What I Read: January

I've mentioned before that winter is my reading season. It's cozy and cold (SO COLD this month!) and dark early and the perfect time (for me) to get a lot of books knocked off my list. I'm doubly motivated this year as I get to buy a new book for every 10 books I read from my own shelves, and I'm dying to get the next book in the Thursday Murder Club series. Have you read them? If you like cozy British mysteries and septuagenarian sleuths...this is definitely a set for you to check out.

And while last year was all about reading through the books on my shelf (some months were a little more themed than others, like more self-improvement in January or mystery in October), this year I am grabbing the books that grab my interest. I had a few reading slumps in 2024 (despite making it through 62 books for the year), but I don't like forcing myself to finish books. So this year I'm starting out by simply reading the books that make me laugh, or the ones that sound interesting...and then are interesting. Reading to hit the numbers isn't really the point (well, it's sort of the point, but not the main point)...I want to read to learn, read to grow, and read to laugh. 

What's on your reading list this year?

Photo by Sixteen Miles Out on Unsplash

I was pretty pleased with myself when I had read my third book of the month by January 7th, but I also knew that the slump could come at any time, so it's always best to make hay while the sun shines (Pa Ingalls taught me that). 

1. The Man Who Died Twice by Richard Osman - ★★★★ I mentioned the Thursday Murder Club series at the start of this post, and this is book #2. I had really low expectations of the first book, and I think because my expectations were so raised during the reading of that, I probably had slightly high expecations for the second book. Don't get me wrong, it was great! I thoroughly enjoyed it and read it in a couple of days, but it received four stars, rather than five, as the first one received. However, the gang is all back together in this one, along with some new members (grandsons, taxi drivers, and a few folks from MI5 and 6 and the American mafia, just to keep it interesting). {Amazon Associates Link}
2. The Man Who Invented Christmas by Les Standiford - ★★★★ I purchased the movie tie-in Kindle version of this (two things I dislike: movie tie-in versions and ebooks, but it was the cheapest way to get it!), and missed the fact that 40% of the book was actually Dickens' A Christmas Carol. So when I got to the 60% mark and Standiford's book ended, I was a bit confused, until I realized we were now diving into Dickens' story after we finished reading about his life, writing, and the most well known of his Christmas tales, A Christmas Carol. This is really more of a 3.5 star book, but I rounded up, because I did learn a few things about Dickens that made all of his stories make more sense. I think there are probably better biographies of Dickens, but this wasn't a bad little book in its own right. {Amazon Associates Link}
3. Your Year of Wonders by Nick Tasler - ★★★★ This is quite a short little read (just 104 pages), which the author calls the perfect "airplane read." This is not a check-list "how to" book, nor does it need to be as we are all coming from different places with different stories, but it is an encouraging book to start out the year. The stories that he shares of people who have accomplished big things, gotten stuck, and figured out a way to move forward are encouraging. I particularly liked his take on fear as a motivator - positive for getting one moving out of a stuck position, negative for encouraging creativity. Not only a good thought for all of us when faced with fear, but a good reminder for parents when dealing with children. {Amazon Associates Link} 
4. The Night Trilogy by Elie Wiesel - ★★ This was a hard series to read. It actually gets two stars because I dislike that the first book (Night) is the non-fiction account of the author's experience in Nazi concentration camps as a 15-year-old boy, while the following books (Dawn and Accident) are fictional accounts, which could easily lead people into thinking that the first book is as well. And the Holocaust should never, in any way, be turned into fiction. It was real, it was horrific, and it should be remembered and learned from. So, although a heavy read, I would give Night four stars on its own, but not included in this trilogy, which gets two. On their own, I would say that Dawn and Accident, while fiction, are highly influenced by Weisel's experiences during the Holocaust, which clearly comes through in his writing. Although he physically survived the war, after reading his work I would say he died mentally, emotionally, and spiritually, which is what made them so difficult to read. {Amazon Associates Link} 
5. The Word is Murder by Anthony Horowitz - ★★★★★ About a third of the way through the book I thought this might turn out to be a disappointment. But by the time I was 80% done with the book and the killer was suddenly revealed and I never saw it coming...I was totally hooked. The premise, that the actual author is writing the story as if it happened, and he was the Watson to Hawthorne's "Sherlock," was intriguing. There was death and murder and blood, but it wasn't gory. In fact, it reminded me a lot of watching "Midsomer Murders," which is no surprise...since the author wrote for that show very early on. Bottom line: The perfect cold-weather, winter cozy read. {Amazon Associates Link}
6. Everyone In My Family Has Killed Someone by Benjamin Stevenson - ★★★ This was a toss-up between three and four stars for me. It was an interesting premise, with a lot of background and a lot of characters to keep track of, which is one of the reasons I ended up giving it three stars instead of four. If you read this, read it all in a weekend, because I ended up setting it down a few times and coming back several days later and I had to remind myself who was who in the story. But when I was reading it straight through, they all made sense. There was definitely a twist at the end that I only saw coming moments before it happened, so that was nice. And the twist at the very end I never saw coming, so kudos to the author for that one. I would definitely give him another try, based on this book. {Amazon Associates Link}
7. The Sentence is Death by Anthony Horowitz - ★★★★ This is the second book in the Hawthorne & Horowitz Mysteries series, and I enjoyed it almost as much as the first. It was a bit of a letdown (which the author, himself, included that letdown as part of the plot line) when the ending felt so similar to the first book. However, just like the first book, I really didn't see who the murderer was until right before (as in a page or two) they were revealed. He does a great job of throwing a lot of options out there, and let you be as confused as he (the author) is in trying to untangle them. All in all, I'm quite enjoying this series and have already started book #3, so you can look for that review next month! {Amazon Associates Link}

And that's the wrap up of the first seven books of 2025. Not a bad beginning, all things considered, and a few winning series that I'm looking forward to continuing this year (and thankfully, all the authors are still writing them, which is fun). 

What's the best book you've read so far in the year? Book goals? 

Jump in the comments and share!