I do this post every year. Every year I look back at how hopeful I was, how excited I was to get to all these books and every year I disappoint myself hahaha. Let’s look at what I did manage to read from my 2024 list. Now 11/24 ain’t bad.

If you would like to read the 2024 list beforehand – read here >>>

If you would like to read my list of 2025 hopefuls – read here >>>

I am going to categorise this post into 3 parts.

• Books I have read
• Books I haven’t read but still want to
• Books I haven’t read and no longer want to

Books I Have Read

Rating: 3 stars

Thoughts: Compared to the previous book in this series, I was underwhelmed. I found the interpersonal relationships and Pip’s character arc to be incredibly engaging and compelling. I am very interested in how Pip’s character is developing especially after the events of this book.  But the plot was just not on the same level as the first book and I guessed a lot of key elements. And the elements that I didn’t guess kind of came out of left field too much for me. Hopefully, I will enjoy the last book more.

Rating: 5 stars

Thoughts: Quickest and easiest 5-star read ever. Miss Faridah never misses. This was a 500+ page book that had perfect pacing and I was not bored once. Even when the plot was less high actioned and was just focusing on the life of high-schoolers, I was so interested in the friendships and relationship dynamics that I didn’t mind the moments where the plot was slower and less about the mystery. Such a great read.

Rating: 4 stars

Thoughts: I loved the first book. Amazing plot, great characters and incredibly captivating setting. This book while I enjoyed it, just didn’t match up to the first book. The plot was confusing for too long, while I loved being in Harrow’s head I wasn’t as fussed about the new to series characters. But I loved the setting and the last third blew my mind. Thankfully I was pre-warned about the confusing plot so I was better prepared. I think I would have potentially dnfd this book if I didn’t know that the plot is confusing for narrative reasons not writing style reasons.

Rating: 4.5 stars

Thoughts: Some of the best moments in my life has been spending 48 hours devouring whatever masterpiece Stuart Turton has written in that point in time. Taking the crime genre and elevating it to heights I am surprised he manages to ascend. This book was no exception. As usual the plot is incredibly engaging and exciting taking you down roads you didn’t expect to go down or didn’t even see in the first place. But I wanted to highlight, in this book in particular, was the incredible characterisation and sense of place. I have never read a murder mystery which has cemented me so strongly in a location before. Through Turton’s writing I wasn’t only able to picture the island and its inhabitants but I truly felt that I was there with our characters experiencing life with them side by side. From the multiple POVs to the picturesque detail, I honestly would love to live there if they weren’t on the edge of succumbing to toxic fog. Another addition to this book is the multiple povs we follow throughout the story. While we do have a central ‘detective’, this story is packed with a variety of important characters who help make this story the most in depth and rich of the three novels Turton has published so far. Following them through the trials and tribulations of island life and then the subsequent murder made you feel connected to the island and the characters themselves as you see them in their natural day to day life and then in a crisis. This was my favourite set of characters in a Turton novel ever.

Rating: 4 stars

Thoughts: I read this after watching the Ballad movie and felt very inspired to start from the beginning. At first I was unsure on the writing style, it felt too young for me. But that is so impactful because it truly shows how young Katniss is in these books. I ended up really enjoying this book and loved seeing the world and characters expanded that they couldn’t fit into the movie.

Rating: 4 stars

Thoughts: I have yet to be disappointed by Hafsah Faizal. This book was such a great read that had me on the edge of my seat not knowing what to expect. Her characters were exciting and memorable, their dynamics and flirty banter were so entertaining. The plot was so enticing and I loved watching the events unfold – I couldn’t keep up with all the information Faizal was sending our way. The setting was so atmospheric. Faizal did a great job blending fantasy and historical reality. While this isn’t set in our world you cannot miss the connections to British colonialism and how accurately Faizal depicted that time in history. I think she did a great job emulating that but adding a fantasy twist that blended so perfectly within the story. The vampires in this story felt fresh and exciting and I enjoyed how they were incorporated in the world and narrative.

Rating: 5 stars

Thoughts: A super engaging and interesting read. I instantly put her next book about horror movies on my TBR!

