The Art Attic #8: 2025 in Books

My best read of 2025 Thanks, Nathan!

In 2025, I read 87 books. They were almost entirely audio, but I did read three or four with my eyeballs. My genres are usually horror, thriller, mystery, and historical fiction. I do read a lot of non-fiction as well from a wide array of topics. These were my most memorable books of 2025:

Let's start with the most confusing title of the year: Zero Stars, Do Not Recommend by M.. Wassmer. Imagine that you are on vacation when the world ends, but it's ending slowly, so your whole resort is trying to band together only to quickly develop a caste system. It's funny and heartfelt. 

Pair these together: Bright Young Women by Jessica Knoll and Know My Name by Chanel Miller. Bright Young Women is fictionalized true crime, but it is pointedly taking the focus off of the limelight-basking narcissist killer and turning it back on the survivors. It follows a young woman who was the chapter president of a sorority house when a certain killer on a spree came to town, killing two of her housemates and maiming two more. That happens first, because this book is about the shock, confusion, bravery and indignity of being sucked into such a situation. Likewise, Know My Name, Chanel Miller's stunning memoir about her own sexual assault and the headline-grabbing aftermath is about the small steps of quiet deviation and the cathartic punch of reclaiming your own narrative. I sobbed.

I did not sob when reading my horror selections for 2025. In fact, Victorian Psycho by Virginia Feito and Listen to Your Sister by Neena Viel are both absolutely hilarious. (If you have a dark soul like me, that is.) Victorian Psycho is for anyone who appreciates the unhinged. It's a short little book both bloody and funny. Listen to Your Sister is about how the central trauma in a family can traumatize everyone differently. That sounds grim, but this trio of siblings are the most sibling siblings since David and Alexis Rose. The way they bicker is both cutting and uproarious. The youngest is one of the most well-written teenagers I've ever read. 

Last year was a big year for historical fiction. I read the first two books in the Lavender House series by Lev A. C. Rosen: Lavender House and The Bell and the Fog. These books follow a detective in San Francisco in the 1950s. It opens with him working up the courage to commit suicide after being outed. Then he meets someone who opens his eyes to the LGBTQ+ world that he had always shunned, which leads to him becoming a PI for said people because they definitely can’t call the cops when they need help. I highly recommend the series for anyone who wants to learn more LGBTQ+ history and where certain toxic male traits were born. 

My dad, the baby, was a kid during WWII, so I grew up on his stories about “fighting the war back home” and about his five older brothers who shipped out to fight all over the world. Like the middle aged dad I am not, I will pick up a lot of books about WWII. All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr is a beautifully written book about a blind French girl, a mechanically gifted German boy, radio, resistance, and the war machine. My husband and I are currently watching the Netflix adaptation. Does not hold a candle to the book. On the home front, I read The Rose Code by Kate Quinn about code breakers and the women who kept the code breaking division running. This title made me cry the hardest. Ugly sobbing. 

Babel by R. F. Kuang is historical fiction and fantasy. Imagine if the Industrial Revolution and the rise of the British Empire wasn’t powered by steam and gears but by magic caused by gaps in translation. (I call stories like this small fantasies because there’s only the one thing that is different. This is my favorite kind of fantasy and sci-fi.) This is a fascinating premise on its own, but Babel was also an amazing deconstruction of colonialism and resistance. I am in awe of this author and can’t wait to read more of her work.

I have been recommending The Black Count by Tom Reiss to everyone. It’s the biography of General Alex Dumas, officer in Napoleon's army, father of writer Alexandre Dumas, and inspiration for his son’s book The Count of Monte Cristo. It also talks about the development of the concept of race and the tension held in places like Britain and France that considered themselves enlightened while ignoring the atrocities they were inflicting on people, especially people of African descent, around the world. Even if you only read a chapter, you’re going to learn something. 

On one hand, Strange Sally Diamond by Liz Nugent is a story about a quirky, probably autistic woman trying to make friends and learn how to be a normal person. On the other hand, it’s a horrific story about men abducting women and making them their captives. I always want to recommend this book as a fun read based on the former while forgetting the later. Oops. It’s a very interesting book, but obviously kind of heavy.

How to Be Eaten by Maria Adelmann is a novel, but it’s more a collection of short stories. A bunch of women whose stories are so famous that they are now the stuff of legend -- Red Riding Hood, Gretel, Cinderella, and more -- gather together for a therapy session to share their real stories. If you like mythology and folklore, this is a fantastic read.

Let's end on a happily ever after with the spicy romance Get A Life, Chloe Brown by Talia Hibbert. This is a charming love story about a stuffy woman with fibromyalgia and the artist who moves in next door. Loved seeing representation for chronic pain. This book is the first in a series and part of the reason I want to give romance more of a choice in 2026.

Honorable mentions: 

The Quiet Tenant by Clemece Michallon (crime thriller)

Blob: A Love Story by Maggie Su (weird fiction)

A House with Good Bones by T. Kingfisher (horror comedy)

Pandora’s Jar: Women in the Greek Myths by Natalie Haynes (mythology)

Evvie Drake Starts Over by Linda Holmes (romance)

Killer House Party by Lily Anderson (ya horror)