says:

A fast-paced and highly original crime thriller set in the art world, perfect for fans of Dan Brown and Harlan Coben.

It is not original, sorry Seb, sister in trouble finds out she has an identical twin and they swap identities to escape the mafia. That’s not original.

I gave this book two out of five stars, it probably deserved less, but I’m reluctant to give people who actually make the effort to write a book less than two stars.

It was poorly written, unoriginal and I did very well to complete it. Maybe that should go on the blurb!

This, together with the unread two, will be going to a charity shop.

‘Sweet Sorrow’ by David Nichols

Everyone likes David Nicholls.

This novel is good.

Two teenagers meet in an amateur dramatic company that is about to put on Shakespeare’s ‘Romeo and Juliet’ – you can probably see where this going – it’s better than you’d imagine.

Well worth a read.

‘Alone on the Wall’ by Alex Honnold’

A book about climbing. I watched a documentary on TV about Alex Honnold, an American free-solo climber.

I thought the book might go into a bit more detail about the man himself. It didn’t really. There was a lot of ‘we climbed a mountain’ and ‘it was a 5.12a difficulty’ and ‘we got the speed record’. But I don’t really know more about him than I did originally.

I’m sure that if you are into climbing you would enjoy it more than me. I didn’t really enjoy it.

‘Day One’ by Abigail Dean

I really didn’t like this book – I never actually got into it at all. I finished it, but only because I rarely give up on a book.

It’s about a school shooting. The actually incident itself is never explained in detail, the book is more about the effect on individuals and the community.

It follows a couple of characters: Marty, a girl involved in the shooting (or not); and Trent, another local who believes the whole thing is a bunch of lies.

I found the book quite confusing at times, it jumps between characters and moments in time, which normally I’m ok with, but with this I never felt comfortable reading. I just found it all a bit hard work.