Rating: 4 stars

Thoughts: Big fan overall. Loved the plot and the use of invisibility as the driving force for the narrative. I also really liked the audiobook narrator. I just didn’t love the pop culture references or the constant mention of why the very obvious love interest couldn’t even like the main character because he is rich and full of himself. When in reality it’s obvious what is going to happen, JUST TALK TO EACH OTHER. It was too repetitive and got a bit annoying.

Rating: DNF

Thoughts: I didn’t love the writing style, I found the pace very slow and just lost interest.

Rating: DNF

Thoughts: I didn’t get too far into this before I dnfd it.

Rating: DNF

Thoughts: I didn’t get too far into this before I dnfd it.

Books I haven’t read but still want to

Plot: All Bree wanted was to uncover the truth behind her mother’s death. So she infiltrated the Legendborn Order, a secret society descended from King Arthur’s knights—only to discover her own ancestral power. Now, Bree has become someone new: A Medium. A Bloodcrafter. A Scion. But the ancient war between demons and the Order is rising to a deadly peak. And Nick, the Legendborn boy Bree fell in love with, has been kidnapped. Bree wants to fight, but the Regents who rule the Order won’t let her. To them, she is an unknown girl with unheard-of power, and as the living anchor for the spell that preserves the Legendborn cycle, she must be protected. When the Regents reveal they will do whatever it takes to hide the war, Bree and her friends must go on the run to rescue Nick themselves. But enemies are everywhere, Bree’s powers are unpredictable and dangerous, and she can’t escape her growing attraction to Selwyn, the mage sworn to protect Nick until death. If Bree has any hope of saving herself and the people she loves, she must learn to control her powers from the ancestors who wielded them first—without losing herself in the process.

I am actually currently reading this at the moment.

Plot: After suffering devastating loss and making drastic decisions, Zetian finds herself at the seat of power in Huaxia. But she has also learned that her world is not as it seems, and revelations about an enemy more daunting than Zetian imagined forces her to share power with a dangerous man she cannot simply depose. Despite having vastly different ideas about how they must deconstruct the corrupt and misogynist system that plagues their country, Zetian must join this man in a dance of truth and lies and perform their roles to perfection in order to take down their common enemy, who seeks to control them as puppets while dangling one of Zetian’s loved ones as a hostage. With political unrest and perilous forces aiming to undermine Zetian at every turn, can she enact positive changes as a fair and just ruler? Or will she be forced to rely on fear and violence and succumb to her darker instincts in her quest for vengeance?

I desperately wanted to read this but with the publication date pushed back I will have to wait. It has actually been put into my 25 in 2025 that’s how much I want to read this book.

Plot: There has always been a darkness to Ilmar, but never more so than now. The city chafes under the heavy hand of the Palleseen occupation, the choke-hold of its criminal underworld, the boot of its factory owners, the weight of its wretched poor and the burden of its ancient curse. What will be the spark that lights the conflagration? Despite the city’s refugees, wanderers, murderers, madmen, fanatics and thieves, the catalyst, as always, will be the Anchorwood – that dark grove of trees, that primeval remnant, that portal, when the moon is full, to strange and distant shores. Ilmar, some say, is the worst place in the world and the gateway to a thousand worse places.

This was chosen for our SFF book group and I plan on reading it very very soon before the end of the year!

Plot: A girl named Rose is riding her new bike near home in Deadwood, South Dakota, when she falls through the earth. She wakes up at the bottom of a square-shaped hole, its walls glowing with intricate carvings. But the firemen who come to save her peer down upon something even stranger: a little girl in the palm of a giant metal hand. Seventeen years later, the mystery of the bizarre artifact remains unsolved – the object’s origins, architects, and purpose unknown. But some can never stop searching for answers. Rose Franklin is now a highly trained physicist leading a top-secret team to crack the hand’s code. And along with her colleagues, she is being interviewed by a nameless interrogator whose power and purview are as enigmatic as the relic they seek. What’s clear is that Rose and her compatriots are on the edge of unravelling history’s most perplexing discovery-and finally figuring out what it portends for humanity. But once the pieces of the puzzle are in place, will the result be an instrument of lasting peace or a weapon of mass destruction?

