Cozy reading season has arrived and that means it’s time to plan your winter reading list!
My recommendations for the best books to read winter 2025 include recently published or soon to be published contemporary fiction, historical fiction, romance, and mysteries/thrillers that I have already read or that are on my TBR for this winter.
Happy winter reading!!
Note: I read across a lot of genres and I only choose books that I have already read or plan to read over the coming weeks for my book lists. If I haven’t yet read the book when I publish the book list then I include the blurb provided by the publisher and update the article with my own thoughts after I read it. Some of the buzziest books of the season are on my lists but I hope I also introduce you to some titles that you might not have heard of otherwise.
You Might Also Enjoy Reading:
Favourite Reads of 2024 – 15 Books I Couldn’t Put Down
15 of the Best Books To Read This Winter (2024)
21 of the Best Books To Read This Winter (2023)
22 Books To Cozy Up With This Winter (2022)
25 Books Set in Cold and Snowy Destinations To Read This Winter
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1. The Favorites by Layne Fargo
Setting: Various U.S. and international locations
I loved this intense drama and epic love story set in the cutthroat world of elite figure skating! When Katarina Shaw and Heath Rocha met as children in a northern suburb of Chicago, he was a troubled kid in the foster care system and she was a motherless girl who was sure that she was destined to become a champion Olympic ice skater. Skating was a means for the two of them to escape their turbulent lives and together they went from childhood sweethearts to champion ice dancers until a shocking event at the 2014 Olympic games ended their skating partnership.
As the 10th anniversary of their final performance approaches, interest has been revived by an unauthorized documentary that includes interviews with figure skating officials as well as friends and rivals of the pair and Katarina has also decided that it’s time to share her side of the story. Alternating between Katarina’s POV and transcript from the documentary, the narrative of The Favorites moves through the timeline chronologically beginning when they are teens until the 2014 Winter Olympic games in Sochi, Russia.
This is the kind of story that you get sucked into – I literally could not put it down! The reader knows from the introduction that there was a shocking incident at the Sochi Olympics but what happened isn’t revealed until the end – there was so much tension and I couldn’t stop turning pages late into the night because I needed to know!
The glimpse into the competitive figure skating world and how damaging it can be to the psyche of young skaters is fascinating as is the obsessive relationship between Katarina and Heath (inspired by Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights). This is a story of ambition, scandal and love with a strong female character who is not always likeable. Katarina is cast as a villain in the world of figure skating because she’s more than a little rough around the edges and she won’t play along and behave as she’s expected to – I was rooting for her all the way! The Favorites will be an enjoyable read for anyone but particularly good for anyone captivated by the world of Olympic figure skating.
Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group for sending a digital ARC of this book for review consideration. All opinions are my own.
2. The Stolen Queen by Fiona Davis
Setting: Egypt and New York City
This dual timeline historical fiction novel transports readers from the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City to Egypt’s Valley of the Kings and the bustling streets of Cairo.
In the 1936 timeline, Charlotte Cross is a young student working on an archaeological dig in the Valley of the Kings in Egypt until an antiquity belonging to the female pharaoh Hathorkare is discovered and a legendary curse possibly reawakened.
Charlotte, working as a curator in the Egyptian wing of the Met in 1978 and consumed with her research on Hathorkare, is preparing for the museum’s upcoming King Tut exhibit when she crosses paths with 19 year-old Annie Jenkins. Annie has been hired as a personal assistant to fashion designer Diana Vreeland who is a consultant to The Costume Institute at the Met and in charge of planning the upcoming Met Gala. On the night of the gala, a valuable antiquity known as the Cerulean Queen is stolen from the Egyptian wing and, after a confrontation with the fleeing thief, Annie joins Charlotte on a desperate mission to Egypt to try and recover the stolen queen.
This is the third book that I have read by Fiona Davis and I love that she focuses her historical novels on landmark New York City buildings. In The Stolen Queen, Davis blends fact and fiction by creating a fictional pharaoh named Hathorkare but basing her on the real-life pharaoh Hatshepsut and then adding a dash of suspense and mystery relating to both Charlotte’s experience in Egypt in 1936 and the theft of the antiquity from The Met in 1978. The Metropolitan Museum of Art is a favourite of mine so I enjoyed the setting and learning a bit more about the museum and the early days of the Met Gala and visiting Egypt has long been on my bucket list so was fascinated by that part of the story as well.
