2025's stand-out fiction reads
If you look at this list and you think we have crossover in our reading tastes, please recommend me a book to enjoy in 2026!
Down the Rabbit Hole by Juan Pablo Villalobos My favourite of the year! Very funny, very dark, very short. Reading this felt like plugging myself into mains electricity.
The Lowlife by Alexander Baron Puts me so believably in the shoes of someone with whom I have almost nothing in common, so that as I read I thought 'yeah if I were him I would have done that too'. Tragicomic.
Tragic Magic by Wesley Brown I'm entranced by how this writer uses language.
Close Range: Wyoming Stories by Annie Proulx Vibrating with believability. Takes you there.
The Meaning Of Night by Michael Cox Slow paced victorian mystery with plot reveal on plot reveal on plot reveal, and a deliciously untrustworthy first-person narrator.
A Morbid Taste for Bones by Ellis Peters I am not immune to the lure of the monk mystery
The Books of Jacob by Olga Tokarczuk A high-effort/high-reward read & a remarkable feat of writing. Totally transporting and not at all what I expected.
The Glass Pearls by Emeric Pressburger A very impactful & challenging book that I have appreciated mostly in retrospect - the ending in particular has stuck with me.
A Place of Greater Safety by Hilary Mantel She's done it again - Hilary Mantel knew how to write messy interpersonal relationships!
Bird in a Cage by Frédéric Dard Mediocre characters (imo) deliver a spectacular noir mystery plot with a great ending.
Picnic at Hanging Rock by Joan Lindsey Tense!!!
The Forgery by Ave Barrera Unexpected! Playful! I got along very well with the pace and the writing style.