Plot: When her brother is murdered, a petty thief from the slums of Longhill sets out to discover who killed him and why. But the more she discovers about him, the more she learns about herself, and the truths she finds are more dangerous than knives. Swept up in an intrigue as deep as the roots of Kithamar, where the secrets of the lowest born can sometimes topple thrones, the story Alys chooses will have the power to change everything.

Synopsis: As a society, there is a tendency to elevate romantic love. But what about friendships? Aren’t they just as – if not more – important? So why is it hard to find the right words to express what these uniquely complex bonds mean to us? In Confessions of a Friendship Addict, Elizabeth Day embarks on a journey to answer these questions.Growing up, Elizabeth wanted to make everyone like her. Lacking friends at school, she grew up to believe that quantity equalled quality. Having lots of friends meant you were loved, popular and safe. She was determined to become a Good Friend. And, in many ways, she did. But in adulthood she slowly realised that it was often to the detriment of her own boundaries and mental health.Then, when a global pandemic hit in 2020, she was one of many who were forced to reassess what friendship really meant to them – with the crisis came a dawning her truest friends were not always the ones she had been spending most time with. Why was this? Could she rebalance it? Was there such thing as…too many friends? And was she really the friend she thought she was?Friendaholic unpacks the significance and evolution of friendship. From exploring her own personal friendships and the distinct importance of each of them in her life, to the unique and powerful insights of others across the globe, Elizabeth asks why there isn’t yet a language that can express its crucial influence on our world.From ghosting and frenemies to social media and seismic life events, Elizabeth leaves no stone unturned. Friendaholic is the book you buy for the people you love but it’s also the book you read to become a better friend to yourself.

Plot: Tunuva Melim is a sister of the Priory. For fifty years, she has trained to slay wyrms – but none have appeared since the Nameless One, and the younger generation is starting to question the Priory’s purpose. To the north, in the Queendom of Inys, Sabran the Ambitious has married the new King of Hróth, narrowly saving both realms from ruin. Their daughter, Glorian, trails in their shadow – exactly where she wants to be. The dragons of the East have slept for centuries. Dumai has spent her life in a Seiikinese mountain temple, trying to wake the gods from their long slumber. Now someone from her mother’s past is coming to upend her fate. When the Dreadmount erupts, bringing with it an age of terror and violence, these women must find the strength to protect humankind from a devastating threat.

Plot: Cornwall, 1730: A young girl known only as Red travels with her father making a living predicting fortunes using the ancient Cornish method of the Square of Sevens. Shortly before he dies, her father entrusts Red’s care to a gentleman scholar, along with a document containing the secret of the Square of Sevens technique. Raised as a lady amidst the Georgian splendor of Bath, Red’s fortune-telling delights in high society. But she cannot ignore the questions that gnaw at her soul: who was her mother? How did she die? And who are the mysterious enemies her father was always terrified would find him? The pursuit of these mysteries takes her from Cornwall and Bath to London and Devon, from the rough ribaldry of the Bartholomew Fair to the grand houses of two of the most powerful families in England. And while Red’s quest brings her the possibility of great reward, it also leads to grave danger.

Plot: It’s all about blood. The blood spilled between the Republic of Mareen and the armies of the Blood Emperor long ago. The blood gifts of Mareen’s deadliest enemies. The blood that runs through the elite War Houses of Mareen, the rulers of the Tribunal dedicated to keeping the republic alive. The blood of the former Legatus, Verne Amari, murdered. For his granddaughter, Ikenna, the only thing steady in her life was the man who had saved Mareen. The man who had trained her in secret, not just in martial skills, but in harnessing the blood gift that coursed through her. Who trained her to keep that a secret. But now there are too many secrets, and with her grandfather assassinated, Ikenna knows two things: that only someone on the Tribunal could have ordered his death, and that only a Praetorian Guard could have carried out that order. Bent on revenge as much as discovering the truth, Ikenna pledges herself to the Praetorian Trials–a brutal initiation that only a quarter of the aspirants survive. She subjects herself to the racism directed against her half-Khanaian heritage and the misogyny of a society that cherishes progeny over prodigy, all while hiding a power that–if found out–would subject her to execution…or worse. Ikenna is willing to risk it all because she needs to find out who murdered her grandfather…and then she needs to kill them.