The novel also raises and addresses with some nuance the interesting ethical issue relating to the ownership of antiquities and when repatriation to the country of origin is the right thing to do. There were some problems with the book – the resolution was a bit too neat and there were some details that bothered me because they didn’t feel appropriate for the time period (such as a 19 year-old of limited means having a passport in 1978 when very few Americans did) – but overall an enjoyable read.
3. Beautiful Ugly by Alice Feeney
Setting: A remote Scottish island
Author Grady Green’s wife, Abby, is running late so he calls her while she’s driving home to share some exciting news. Over speakerphone, he hears her slam on the brakes, she tells him that she’s getting out to investigate a body on the road, then nothing. Grady finds the car abandoned cliffside with the headlights on, the driver’s door open, and the phone still on the dashboard but Abby has disappeared.
A year later, Grady is struggling to complete his next novel as he is still overcome with grief over Abby’s disappearance and battling insomnia. His agent arranges for him to stay at a cabin she owns on a remote Scottish island in hopes that the change of scenery will serve as inspiration for his writing but shortly after arriving Grady gets a glimpse of a woman who looks exactly like his missing wife. Grady soon senses that there is something sinister afoot on the island but it’s possible he’s just hallucinating as a result of too little sleep and too much alcohol.
A slow-burn, psychological thriller that was a somewhat entertaining read although the plot is a bit far-fetched particularly towards the conclusion. The story is told mostly from the point of view of Grady (who might be an unreliable narrator) with some chapters from the point of view of Abby in the days leading up to her disappearance via sessions with her therapist.
The book has a great premise and I enjoyed the eerie and remote island setting but the nonsensical plot twists not so much. With the exception of Grady’s dog, Columbo, every character in the book is unlikeable and I didn’t much care what happened to them. This was my first time reading a book by this author and it was not really for me but fans of her prior novels will likely enjoy this one as well.
4. We, the Kindling by Otoniya J. Okot Bitek
Setting: Uganda
We, the Kindling weaves together the tragic stories of several girls in northern Uganda who were abducted in the early 1990s from their school and forced to join the rebel group known as the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) until they made their way home as young women several years later. The insightful narrative moves between past and present layering Ugandan folk tales between the memories of individual girls of the circumstances of their abductions, the brutality of their captivity, unwanted marriages, gun battles, endless treks and their perilous jouney home.
This concise, thoughtful novel is not easy but it is an impactful read that will appeal to readers who enjoy literary fiction. The author is also a poet and each word of her beautifully-written prose is as carefully selected as the words of a poem. It’s gutwrenching to contemplate the extent of what these girls endured in captivity and also heartbreaking to realize that, in many cases, they weren’t welcomed home but were blamed for the time they spent with the LRA. The voices of these young women are unforgettable.
Thank you to Penguin Random House Canada for sending an ARC of this book for review consideration. All opinions are my own.
Currently available on Kindle only on Amazon in the U.S.
5. Homeseeking by Karissa Chen
Setting: China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, New York City and Los Angeles
Homeseeking is the sweeping story of childhood sweethearts torn apart by war and reunited sixty years later on the other side of the world. Haiwen, a recent widower, is shopping at a market in Los Angeles in 2008 when he looks up and sees Suchi who he first met as a young child in Shanghai. Their childhood friendship blossomed into deep love by the time they were 16 but they were separated when Haiwen secretly enlisted in the Nationalist army in 1947 to save his older brother from the draft. Haiwen went away without saying goodbye but left his precious violin on her doorstep with a note saying ‘Forgive me’. Spanning decades, the story follows the separated lovers from Shanghai to Hong Kong, Taiwan, New York and California.
This is a beautifully-written dual point-of-view love story about two people whose lives unfold against the backdrop of political events. From Suchi’s POV, the story moves forward from the time that they are children in Shanghai and from Haiwen’s POV the story moves backwards in time from when they meet again in LA. It sounds like a complicated structure but it works very well as the story of what happened in both of their lives over 60 years is slowly revealed.
