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Books I "Read" in 2025
So, my NYR for 2025 was to "read" (listen to) more (audio)books, which I sort of ended up front loading. Basically, I read 13 books (DNF 3) books March to May and then didn't pick up another book until this month. That, said while I did come across some stinkers, there were also some that I read that I really enjoyed.
Books Listened To:
That said, this brings up two points for me going into next year where I think my 2026 NYR is to read books:
1. As much as I enjoyed the Octavian Nothing books, M.T Anderson, who wrote them (context: the books follow a slave through the American Revolution) is white. I think the books were well researched and handled the themes of race and identity with great mastery, but by contrast, I look back on the other books I read by actually black writers and by and large, I didn't come across one that really gripped me. Even now, I'm reading Kindred by Octavia Butler and while I'm enjoying it well enough, it's not wowing me. Real Life, The Nickel Boys and The Underground Railroad didn't wow me, either, which was a disappointment, especially with the latter two because they have good concepts and ticked off a lot of boxes for me as a reader. The execution for those books was just not... idk, it didn't meet my expectation given the awards and commendations by others. I found Colson Whitehead particularly disappointing because I read two of his books and they were both so dry and unengaging (as well as unengaged—literally, the POVs felt so strangely detached) compared to Octavian Nothing. I know, bad to pit two books against each other other when so many things about them are different, but... I guess after seeing the light, lol—coming back to trying to read more books (and not just fanfiction, which I also read less and less of nowadays) and stumbling across a writer whose works gets you so fired up to get excited about hearing more stories and reading more books... it's just bitterly disappointing when the books that come after don't carry that momentum. All this to say, I'm hoping I can find more books in 2026 that are written by black authors (lived experience, etc) that really work for me as a reader. The other books by non-black authors of color that I read ranged from Just Decent to Pretty Good, so they get a pass this year/won't be trying As Hard to search better in 2026, although of course it'll also be a fun challenge to find more good stuff from non-white writers in general... something that's important to me as a reader since I am also not white (in case that wasn't clear lol).
2. With regards to actually reading with my eyeballs, I'm curious to see how that will go and if I'll be able to tell how that influences my view of the narrative. Some of the audiobooks I read this year, I do suspect that the voice acting made a difference. Sort of likewise, I find myself hoping it was wooden narration that partially made me disengage from the Whitehead novels (although I'm not confident there...). I will probably just be reading books on Libby or maybe I'll try and read some of the books I have on the shelf at home. I'm going to set a much lower goal for reading. This year my goal was 9 books (1 for each month and I made my NYR in March lol). I think my goal for 2026, keeping in mind I won't be able to "read" while I work or run, will be 5.
I'm going to try and write reviews/final thoughts for next year's books, too, because I suppose it's a muscle I should keep training even though (maybe especially because) I feel like an idiot and a poser when I try to do literary analysis... if you can call it that. I suppose what I do is more like summarising and shallowly opining. Ogre barely even literate!
Well, whatever.
Books Listened To:
- The Body Falls (Inishowen Mysteries #5), Andrea Carter
- The Underground Railroad, Colson Whitehead
- Yellowface, R.F Kuang
- The Resurrectionist, A. Rae Dunlap
- The Pox Party (The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation #1), M.T Anderson
- The Kingdom on the Waves (The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation #2), M.T Anderson
- The Nickel Boys, Colson Whitehead
- Real Life, Brandon Taylor (79% DNF)
- Lavender House (Evander Mills #1), Lev A.C Rosen
- The House of Doors, Tan Twan Eng (39% DNF)
- The Bell in the Fog (Evander Mills #2), Lev A.C Rosen (71% DNF)
- Mexican Gothic, Silvia Moreno Garcia
- You Are Fatally Invited, Ande Pliego
That said, this brings up two points for me going into next year where I think my 2026 NYR is to read books:
1. As much as I enjoyed the Octavian Nothing books, M.T Anderson, who wrote them (context: the books follow a slave through the American Revolution) is white. I think the books were well researched and handled the themes of race and identity with great mastery, but by contrast, I look back on the other books I read by actually black writers and by and large, I didn't come across one that really gripped me. Even now, I'm reading Kindred by Octavia Butler and while I'm enjoying it well enough, it's not wowing me. Real Life, The Nickel Boys and The Underground Railroad didn't wow me, either, which was a disappointment, especially with the latter two because they have good concepts and ticked off a lot of boxes for me as a reader. The execution for those books was just not... idk, it didn't meet my expectation given the awards and commendations by others. I found Colson Whitehead particularly disappointing because I read two of his books and they were both so dry and unengaging (as well as unengaged—literally, the POVs felt so strangely detached) compared to Octavian Nothing. I know, bad to pit two books against each other other when so many things about them are different, but... I guess after seeing the light, lol—coming back to trying to read more books (and not just fanfiction, which I also read less and less of nowadays) and stumbling across a writer whose works gets you so fired up to get excited about hearing more stories and reading more books... it's just bitterly disappointing when the books that come after don't carry that momentum. All this to say, I'm hoping I can find more books in 2026 that are written by black authors (lived experience, etc) that really work for me as a reader. The other books by non-black authors of color that I read ranged from Just Decent to Pretty Good, so they get a pass this year/won't be trying As Hard to search better in 2026, although of course it'll also be a fun challenge to find more good stuff from non-white writers in general... something that's important to me as a reader since I am also not white (in case that wasn't clear lol).
2. With regards to actually reading with my eyeballs, I'm curious to see how that will go and if I'll be able to tell how that influences my view of the narrative. Some of the audiobooks I read this year, I do suspect that the voice acting made a difference. Sort of likewise, I find myself hoping it was wooden narration that partially made me disengage from the Whitehead novels (although I'm not confident there...). I will probably just be reading books on Libby or maybe I'll try and read some of the books I have on the shelf at home. I'm going to set a much lower goal for reading. This year my goal was 9 books (1 for each month and I made my NYR in March lol). I think my goal for 2026, keeping in mind I won't be able to "read" while I work or run, will be 5.
I'm going to try and write reviews/final thoughts for next year's books, too, because I suppose it's a muscle I should keep training even though (maybe especially because) I feel like an idiot and a poser when I try to do literary analysis... if you can call it that. I suppose what I do is more like summarising and shallowly opining. Ogre barely even literate!
Well, whatever.