2025: Books!

I read a lot of books in 2025. I keep one-upping myself from the previous year. Unintentionally. I won't be writing blurbs about all the books I read this year, as honestly, I don't remember too much about each one. As I reflect on this list of reading, I think it's a reflection of my year. There's a lot of light/fun reading this year. When I'm in the mood for light reading, it means I'm looking to read something other than what my reality is experiencing. 

I allow myself to do fun reading now. It's nice to enter into a fictional character's world, see life through their eyes, and then step out when the book finishes. I've had to ask myself: why read if I can't remember half the books I've read?  It feels a little counterproductive at times, spending so many hours with these books and not being able to recall anything of importance. But I think that misses the point.

We meet so many people in our lives throughout the years, and we probably truly keep in touch with less than half, maybe even less than a quarter. Were those people we met before "unnecessary"? I still think about my elementary school friends and how close we were at the time. I'd go to their houses to play or do group projects together. 

Even though our lives were not meant to keep in touch with every single person we've ever met or interacted with, it doesn't mean his/her presence wasn't important at the time, even if only for a short while. I think if we actually did keep in touch with every single person, our lives would explode with anxiety and stress at dealing with so many people all the time. 

So much like our interactions with people and the way only a few (relatively) truly stick around and last, reading books feels the same way at times. We read to explore various characters and stories. Many will be forgotten once the back cover closes and others will linger on in our minds, reminding us of the locations we sat and read or multi-tasked while listening to an audio book.   

 

Ornithologists Guide to Love

Veronica Speedwell #1: A Curious Beginning

Accidentally Amy

Happily Never After

Flirty Little Secret

Veronica Speedwell #2: A Perilous Undertaking

The Love Wager

The Secret Service of Tea and Treason

Veronica Speedwell #3: A Treacherous Curse

Veronica Speedwell #4: A Dangerous Collaboration

The Do Over

Veronica Speedwell #5: A Murderous Relation

P.S. I Hate You

Better Than the Movies

Nothing Like the Movies

The Silence Between Us

Fourth Wing

Iron Flame

Just For the Summer

A Pho Love Story

Love on Paper

You Bet Your Heart

Onyx Storm

Wreck the Halls

Veronica Speedwell #6: An Unexpected Peril 

Part Of Your World

Yours Truly

Powerless

Veronica Speedwell #7: An Impossible Imposter 

First Time Caller

A Sinister Revenge

The Wish Switch

Reckless

Love That Dog

Veronica Speedwell #8: A Grave Robbery

Maid For Each Other

The Friend Zone 

Life's Too Short

Fearless

Hamlet

Sounds Like Love

The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion Volume One 

Love and Other Great Expectations

The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion Volume Two

I Just Wish I Had a Bigger Kitchen

Love Unmasked

Fearful

(The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe came somewhere before Prince Caspian)

The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion Volume Three

The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion Volume Four

Prince Caspian 

The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion Volume Five

Great Big Beautiful Life  

 

 

 

I made it to 53 this year.  

Canonized

 It had been bothering me for 10 years on and off. It was the last paper I wrote for his class in college. We were told to choose a piece of literature we thought worthy of being in the literary canon. Being a flustered college junior at the time anxiously awaiting to finish the last of her classes in order to get into full-time student teaching and graduate early, I picked a novel I was already reading, wasn't terrible, and fit the requirements so I thought: Jane Eyre. 

Now, Jane Eyre is not a terrible book by any means. I'm sure there are many fans of this novel who would have written a fabulous essay on why it should be a part of the literary canon. Unfortunately, that person was not me, and the essay I wrote was only slightly convincing of its canonical merit. It was my lowest scoring essay of his class for the semester, and I always remembered. 

This professor and I stayed in touch minimally over the years. We may have corresponded 2-3 times since I graduated. It took 10 years for me to have the courage to send him an email, and not only to tell him I wish I had written my essay on another book, but also which book I should have written it on.

Why was I so scared all these years? The book I wanted to choose, and still choose today, pales in difficulty to Jane Eyre. As an English major and graduating senior, choosing a book of importance to be canonized means a high-level, scholarly book, right? That's what I thought, and it took me all these years to finally come to terms with the fact that I thought wrong, and it was perfectly all right.

The book I should have chosen was a book I'd first read as an elementary school student. I read it again in 7th grade as required reading in English class that year. I read it again a few years later. And I read it again this summer. Each time I've read it, I've pulled away different philosophies, lessons, and themes. All of them have been there all along, but it took different life stages and different versions of who I was as a person to see them. 

I should have picked Walk Two Moons by Sharon Creech. I've thought about rewriting that paper just to feel like I was being true to myself, but let's be honest. Nobody has any use for me to be writing a literary essay anymore. So instead, I'll share about it here.

1. Walk Two Moons is accessible to people of all ages and abilities. It could be for a challenge for an advanced 4th grader, which is about the time I discovered it. It could be just right for an on-level or below average 8th grader, or a refreshing, simple read for an adult. The protagonist is 13-years-old, so obviously it was written to appeal to the young adult audience of approximately middle school age. But as I mentioned before, I read it many times, and it still spoke to me each time.

2. The book is unpredictable. There are cliffhangers left at the end of multiple chapters, and the ending is not what you expect it to be. When reading it for the first time, it hooks you in a way that you want to keep going. The way it's all woven together is quite ingenious really. The first time I read the book, it took three days. The second time I read it, I finished it in one. And I am not a fast reader.

3. The book provides multiple perspectives depending on the reader's age and experience. Reading it at different periods of life allows the reader to relate to different characters. A middle schooler would relate to Phoebe or Salamanca whereas an adult reader would relate to Mrs. Winterbottom or Mr. Hiddle. 

If you know me, you'll know I relate very personally to Salamanca. That's one of the biggest reasons why I've always loved this book because it made me feel like there was someone out there, albeit fiction, who understand and experienced exactly what I was going through. But the older I've gotten, I've come to realize the true importance of where this book earns its title. And how little people take the time to walk two moons...in someone else's moccasins.