I loved this moving story of two people who get a late in life second chance at friendship/love. Told against the backdrop of Chinese history, Haiwen and Suchi’s personal story is closely tied to the major political events in China that impacted their lives. My knowledge of Chinese history is limited so I appreciated learning more particularly relating to the Civil War between the Communist Party and the Nationalist forces led by Chiang Kai‐shek and the history relating to Taiwan and Hong Kong.
The novel also addresses issues relating to the Chinese diaspora – the pain and sacrifice for separated families, the experience of leaving China and starting over again in another country and whether home remains the place they left behind. Homeseeking is an ambitious and compelling debut – I grew to care so deeply about Haiwen and Suchi that I didn’t want it to end.
6. The Day I Left You by Caroline Bishop
Setting: Germany and England
In East Berlin in 1982, Greta Schneider meets and falls in love with Henry Henderson who is an engineer on an 8 week work visa from Britain. Greta yearns to explore the world working as a translator and her whirlwind romance with Henry gives her a taste of what life is like beyond the Iron Curtain.
They have only been together a few weeks when Henry’s visa expires but they decide to get married since Greta is forbidden to travel beyond the Berlin Wall. Within a relatively short period of time, Greta is granted permission to leave East Berlin and the newlyweds settle happily into their life together in Oxford until one day when Greta walks out the door and disappears leaving only a simple note behind.
More than thirty years later, Henry has never remarried and still has unanswered questions about what happened to Greta. He knows that they loved each other and had a happy marriage but he accepts that perhaps he didn’t know his wife as well as he thought he did. Henry knows he should move on but hasn’t been able to until one day a young mother comes into his shop and unknowingly brings with her a clue that might finally answer Henry’s questions about what happened to the love of his life.
The Day I Left You is a dual timeline/dual point-of-view novel that takes place in East Berlin and Oxford, England in the early 1980s and in 2018. It’s a welcome change to read a historical novel that isn’t set in World War II and I particularly enjoyed the Cold War backdrop because I grew up during that time period.
This was an enjoyable read – well-researched and well-written historical fiction with a bit of romance and a plot centred around Cold War intrigue. The Day I Left You is a compelling and thought-provoking story that provides interesting insight into what it was like living behind the Iron Curtain in the 1980s – perfect for readers of historical fiction who would like to read about this fascinating time period.
Thank you to Simon & Schuster Canada for sending an ARC of this book for review consideration. All opinions are my own.
7. The Lotus Shoes by Jane Yang
Setting: China
Told from alternating points of view, The Lotus Shoes is the story of two women from the opposite sides of society in late 19th century China whose lives become intertwined as young girls. At the time, tightly bound feet known as “golden lilies” are considered the highest standard of beauty among the upper classes of Chinese society and necessary for a young woman to make a good marriage.
Little Flower is born to a lower class family, however, her mother started binding her feet when she was four years old in hopes that having golden lilies would provide her with greater opportunity in the future. Tragedy befalls her family, however, and at the age of 6, Little Flower is sold to the prominent Fong family to be a muizai (maidservant) for daughter Linjing who is the same age.
Despite having all of the advantages of her family’s wealth and position in society, Linjing is resentful of Little Flower for her golden lilies and for her exceptional skill at embroidery which is considered the purview of high class ladies and acts out of spite to hurt Little Flower whenever she can. Linjing insists that Little Flower be included as part of her dowry to accompany her as maidservant to her future husband’s house but scandal strikes the Fong family setting the two young women upon a different path.
The Lotus Shoes is beautifully written, character-driven historical fiction based on stories from the author’s family. The story highlights the manner in which class, gender and social norms prevented women and anyone from lower classes from getting ahead in 19th century China with a particular emphasis on the limited options for women who lacked agency and rights in the patriarchal society. Western ideas are starting to seep into Chinese society at this point, however, the cultural practice of foot binding and marriage traditions that left women at a disadvantage were still prevalent.
Little Flower is a resilient character demonstrating courage and determination in the face of a great deal of hardship. Linjing is flawed and much harder to feel sympathy for, however, she also has very limited choices available to her despite her family’s wealth and social position. A touching debut from Jane Yang!
Thank you to NetGalley and Harlequin Trade Publishing for sending a digital ARC of this book for review consideration. All opinions are my own.
