I'm doing again what I've done before - since no one stopped me last time - and reproducing my year's reading here, then choosing a book of the month for every month. The books of the month are the ones that make me smile again, remembering reading them, or the ones I can't believe I read all those months ago because they're as fresh as ever in my mind, or the ones I wish I hadn't read so I could read them for the first time now. I should just say, though, that the only reason Linda Castillo isn't at least one of them is that I wouldn't know which of her Amish mysteries to pick. Same for Joshua Moehling's Ben Packard series. And I can't quite believe that Stephen King wasn't one. Nor Ashley Mullinger's memoir about being a professional inshore fisherwoman - she was knocked off by Delia Pitts. Anyway . . .
Right now, I'm reading:
TOM LAKE, Ann Patchett - and it's great. Of course it is.
December, 2024
WE USED TO LIVE HERE, Marcus Kliewer
EVERYONE ON THIS TRAIN IS A SUSPECT, Benjamin Stevenson
DAYS AT THE MORISAKI BOOKSHOP, Satoshi Yagisawa
WHERE THEY LAST SAW HER, Marcie Rendon. Devin Abrahmson of Once Upon A Crime in Minneapolis has never hand-sold me a disappointing book. When I was in signing stock in September, I asked her for whatever she wanted to give me and she gave me this sometimes harrowing, sometimes uplifting, always absorbing novel about modern life on a reservation near the pipe line in northern MN, where young women are going missing. It's an own voices triumph by a native writer, clear-sighted yet optimistic, and plotty as hell. A great gang of fierce women at the heart of it too.
November 2024
THE BURNING, Linda Castillo
SCRAP, Calla Henkel
QUARTET IN AUTUMN, Barbara Pym
THE WIFE UPSTAIRS, Rachel Hawkins
TROUBLE IN QUEENSTOWN, Delia Pitts It's a new PI series! Yay! I could no more write one than I could sculpt one out of marble with a spatula, but I love them: Tracy Clark's Cass Raines, Kristin Lepionka's Roxanne Weary, Sara Paretsky's V I Warshawski natch, and now Delia Pitts' Vandy Myrick, a private eye with a heavy heart just trying to keep the lights on in a small town she knows far too well when a simple case of pre-divorce surveillance turns into something much darker. From the bar to the carehome to the hairdressers to the mayor's office - I fell in love with quirky old Queenstown. Roll on book 2.
ONE OF US KNOWS, Alyssa Cole
WHAT YOU ARE LOOKING FOR IS IN THE LIBRARY, Mishiko Aayoma
LONG ISLAND, Colm Toibin
MY FISHING LIFE, Ashley Mullenger
October 2024
EVERYONE IN MY FAMILY HAS KILLED SOMEONE, Benjamin Stevenson
FROM A BUICK 8, Stephen King
JACKIE, Dawn Tripp Right, so I was living in DC in interesting times and spending a lot of time in pretty old Georgetown, but even if I'd been at home in scruffy northern California or at home home in the plotching rain of Scotland, I think I'd have been swept away by this fictionalised account of Jackie Kennedy's life. It's beautifully written and - as far as I know - fills in blanks without changing any facts. I loved Curtis Sittenfield's American Wife (about Laura Bush) but this is something else again. Her surviving family might hate it, but I gobbled it up.
THE LAST PLANTATION, James R Jones
DEMON COPPERHEAD, Barbara Kingsolver
September 2024
THE WEDDING PEOPLE, Alison Espach. I was at the beach in Rhode Island, and I'd just written a book about a wedding. This novel is set at a beach wedding in RI - come on! But it's not a "beach read". It's bitingly funny and a bit bleak, the way it looks at life's sands running out and the disappointments only blessed lives escape. (But - SPOILER ALERT - don't worry; it's got a bit of beach read in there too.)
SHAMED, Linda Castillo
HAPPY PLACE, Emily Henry
LONG TIME GONE, Joshua Moehling
SANDWICH, Catherine Newman
ANYTHING FOR A FRIEND, Kathleen M Willett
August 2024
BREAKING SILENCE, Linda Castillo
THE TAKEN ONES, Jess Lourey
BULL'S EYE, Shannon Baker
THE MYSTERIOUS CASE OF THE ALPERTON ANGELS, Janice Hallett
BIG GAY WEDDING, Byron Lane Pure joy. I was standing in the queue to pay for my books at the Tucson Festival of Books in the Spring and saw this jacket face up on the table. Who could resist? Inside, it's basically Mamma Mia except it's set on a farm in Louisiana and it makes you cry more.
July 2024
MISSING WHITE WOMAN, Kellye Garrett
A BOOKSHOP OF ONE'S OWN, Jane Cholmeley
SKELLIG, David Almond The twenty-fifth anniversary edition of a book I'd never read? See, it's a kids' book and twenty-five years ago I was already grown up and didn't read YA and juvenile fiction. (The bad old days.) It deserves all the years in print and every word of praise. The young hero has just moved house and his baby sister is desperately ill in hospital. When he should be helping unpack, he finds Skellig in a shed in the garden. Who is Skellig? Good question. A homeless man? A guardian angel? A personification of trauma? Brilliant stuff.
