Here’s my reading list from 2025, lightly annotated. Look for bold for titles I particularly enjoyed (while noting that my enjoyment is not necessarily a recommendation!). These are not in chronological order but grouped thematically.

First the non-fiction:

  • Gone Bush, Paul Kilgour. A chatty memoir of a life spent tramping the back country of New Zealand. Paul is an old friend so I’m biased, but I enjoyed this very much.
  • A Memoir of My Former Self, Hilary Mantel. Lots of little gems in here, but the whole is quite sad.
  • On Looking, Alexandra Horowitz. I didn’t enjoy this as much as I expected to, but it was pleasant enough. (Once I figured out how to edit the e-book formatting, because some part of the non-standard software sequence I use to get ebooks onto my reader removed all margins. Strictly speaking nothing is actually hidden when you’re reading that way, but it really absolutely definitely will not do.)
  • Blue Machine, Helen Czerski. On the ocean, particularly its larger systems and patterns and structures. Lots of truly surprisingly detail, like a 94-metre-deep hole in the ocean surface, or Ramisyllus the worm with multiple independently mobile anuses.
  • Inventing the Renaissance, Ada Palmer. This is a rich brew, but well worth it. I had no idea just how chaotic that period was.
  • The Notebook: A history of thinking on paper, Roland Allen. This was particularly nice on how the availability of notebooks may have contributed to the artistic explosion of Renaissance Italy, by giving painters and sculptors the ability to capture quick sketches in the field to be used later as reference material.
  • Once Upon a Prime (not finished), Sarah Hart. This was light but plenty fun, on connections between mathematics and literature. I think I didn’t finish it because it got repossessed by its owner.
  • Cows, Pigs, Wars, and Witches, Marvin Harris. Somewhat old-fashioned anthropology, but lots of interesting ideas nonetheless.
  • The Inklings, Humphrey Carpenter. On the discussion circle of CS Lewis and JRR Tolkien. I came away more impressed with how deeply they felt the importance of doing what they were doing right, but with a much lower opinion of what they were actually doing, compared to how I went in.
  • The Religion Construction Kit, Mark Rosenfelder. I don’t remember much from this. Rosenfelders “construction kits” are written as material for worldbuilding or conlanging, and they’re lighter on detail than it turns out I was looking for: lots of lists of possibilities (with the motivation that you probably aren’t aware of all the possibilities that exist) but not much about where any particular possibility comes from in our world or how it works.
  • Why Buddhism is True: The Science and Philosophy of Meditation and Enlightenment, Robert Wright. This more or less convinced me that it would be useful to at least try some meditation practise. I didn’t though.
  • Sea People, Christina Thompson. On what we know about Polynesian voyaging, and (just as interesting) on how we know it.
  • Beyond Weird, Philip Ball. This was my big one for 2025, and might yet get a blog post in 2026 trying to express why. I read it twice, because my first time through was too quick and superficial. It’s surveying our current understanding of quantum theory, which (it turns out) is much advanced since last I checked in (late 90’s, with books written in the mid 80’s).
  • Quantum, Manjit Kumar. Following up on Beyond Weird (which is mostly about the theory and only incidentally about the history), this one tells the story of the development of quantum theory chronologically and with a focus on the personalities and “movements” involved, particularly focusing on Einstein and Bohr. It left me with increased respect for Einstein’s physical intuition, a fair bit of frustration that Bohr’s movement captured so much of the conceptual terrain, unresolved confusion as to whether Einstein was in the end “morally right” in his broad position or not, and a deepened appreciation of just what a weirdo that guy was.

I’ve been reading to our boys in the evenings before they sleep. I didn’t always record these books in my reading list, so I’m not sure if these are all from this year, but these were the ones we’ve done so far:

  • Where the Red Fern Grows, Wilson Rawls (content warning for animal death)
  • Bridge to Terabithia, Katherine Paterson (content warning for human death)
  • The BFG, Roald Dahl (content warning for farting (humourous))
  • The Pushcart War, Jean Merrill (content warning for anticapitalism (positive))
  • A Green and Ancient Light, Frederic S. Durbin. This isn’t written as a children’s book, but I read it to them and they enjoyed it. It’s a beautiful, slow, lyrical story.

A bunch of extremely low-effort SF while I was flying around the world, then jetlagged, then flying back around the world, and (predictably enough) jetlagged again:

  • The Corporation Wars, Ken MacLeod
    • The Corporation Wars: Insurgence
    • The Corporation Wars: Emergence
  • Agent Cormac, Neal Asher
    • Polity Agent
    • Line War
  • Spatterjay, Neal Asher
    • The Voyage of the Sable Keech
    • Orbus
  • Rise of the Jain, Neal Asher
    • The Soldier
    • The Warship
    • The Human

I paid to become a Worldcon member to get the Hugo voter’s packet, and somewhat regretted it. I had already read quite a few of the books and stories included, and from the ones I hadn’t I didn’t particularly enjoy very many.