8. The Queens of Crime by Marie Benedict
Setting: England and Boulogne-sur-Mer, France
Five of the greatest women crime writers in England in the 1930s band together to solve an actual murder in Marie Benedict’s latest historical fiction novel.
In 1931, popular mystery writer Dorothy L. Sayers had been instrumental in the formation of the Detection Club inviting all of England’s most prominent writers of detective fiction to become members but she is caught offguard when the men involved want to limit female membership to just her and Agatha Christie. She manages to have Ngaio Marsh, Margery Allingham and Baroness Emma Orczy initiated as well but they are treated as second-class citizens by their male counterparts despite their successful careers.
Dorothy hatches a scheme to showcase the skills of the five female writers by solving a real-life mystery in the same way that they would in any of their novels. She lands on the unsolved case of a young English nurse who disappeared while visting France on a day trip with a fellow nurse and was later found strangled in a nearby park. The case which has confounded the police has all of the hallmarks of a locked room mystery as the young woman went missing from a window-less public restroom while her friend waited at the only exit. Dorothy’s group of women writers who call themselves the ‘Queens of Crime’ embark on their own investigation but, as they get closer to unravelling the mystery, the killer targets Dorothy who has a secret from her own past that she’s desperate to keep hidden.
I have always loved Agatha Christie’s mysteries so I was drawn to The Queens of Crime because she’s featured as one of the main characters. Loosely inspired by a true story relating to Sayers (and told from her point of view), this was an enjoyable historical murder mystery (entirely fictional) that also offers a bit of a peek into the world of crime writing in the 1930’s – i.e. the golden age of mysteries and the ‘rules’ for the writing of such mysteries that were established by the Detection Club.
In addition to the clever mystery to work out, the novel is also a story of female friendship with strong, successful women supporting each other and working together to prove themselves in a male-dominated field. The historical context relating to the role of women in England is also interesting as this was the period of time between the two world wars when women were expected to revert to domestic life. The toll of the war years, however, meant that many young women weren’t able to find husbands and were labelled “surplus” and much maligned for their marital status – particularly if they also sought employment. Overall, this was a pageturner so a fun, quick read!
I would have loved to read an author’s note explaining more about these five mystery authors, the Detection Club and the historical time period but there wasn’t one with the ARC – hopefully there will be in the finished copy!
Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for sending a digital ARC of this book for review consideration. All opinions are my own.
9. The Dressmakers of London by Julia Kelly
Setting: London, England
FROM THE PUBLISHER: Isabelle Shelton has always found comfort in the predictable world of her mother’s dressmaking shop, Mrs. Shelton’s Fashions, while her sister Sylvia turned her back on the family years ago to marry a wealthy doctor whom Izzie detests. When their mother dies unexpectedly, the sisters are stunned to find they’ve jointly inherited the family business. Izzie is determined to buy Sylvia out, but when she’s conscripted into the WAAF, she’s forced to seek Sylvia’s help to keep the shop open. Realizing this could be her one chance at reconciliation with her sister, Sylvia is determined to save Mrs. Shelton’s Fashions from closure—and financial ruin.
Through letters, the sisters begin to confront old wounds, new loves, and the weight of family legacy in order to forge new beginnings in this lyrically moving novel perfect for fans of Genevieve Graham and Lucinda Riley.
10. Three Days in June by Anne Tyler
Setting: Baltimore, Maryland
Anne Tyler’s latest book is told from the point of view of Gail Baines over three days in June – the day before her daughter Debbie’s wedding, the day of and the day after.
The story opens with Gail walking out of the private school for girls where she is an administrator when she is passed over for a promotion because of her lack of people skills. When Gail arrives home, her ex-husband Max shows up on her doorstep with a foster cat in tow and in need of somewhere to stay for the wedding weekend. As they prepare for the rehearsal dinner, a secret relating to the groom threatens to derail the wedding and prompts Gail to consider her past.
Three Days in June is a sensitive portrayal of a woman leading an altogether ordinary yet interesting life. Even though the book is less than 200 pages long, the characters are well-developed – quirky yet relatable and endearing and Tyler deftly balances the touching and funny moments throughout. This short feel-good read is a thoughtful story about human nature – simple but beautifully crafted.
Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Random House Canada for sending a digital ARC of this book for review consideration. All opinions are my own.
11. Maya & Natasha by Elyse Durham
Setting: The former Soviet Union
FROM THE PUBLISHER: Maya and Natasha are twin sisters born in the midst of the Siege of Leningrad in 1941 and immediately abandoned by their mother, a prima ballerina at the Kirov Ballet who would rather die than not dance. Taken in by their mother’s best friend at the Kirov, the girls are raised to be dancers themselves. The Vaganova Ballet Academy—and the totalitarian Soviet regime—is the only world they know.
In 1958, now seniors at the Vaganova at the height of the Cold War, all Maya and Natasha and their classmates want is to dance with the Kirov, and to join the company on its tour to America next year. But a new law from the Kremlin upends Maya and Natasha’s lives: due to fears of defection, family members may no longer travel abroad together. The Kirov can only accept one of them.
Maya, long accustomed to living in her sister’s shadow, accepts her bitter fate, until a new dance partner inspires her to dream bigger and practice harder. For the first time—and at the cruelest possible moment—the sisters are equally matched. And then one sister betrays the other, altering their lives forever and splitting them in two, though neither will stray far from the other’s orbit.
As one of the twins pursues her ballet career and experiences a world outside Russia for the first time, the other is cast in an epic film adaptation of War and Peace, produced and financed by the Soviet State. As the Cold War heats up, Maya and Natasha must confront their loyalties: to East versus West; to the government that saved them versus their dreams of freedom; and, always, to each other.
12. The Snowbirds by Christina Clancy
Setting: Palm Springs, California
Kim and Grant are a couple in their ’50s from Madison, Wisconsin who have been together for thirty years but never married. Kim wanted to escape the cold and snow by spending the winter in Palm Springs, California and Grant, a professor who has recently lost his job at a liberal arts college, didn’t like the idea but reluctantly agreed. Kim embraced life in the condo community from the moment they moved in but it was taking Grant longer to find his footing – until he discovered hiking.
The story opens as Kim learns that Grant has gone missing on a New Year’s day hike in the Palm Springs mountains and the narrative moves back and forth between the search for Grant in the present timeline in January 2023 and what has happened over the weeks that they have been in Palm Springs while also shedding light on the history of their relationship.
The Snowbirds is an enjoyable read about mid-life transitions with a relatable couple assessing what’s next for each of them individually and whether there is a future for their relationship. There’s also an element of suspense relating to Grant’s disappearance and I particularly enjoyed the sense of place – Palm Springs sounds quite appealing as I’m in the midst of a Canadian winter!
Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for sending a digital ARC of this book for review consideration. All opinions are my own.
13. Punished by Ann-Hélen Laestadius
Setting: Northern Sweden
In the follow-up to her international bestseller Stolen, this is a dual timeline story about five Sámi children forced to attend a government-run boarding school in Northern Sweden.
In a community near the Arctic Circle in the early 1950s, Else-Maj, Jon-Ante, Nilsa, Anne-Risten and Marge are taken from their families once they turn seven years old as the Swedish government has decreed that all children of reindeer herders must attend the “nomad school”.
At the school run by a vicious headmistress named Rita Olsson, the children endure horrific physical, verbal and psychological abuse and are stripped of their language and culture. Their families know nothing of the abuse because the children only return home occasionally and are afraid to speak up for fear of additional punishment. Thirty years later, Rita Olsson turns up in their community resurfacing trauma for the five Sámi who haven’t forgotten or forgiven the way she treated them.
Inspired by the author’s own family history, this is a powerful story told from the perspective of each of the five Sámi both as children and as adults. The narrative addresses issues of cultural assimilation as well as the impact that childhood trauma had in shaping each of them as adults, how it affected each of them differently and how it is passed between generations.
A thought-provoking and moving novel that educates with respect to the treatment of the Indigenous population of Northern Sweden which has parallels to historic wrongs perpetrated against the Indigenous population in other countries such as Canada which also had a residential school system.
14. Good Dirt by Charmaine Wilkerson
Setting: New England, France
FROM THE PUBLISHER: When ten-year-old Ebby Freeman heard the gunshot, time stopped. And when she saw her brother, Baz, lying on the floor surrounded by the shattered pieces of a centuries-old jar, life as Ebby knew it shattered as well.