YOU LIKE IT DARKER, Stephen King
THE BOOKSHOP WOMAN, Nanako Hanada
MOTHERWELL, Deborah Orr
June 2024
YOU ARE HERE, David Nicholls
THE SUSPECT, Rob Rinder
LONDON PARTICULAR, Christianna Brand
THE BLACK DRESS, Deborah Moggach
SHAKESPEARE: THE MAN WHO PAYS THE RENT, Judi Dench This book is lightly edited transcripts of conversations between Dame Judi and her frequent director at Stratford. The chats were meant to be saved as part of the Royal Shakespeare Company's archive, but someone knew gold when they saw it. I would say that whether you'd enjoy this depends on how much Shakespeare you've seen. I found that the discussion of the plays I didn't know at all - Coriolanus; The Merry Wives of Windsor - didn't hold my attention, but the many that I knew were enriched and sometimes transformed by hearing how Dench approached her roles. And she's very funny too.
DEATH OF A BOOKSELLER, Alice Slater
CALL ME MRS BROWN, Brendan O'Carroll
THE MIDWICH CUCKOOS, John Wyndham
CAUGHT, Harlan Coben (reread)
OLD BONES LIE, Marion Todd (reread)
May 2024
STALIN ATE MY HOMEWORK, Alexei Sayle
CAUGHT, Harlan Coben
MUSIC IN THE DARK, Sally Magnusson
STRANGE SALLY DIAMOND, Liz Nugent
THE WINDSOR KNOT (Her Majesty the Queen Investigates), S J Bennett I picked this up for comfort (see also the re-reads in June). My dad had just died and there was nothing I wanted to read more than a clever story about how another big presence that had been around my whole life was still here and having a blast. I have no idea how authentic the depiction of palace intrigue and Whitehall shenanigans is, but it was convincing. I'll read the next one. And the one after that. RIP, your Madge.
THE GARDEN OF FORGOTTEN WISHES, Trish Ashley
BRIDGES TO BURN, Marion Todd
April 2024
THE KAMOGAWA FOOD DETECTIVES, Hisashi Kashiwai
FOOL ME ONCE, Harlan Coben
STUDIES, Jenny Colgan
THE TRIAL, Rob Rinder
LESSONS, Jenny Colgan
RULES, Jenny Colgan
CLASS, Jenny Colgan So I was packing to go home to Scotland, knowing what was coming, and I found out that one of my favourite writers had published a school story for grown-ups, closely modelled on the Mallory Towers series that were my favourites when I was a kid. Perfect. I read four of them, during some of the most unusual few weeks of my life so far. And if there end up being six novels - one for each year of school - I've got two to go.
March 2024
AND THERE HE KEPT HER, Joshua Moehling
COMFORT EATING, Grace Dent
HOW NOT TO DROWN IN A GLASS OF WATER, Angie Cruz I loved this book so much. It's mostly Cara Romero, newly unemployed fifty-something, being completely unable and unwilling to understand what her employment counsellor is and is not there to help with. Her life is chaotic, ludicrous, heart-wrending and impossible to look away from, with all its feuds and estrangements and unbreakable bonds - often with the same people.
SO LATE IN THE DAY, Claire Keegan
DON'T KNOW TOUGH, Eli Cranor
THE MOTION PICTURE TELLER, Colin Cotteril
CIRQUE DU SLAY, Rob Osler
BEING MORTAL, Atul Gawande
FINLAY DONOVAN IS KILLING IT, Elle Cosimano
Feb 2024
MY DARKEST PRAYER, Shawn. A. Cosby
WITNESS FOR THE PERSECUTION, E J Copperman
THE SAVAGE KIND, John Copenhaver
THE CASE OF THE MISSING MAID, Rob Osler (Jan 2025) Don't judge this book by the cover. Because this isn't the cover. This is the picture of Harriet Morrow that I drew on the front of the printed manuscript, proving that I should stick to words. Rob's words I heartily recommend. Harriet is the first woman detective at a Chicago agency in the 1890s, breaking rules as well as her case, as she bicycles around the city. There's a tender and nailbiting depiction of queer life in mortally dangerous times for non-conforming people too.
DEATH OF A FLYING NIGHTINGALE, Laura Jensen Walker (Aug 2024)
WHERE THE DEAD SLEEP, Joshua Moehling
THE MISTRESS OF BHATIA HOUSE, Sujata Massey
THE BELL IN THE FOG, Lev A C Rosen
January 2024
HIDE, Tracy Clark
PRAY FOR SILENCE, Linda Castillo
LESSONS IN CHEMISTRY, Bonnie Garmus
YELLOWFACE, Rebecca Kuang Is it a thriller? Is it a satire? Is a reflection on white privilege? It's all that and more. A sly look at the worst of the publishing industry and an all-too-believable dark fairytale about what a very hungry debut author might do to get ahead. I read it with my shoulders round my ears from the cringing, but I read it in days.
ALL THE SINNERS BLEED, S.A.Cosby
On the Air with Zoe Washington, Janelle Marks
Christmas Holiday 23-24
STAY ANOTHER DAY, Juno Dawson I always read a Christmas book at Christmas (it's Jenny Colgan coming up) and last Christmas it was this luscious family melodrama / rom-com set in posh Edinburgh in the run up to the 25th. It reminds me so much of my late teenage years I can't believe I didn't meet myself in one of the party chapters, but I'm pretty sure people who've never been to Scotland would find a lot to love here too. At the very least, this lot will probably make your home life feel tranquil in comparison.
The Last Remains, Elly Griffiths
Remainders of the Day, Shaun Bythell,
Holly, Stephen King,
The Christmas Appeal, Janice Hallett
The Raging Storm, Anne Cleeves
A Very Noble Profession, Nicola Beauman
The Last Devil to Die, Richard Osman
So there they are, my fourteen books - one for each of the last twelve months with a bit of added TBR artithemtical magic. Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
Cx
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