Plot: Jack Tamerlaine hasn’t set foot on Cadence in ten long years, content to study music at the mainland university. But when young girls start disappearing from the isle, Jack is summoned home to help find them. Enchantments run deep on Cadence: gossip is carried by the wind; plaid shawls can be as strong as armor, and the smallest cut of a knife can instil fathomless fear. The capricious spirits that rule the isle by fire, water, earth, and wind find mirth in the lives of the humans who call the land home. Adaira, heiress of the east and Jack’s childhood enemy, knows the spirits only answer to a bard’s music, and she hopes Jack can draw them forth by song, enticing them to return the missing girls. As Jack and Adaira reluctantly work together, they find they make better allies than rivals as their partnership turns into something more. But with each passing song, it becomes apparent the trouble with the spirits is far more sinister than they first expected, and an older, darker secret about Cadence lurks beneath the surface, threatening to undo them all.

Plot: It’s an average work day. You’ve been wrapped up in a task, and you check the clock when you come up for air—4:44 pm. You go to check your email, and 44 unread messages have built up. With a shock, you realize it is April 4th—4/4. And when you get in your car to drive home, your odometer reads 44,444. Coincidence? Or have you just seen the edge of a rabbit hole? Rabbits is a mysterious alternate reality game so vast it uses our global reality as its canvas. Since the game first started in 1959, ten iterations have appeared and nine winners have been declared. Their identities are unknown. So is their reward, which is whispered to be NSA or CIA recruitment, vast wealth, immortality, or perhaps even the key to unlocking the secrets of the universe itself. But the deeper you get, the more deadly the game becomes. Players have died in the past—and the body count is rising. And now the eleventh round is about to begin. Enter K—a Rabbits obsessive who has been trying to find a way into the game for years. That path opens when K is approached by billionaire Alan Scarpio, the alleged winner of the sixth iteration. Scarpio says that something has gone wrong with the game and that K needs to fix it before Eleven starts or the whole world will pay the price. Five days later, Scarpio is declared missing. Two weeks after that, K blows the deadline and Eleven begins. And suddenly, the fate of the entire universe is at stake.

Plot: For as long as she can remember, Evangeline Fox has believed in true love and happy endings… until she learns that the love of her life will marry another. Desperate to stop the wedding and to heal her wounded heart, Evangeline strikes a deal with the charismatic but wicked Prince of Hearts. In exchange for his help, he asks for three kisses, to be given at the time and place of his choosing.  But after Evangeline’s first promised kiss, she learns that bargaining with an immortal is a dangerous game—and that the Prince of Hearts wants far more from her than she’d pledged. He has plans for Evangeline, plans that will either end in the greatest happily ever after or the most exquisite tragedy…

Books I haven’t read and no longer want to

Plot: Heroes die, cowards live. Daughter of a conquered world, Ruying hates the invaders who descended from the heavens long before she was born and defeated the magic of her people with technologies unlike anything her world had ever seen. Blessed by Death, born with the ability to pull the life right out of mortal bodies, Ruying shouldn’t have to fear these foreign invaders, but she does. Especially because she wants to keep herself and her family safe. When Ruying’s Gift is discovered by an enemy prince, he offers her an impossible deal: If she becomes his private assassin and eliminates his political rivals—whose deaths he swears would be for the good of both their worlds and would protect her people from further brutalization—her family will never starve or suffer harm again. But to accept this bargain, she must use the powers she has always feared, powers that will shave years off her own existence. Can Ruying trust this prince, whose promises of a better world make her heart ache and whose smiles make her pulse beat faster? Are the evils of this agreement really in the service of a much greater good? Or will she betray her entire nation by protecting those she loves the most?

I heard a lot of people were offended by the nature of this book due to it referencing an incredibly awful time in Chinese history as the basis for its plot. Because of this I gave my copy away.