The crime was never solved—and because the Freemans were one of the only Black families in a particularly well-to-do enclave of New England—the case has had an enduring, voyeuristic pull for the public. The last thing the Freemans want is another media frenzy splashing their family across the papers, but when Ebby’s high profile romance falls apart without any explanation, that’s exactly what they get.
So Ebby flees to France, only for her past to follow her there. And as she tries to process what’s happened, she begins to think about the other loss her family suffered on that day eighteen years ago—the stoneware jar that had been in their family for generations, brought North by an enslaved ancestor. But little does she know that the handcrafted piece of pottery held more than just her family’s history—it might also hold the key to unlocking her own future.
In this sweeping, evocative novel, Charmaine Wilkerson brings to life a multi-generational epic that examines how the past informs our present.
15. The Heart of Winter by Jonathan Evison
Setting: Bainbridge Island and Seattle, Washington
Abe and Ruth Winter, an elderly couple living on Bainbridge Island, Washington have, against all odds, been together for 70 years. Their opposites attract relationship started on a disastrous blind date at the University of Washington in the 1950s – Abe was smitten and Ruth thought he was annoying and too conservative – but their relationship has endured despite their differences.
Abe has just celebrated his 90th birthday convinced that it’s sure to be his last when a loose tooth that has been bothering Ruth turns out to be a symptom of something more serious. Despite his own limitations, Abe is determined to take care of Ruth even as the couple’s three living children question his ability and pressure their parents to give up the farm.
The dual timeline narrative alternates between the points-of-view of Abe and Ruth both during the present day health crisis and through their seventy year relationship starting at the beginning.
The Heart of Winter is a beautiful, emotional story of a long-married couple with a turbulent history struggling with illness and loss of independence. The novel explores seventy years of moments that make up a lifetime together as well as the challenges of aging and illness. It’s a quiet, heartwarming story of a love that has endured throughout a lifetime – a story of love, loss, forgiveness, and family that shows how love requires compromise and making the choice to stay together. This story touched my heart – it is so relatable and I’m sure it will be one of my favourite reads of the year.
16. Wedding Dashers by Heather McBreen
Setting: London to Belfast
Two stranded wedding guests make their way from London to Northern Ireland in this delightful rom-com debut.
Ada is en route from Seattle to Ireland for her younger sister’s destination wedding and she’s less than thrilled. Her business has recently failed, she’s living with her parents after her long-time boyfriend decided they needed a 3 month break, she’s flat broke and, worst of all, she’s convinced her sister is rushing into an ill-considered marriage. Now the budget airline has cancelled her connecting flight to Belfast and she’s stranded in London without the means to even book a hotel room.
Ada’s luck seems to take a turn for the better when she meets Jack – a very attractive fellow traveller who is also stranded – and he offers to share his hotel room with her. After a few drinks, Ada decides there’s no reason why she can’t share her true feelings about the wedding, the groom and the womanizing best man she dreads meeting with this airport stranger only to discover that they are both heading to the same wedding and Jack is the aforementioned best man. The pair decide to put the misunderstanding aside and travel together via a mix of ferry, trains, and automobiles in a desperate attempt to make it to the wedding on time while also trying to keep their simmering attraction to each other in check.
Wedding Dashers is a fun read and a very strong romance debut – anyone who has had travel go sideways can relate! There’s sizzling chemistry and witty banter as the two main characters get to know each other in this slow burn/forced proximity romance as well as some heavier issues that the two are coming to terms with. Laugh-out-loud funny yet also emotional at times – a great choice for romance readers interested in a steamy road-trip romance!
Thank you to NetGalley and Berkley Publishing Group for sending a digital ARC of this book for review consideration. All opinions are my own.
17. The English Problem by Beena Kamlani
Setting: India and England
In this impressive debut, Shiv Advani is handpicked as an 18 year-old by Mahatma Gandhi to travel from India and study law in London. The plan is that he will return to India after his studies and use his knowledge of their own laws to help with a non-violent ouster of the British colonizers. Shiv arrives in London to begin his studies in 1931 but is then asked to stay after graduation to gain experience as a barrister eventually spending a decade in England before his journey home in 1941.
