The Spell Shop by Sarah Beth Durst

Started: 4.1.26

Finished: 10.1.26

Paperback

Cosy cottagecore fantasy with sweet romance and found family

Kindle Paperwhite

I caved in!

Even though my Kindle Fire works perfectly fine (apart from being a bit slow to charge, and quick to drain), I decided to treat myself to a Kindle Paperwhite. I got a screen protector, a really nice case, and even a remote page turner, which is the height of laziness but so cool!

Currently reading One Dark Window on it - very happy!

Magical Midlife Madness by K. F. Breene

Paused... to come back to...

I started this yesterday I think, and although it was ok, I feel like I have other books that I'm in more of a hurry to read, so I've put this back on the TBR pile for now. I didn't want to make it a DNF because I would still like to read this series, just not yet...

I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman

Started: 5.1.26

Finished: 8.1.26

Kindle

Whew! It's hard to know what to say about this book. It's sad, but uplifting too. It's about friendship and love. It deals with resilience and loneliness. There's a certain lack of meaning to the plot, yet it's so meaningful too. It's heartbreakingly beautiful.

The Descent by Alma Katsu (The Immortal Trilogy)

Started: 3.1.26

Finished: 4.1.26

Paperback

Hmmm. Hmmm. 

I wanted to love this book as much as the first two. But it just seemed to go in a weird direction. 

It begins a few months after Luke has died from cancer. (He and Lanore had spent 4 years together, after Adair had let her go). I'm not sure what the point of Luke was really. I know he played a role in her life, but I'm not sure how necessary it was.

Lanny is having nightmares about Jonathan being tortured in the underworld. Yes, she's still obsessed with him, which I found increasingly frustrating.

Although he did redeem himself towards the end of his life, he was never really very good to her, but she couldn't let him go. She decides that she must go to the underworld to rescue him, and the only person who can help her with that is Adair.

He has been living in exile on a mystery island, although when Lanny arrives she finds that he is enjoying the company of two young women. He later confesses to her that he thinks they may be possessed by / reincarnations of two witch sisters who he'd wronged in a previous lifetime. That was a bit random and out of the blue.

Adair is now a changed man, and just as he agrees to help Lanny go to the underworld, she finally realises that she loves him. At last!!

He doesn't need to kill her, he just casts a spell to send her spirit there to look for Jonathan. What feels like just minutes and hours for her, are months passing for Adair while he keeps vigil over her sleeping body. The sections in the underworld also felt like months passing for me, to be honest, it really slowed things down.

At one point, Adair is drugged by the two women (who are the witches, as he suspected) and they throw Lanny's body into the sea. He summons huge waves which wash her back to him, but wash away the two women. So that's that. 

He has no way of knowing what is happening to Lanny in the underworld, and realises that the only thing he can do is join her there, which he does.

It transpires that Adair is actually the King Of The Underworld, but he'd escaped and had all his memories erased, and new ones implanted, to allow him to survive in the real world. The Queen is actually his sister; he didn't want to marry her though, because, ew, incest! (Nevermind all the other stuff he's done). In the end, they have to ask The Big Man (God - long white hair, toga style outfit) for permission to be allowed to return to the real world and live as mortals, which he allows. Meanwhile, Jonathan is promoted to Queen Consort / new King Of The Underworld.

The whole underworld section is just where it fell down for me. It turned out that the Queen had sent those nightmares to Lanny, and that actually Jonathan was quite happy and didn't need rescuing, so once again she'd screwed things up chasing after him. I'm glad that she finally realised that she loved Adair, and that it'd kind of been him all along, but when they returned from the underworld, it was practically on THE LAST PAGE! We never got to see them together, properly in love!

The Reckoning by Alma Katsu (The Immortal Trilogy)

Started: 1.1.26

Finished: 3.1.26

Paperback

3.1.26 - I'm 39% of the way through. After being 'buried alive' behind a brick wall for 200 years, Adair has been released (the mansion was being demolished). He goes to the house of Jude, another immortal, who has to teach him about modern life in 2010. Meanwhile, Lanore senses that he's free, and runs away from Luke, to protect him. 

Adair at first is filled with murderous rage at Lanore, but as time passes he realises that he is actually in love with her. He doesn't want to kill her, but he's still angry with her for leaving him, and he's scared of what his rage might make him do.

He has used a reincarnation spell to raise the badly decomposed body of Jonathan, with a view to moving his soul into Jonathan's body, in the hope that Lanore will love him.

I wish I had someone to talk to about this book! Adair is, I think, what they call 'morally grey'. He's done some horrific things, but he is capable of remorse, some of the time, and he's also capable of love, albeit quite a possessive love. I don't know how I feel about Lanore though. 

3.1.26, later - Just finished! Jonathan brought with him news of the 'Queen Of The Underworld' who Adair was quite afraid of, so he eventually sent him back. He found Lanore, and by then was completely in love with her (although raped her as soon as they met, so, hmmm). He let Luke survive, after removing all memories of Lanny, and then Adair and Lanore moved to a house in the mountains above Lake Garda. After two months of realising that she wasn't going to love him in the way that he wanted her to, he let her go. 

Bring on book 3!

The Taker by Alma Katsu (The Immortal Trilogy)

tarted: 28.12.25

Finished: 1.1.26

Paperback (large, sprayed edges!)