  • Absolution, Jeff Vandermeer (recommended only if you’ve read the first three: it’s a worthwhile reinforcing of the story’s foundations)
  • Lake of Souls, Ann Leckie. These are good shorts, even if you’re not already an Ancillary fan. I think the voter’s packet only had the title story (?) but I enjoyed the rest as well.
  • Someone you can build a nest in, John Wiswell
  • Navigational Entanglements, Aliette de Bodard
  • What Feasts at Night, T Kingfisher
  • A Sorceress Comes to Call, T Kingfisher
  • The Stormlight Archive, Brandon Sanderson
    • The Way of Kings
    • Words of Radiance (not finished: I forced myself through the first one, started the second, and then quickly realised there was no particular reason I needed to do this to myself)

Miscellaneous fiction:

  • The Spear Cuts Through Water, Simon Jimenez. I bet reviews use the word “dazzling”. This is mythmaking; this is entertwined narrative strands; a significant part of the plot is related as a description of a dance performance. Dazzling. File it with The Saint of Bright Doors and Rakesfall, and please tell me what else you have filed on that shelf because I want to read them too.
  • Spook Country, William Gibson
  • Adrian Tchaikovsky’s Tyrant Philosophers series. I was pretty lukewarm on the first book in this series: I enjoyed the throwback to New Weird styling but felt like the plot was awkwardly predictable by reasoning about authorial decision-making. I haven’t re-read it, but I’ve grown more enthusiastic about the setting even as the New Weird style has fallen away and the predictability has, if anything, increased. Lowering standards, perhaps.
    • House of Open Wounds
    • Days of Shattered Faith
  • The Man From St Petersburg, Ken Follett.
  • The Fractured Europe Sequence, Dave Hutchinson. A re-read, and I continue to enjoy these an awful lot. They’re spy stuff in the tradition of I guess Le Carré (which makes me think I should read some Le Carré), with some pure-sf mcguffins mixed in (which is in fact something of a spoiler for the first book, as it seems entirely naturalistic for at least its first half). The “fractured Europe” has broken into a cacophony of tiny statelets, all with their own currencies and border controls and intelligence services all interfering with each other, and much of the spy shenanigans are needed simply for moving people or post from one side or Europe to the other. Besides all the intrigue and tension, these are frequently extremely funny books. They’re staying on my occasional-reread shelf.
    • Europe in Autumn
    • Europe at Midnight
    • Europe in Winter
    • Europe at Dawn
  • Exordia, Seth Dickinson. I mostly could get into this, despite not being particularly into the grimdark bit, via a decent amount of interest in the metaphysics he’s aiming for. He lost me completely at the end, though, with two decisions: firstly to go all in on some mildly kinky sex that seemed entirely unnecessary, and secondly to abruptly zoom the scale out in a way that seemed to entirely trivialise those metaphysics (at the same time signalling very clearly his intent to use this as a shared setting for future work).
  • The Book of Love, Kelly Link. I very much enjoy Link’s short work. Less so the novel, sadly.
  • The Extinction of Irena Rey, Jennifer Croft. Enjoyably unhinged.
  • Firefall, Peter Watts (this is Blindsight and Echopraxia published in one volume). I said I don’t like grimdark, and then I go and reread Peter Watts. Is it credible if I say I read Watts for his ideas? (I don’t read him for his ideas, but I do find the ideas fascinating. The afterwords where he traces the ideas of the books back to real research topics are great.)
  • The Book of Strange New Things, Michel Faber. I do have a soft spot for SF that engages directly with religious thought, but I have to admit that there are some default modes for such SF that are pretty old and tired by this point. To my (perhaps naive) eye this one steers clear of the obvious rocks, but I can’t say in the end that I understood what the author intended.
  • The Manual of Detection, Jedediah Berry
  • The Ministry of Time, Kaliane Bradley
  • The Dragon’s Path, Daniel Abraham. I enjoyed this enough, I guess, but I just wasn’t committed enough to the story or characters to carry on into the next one.
  • The Murderbot Diaries, Martha Wells. I finally broke down and read these; I did not become a fan. To some extent they group thematically with the Hugo nominees that I’m not so enthusiastic about: trauma and neurodivergence and found family and monster-with-a-soft-heart. I’m a big hypocrite though, because I’m right now enjoying Witch King (by the same author, as it happens) which is all of those things as well. Oh well.
    • All Systems Red
    • Artificial Condition
    • Rogue Protocol
    • Exit Strategy
    • Network Effect
    • Fugitive Telemetry
    • System Collapse
  • Machineries of Empire, Yoon Ha Lee. Oh look, there’s trauma and neurodivergence and monstrousness again, only this time I like it! Can’t expect consistency it appears. But what I enjoy about this series is the sheer audacity of the setting: an evil space empire in which choosing to observe a particular calendar can alter the laws of physics in ways the author is free to make as magical as they like, so long as they also mention some mathematical terminology in the process. That is a trick that slowly wears off though: I enjoyed this reread less than I have in the past, and I probably won’t return to it.
    • Ninefox Gambit
    • Raven Stratagem
    • Revenant Gun
  • Spinning Silver, Naomi Novik
  • The City of Brass, S.A. Chakraborty
  • Dreamships, Melissa Scott
  • The Men Return and others, Jack Vance
  • Commonweal, Graydon Saunders. These are interesting. They describe an extreme society that I’m pretty sure is based on real ideas (Soviet collectivisation and central economic planning maybe?) but I’m also pretty sure the author wants you to read it as a not inherently terrible idea. Only, pulling the other way, he justifies lots of the extremes by some extremely extreme worldbuilding (his society is embedded in a multi-millenia history of misrule by sorceror, and the extremes are justified in contrast to that history), and he’s in-world ambivalent about how extreme is the right amount of extreme to go. And finally, following the Steven Brust Cool Stuff Theory of Writing, it’s pretty clear that what Graydon Saunders finds cool is (a) successful economic planning and (b) artillery engagements. I’m glad I read these; I can’t in conscience recommend them to a general audience; and I’m still entirely bemused as to what the author thinks he’s up to.
    • The March North
    • A Succession of Bad Days
    • Safely You Deliver
    • Under One Banner
    • A Mist of Grit and Splinters
  • The Locked Tomb, Tamsyn Muir. A re-read prompted by wondering when the fourth (and final) volume will arrive. These are still fun; a bit less so now that I really understand what’s going on. If “lesbian necromancers in space” sounds fun to you (and yes they are as overwrought as that suggests), give them a try.
    • Gideon the Ninth
    • Harrow the Ninth
    • Nona the Ninth