2024 in review (books)

11 Mar, 2025

My latest annual reading spreadsheet tells me that I read 52 books in 2024. That number hasn't changed much over the past several years and neither have my most-read genres — fantasy, sci-fi, horror, and mystery.

More interesting was some of the other stats I gathered:

The Good

The library continues to save me a ton of money, longer books make up for the poor (and easily-gamified) reading measure that is raw book count, and I'm making an effort to diversify the author gender.

The Bad

I need to branch out beyond the Anglosphere. This is where my reliance on the library backfires, as their non-English selection outside of classics is close to nil. One of the last French books I read¹ was almost impossible to get without importing it for an exorbitant amount, so I gave in and bought it on Amazon. But I can still do a better job of reading English books from other countries.

Favorite Reads

Here were some of my favorites, in no particular order:

The Book of Bill, Alex Hirsch

Whimsical, absurd, and expands the Gravity Falls lore.

NOTE: Watching the show is very much a prerequisite to reading this book

Rooks and Ruin (Series), Melissa Caruso

Kind of early in the list for a cop-out, but I'm including an entire trilogy.

I recommend this for fans of high fantasy with mystery, palace intrigue, strong female characters, changing stakes, self-discovery, and magic systems that aren't broken.

Saban's Go Go Power Rangers (#1-4), Ryan Parrott

If you watched any Power Rangers as a kid, then you'll love this modern take on the original Mighty Morhpin series.

The Tainted Cup, Robert Jackson Bennett

A great start to a new fantasy series with a murder mystery, interesting magic system, and a female Sherlock Holmes analogue who's more compelling than most I've come across.

The Trials of Empire, Richard Swan

The third and final book in the Empire of the Wolf series. Not as strong as the first two books and the expanded afterlife plots felt rushed, but a solid ending to the series nonetheless.

Close to Death, Anthony Horowitz

The conceit of this mystery series is Horowitz writing himself into the story as the narrator who plays sidekick to an unpleasant (to say the least) but effective detective and writes books about their cases (sound familiar?). You'd think that this would get old, but Horowitz changes the setting and format enough to keep things fresh.

This time, they revisit an old case whose ending the detective wasn't satisfied with, and we learn more about his past. Five books in and more epistolary than the previous ones, but it might be my favorite since the debut.

The Witchstone, Henry H. Neff

A fantasy novel with demons, family curses, and Hell as a corporate bureaucracy. The humor worked for me but I think it'll be very hit-or-miss with readers.

Honorable Mentions

This clearly wasn't the best year of horror for me since the genre is only showing up in this section.

Strangely enough, all 3 entries are from the same family:

Heart-Shaped Box, Joe Hill

This was somehow only my second time reading a Joe Hill novel². Not the most original story by any means, but it's well-done for a debut and doesn't have the pacing issues I've seen in some of his dad's work.

'Salem's Lot and The Shining, Stephen King

As a latecomer to the King œuvre³, I had very few preconceived notions going into these two books⁴. This spared me from the quibbling people do after reading or watching adaptations of media they love.

My thoughts on both were the same — great and simple stories that unfortunately drag too long in the middle.

Goals for 2025

A short and hopefully very achievable list:

• Keep supporting the library⁵
• Diversify my reading even more

#books