28.12.25 - This has been on the Want List for a long time, I really hope it lives up to expectations!

1.1.26 First finished book of 2026!

I'm not very familiar with all the new genres that seem to exist these days, but I think this might be described as 'magic realism'. It begins in the present day, where Dr Luke Findley meets Lanore McIlvrae. Lanore originally lived in the early 1800s, but was made immortal. Luke helps her escape the hospital, after she killed her (also immortal) friend and on/off lover Jonathan. As they flee to Canada, and eventually to Paris, Lanny tells Luke all about her past life, and how she was made immortal by an alchemist called Adair. He introduces her to a hedonistic lifestyle involving all kinds of sexual acts, but thankfully it didn't go into too much detail about these.

I think this trilogy might be a good introduction to the fantasy genre for me, easing me into it gently.

Back To Blogging!

Future me is writing this in February 2026! I've been prompted to resurrect my old blog again (and make a few changes to it) due to losing my reading journal which I've been writing on Penzu. It was only down for a few hours, but I was a bit sad to think I might've lost it all (although most of my reviews are on Storygraph and Pagebound now). When it came back on, I copied and pasted most of my Penzu reviews into this blog; I only started it in 2025 so there weren't too many, but I did leave out a few DNFs here and there to speed up the process. 2026 is all up to date though, and I've decided to just use this blog instead of Penzu from now (Feb 26) onwards. 

2025 Five Star Reads

These are the books I rated 5 stars on Storygraph in 2025:

Dark Matter by Michelle Paver

The Solitude of Thomas Cave by Georgina Harding

An Echo In The Bone by Diana Gabaldon

Written In My Own Heart's Blood by Diana Gabaldon

Go Tell The Bees That I Am Gone by Diana Gabaldon

The Body: A Guide For Occupants by Bill Bryson

The Haunting Of Hill House by Shirley Jackson

The Terror by Dan Simmons

The Fisherman by John Langan

Do I still agree with all of these? I would say yes to the Outlander books, just because the whole series has been so enjoyable, and I can't fault Diana Gabaldon's writing. The Body is the only non-fiction, but I found it so interesting and it was written with Bryson's usual humour and accessibility. Dark Matter will always be a 5 star read, obviously! I'm not sure if I like The Solitude Of Thomas Cave, and The Haunting Of Hill House as much as I think I do, or as much as I think I should, but they are stories that have lingered with me afterwards, when so many don't. The Fisherman was weird, and there were aspects of it that I struggled with, if I'm being really honest, but I also loved it, and I loved the writing style. It certainly didn't disappoint. And what can I say about The Terror? Just phenomenal!

Top Books Of 2025

Just looking at my reading journal and thought I'd try and choose my favourite (and maybe least favourite, not including DNFs) books from each month, and then my favourites for the whole year.

January

I re-read Dark Matter, finishing it on the 1st, so that would be my favourite. I liked the other two books also, so I'm not going to choose a least favourite.

February

In Feb, I only read books 7 and 8 of the Outlander series, so they can both be a tie for favourite.

March

In March I read book 9 of Outlander, so that was my favourite. Least favourite was The Drift by CJ Tudor, not what I was expecting, and not my cup of tea.

April

I think the best book I read in April is going to be The Body: A Guide For Occupants by Bill Bryson, because it was so well-written and interesting and accessible. Close second is Ghostwriting by Eric Brown, an unexpectedly good short story collection. I think maybe Dolly by Susan Hill was a bit of a disappointment.

May

The Haunting Of Hill House was a re-read in May, and although I struggle with some of the writing, it's still a favourite overall. The Ritual by Adam Nevill didn't live up to the hype for me.

June

Absolutely no question, The Terror by Dan Simmons blew everything else out of the water! The Supernatural Enhancements by Edgar Cantero was just weird, and a struggle to get through.

July

No really good books in July, but I did enjoy The Turn Of The Key by Ruth Ware. All The White Spaces by Ally Wilkes was disappointing.

August

Raising Hare by Chloe Dalton was just beautiful. If You See Her by Ania Ahlborn was another that didn't live up to the hype.

September

I only read three books in September. Pandora by Susan Stokes-Chapman wasn't amazing, but it did keep my attention, and I enjoyed being able to discuss it with the Thrive Book Club. Wintering by Katherine May went right over my head, and Bat Eater by Kylie Lee Baker wasn't as good as I was expecting it to be.

October

At the time I absolutely loved At Home With The Horrors by Sammy Scott, although I can't really remember any of the stories now. Hell House by Richard Matheson was of its time I guess, and not good. 

November

Another month of only three books. We Solve Murders by Richard Osman was definitely the best and most fun of the three. The Haar by David Sodegren was weird, but ok. Near The Bone by Christina Henry was good and I want to read more books by her.

December

The Fisherman by John Langan - outright winner for this month! I did struggle with the cosmic horror, but I loved the writing. The Twyford Code by Janice Hallett was probably the biggest disappointment, because I'd enjoyed The Appeal so much earlier in the year.

And if I had to choose my three favourite books for the whole year, I think it would be as follows: 

1. The Terror by Dan Simmons

2. Raising Hare by Chloe Dalton

3. The Fisherman by John Langan