The narrative alternates between two timelines – one that begins in 1931 when Shiv is a newly arrived immigrant to London and the second in 1941 when he is aboard a ship homeward bound for India – and includes complex fictional characters who interact with real-life historical figures including Gandhi, Romanian-British journalist Miron Grindea and writers E.M. Forster and Virginia Woolf.
The English Problem is a slow-paced, character driven novel set against the backdrop of India’s independence movement, the rise of fascism in Europe and the onset of World War II. Beautifully written and descriptive, it’s a touching story of one young man’s struggle with his sexual and cultural identity but also a story of the far-reaching impact of colonialism as well as racism and classism in England.
This was an interesting and enjoyable read – my only criticism is that it did feel longer than it needed to be (nearly 500 pages) and started to drag a bit towards the end. The English Problem ends prior to Partition in 1947 and I would love to know what happens next to Shiv, his family and Lucy as India gained her independence but his home region became part of the new state of Pakistan.
Thank you to NetGalley and Crown Publishing for sending a digital ARC of this book for review consideration. All opinions are my own.
18. Back After This by Linda Holmes
Setting: United States
Publication Date: February 25, 2025
FROM THE PUBLISHER: Cecily Foster loves to make podcasts. She fiercely protects her colleagues, dearly adores her friends, and never misses dinner with her sister. But after a disastrous relationship with a colleague who stole her heart and her ideas, she’s put romantic love on hold.
When the boss who’s disappointed her again and again finally offers her the chance to host her own show, she wants to be thrilled. But there’s a catch—actually, two catches. First, the show will be about Cecily’s dating life. And second, she has to follow the guidance of influencer and newly minted relationship coach Eliza Cassidy, whose relentlessly upbeat attitude seems ready-made for social media, not real life.
Cecily would rather do anything other than put her singledom on display (ugh) or take advice from the internet (UGH). But when her boss hints that doing the show is the only way to protect a friend’s job, she realizes she has no choice.
To make matters more complicated, once she’s committed to twenty blind dates of Eliza’s choosing, Cecily finds herself unable to stop thinking about Will, a photographer she helped to rescue a very big and very lovable lost dog. Even though there are sparks between the two, Will’s own path is uncertain, and Eliza’s skeptical comments about Cecily’s decision-making aren’t helping. On the one hand, Will seems great. But on the other hand . . . don’t they all?
As Cecily struggles to balance the life she truly desires and the one Eliza wants to create for her, she finds herself at a crossroads. Can Cecily sort through all the advice and find a way to do what she loves without losing herself in the process?
19. What Happened to the McCrays? by Tracey Lange
Setting: Potsdam, New York
When Kyle McCray receives word that his father has suffered a debilitating stroke, he returns to his hometown of Potsdam in upstate New York with no expectation of a warm welcome. Two and a half years earlier, Kyle burned a lot of bridges when he abruptly left town abandoning his dad, his friends, the employees at the garage he owned and Casey, his wife of sixteen years.
Apologies are made, responsibility is taken and before long Kyle is given an opportunity to redeem himself by taking on coaching the struggling middle school hockey team. He starts to think about moving back to Potsdam but knows that it’s only possible if Casey doesn’t object to his staying.
A “then” and “now” dual timeline story from both Kyle and Casey’s points-of-view shows the start of their relationship as highschool sweethearts and continues up until the point that Kyle left town slowly revealing what happened to the McCrays at the same time as they confront the pain of their broken marriage and try to make peace with the past in the current timeline.
What Happened to the McCrays is an emotional family drama – both heartbreaking and hopeful. I was fully invested in this poignant story of family and community, love and loss, regret, forgiveness and redemption. The characters are sympathetic and you can’t help but root for them, the small town experience is authentic, and I loved the middle school hockey players and the adorable dog.
This is the first book that I have read by this author and it was quite an enjoyable read – I’ll definitely pick up the author’s previous two books We Are the Brennans and The Connelly’s of County Down now!
Thanks to NetGalley and Celadon Books for sending a digital ARC of this book for review consideration. All opinions are my own.
20. Presumed Guilty by Scott Turow
Setting: Rural midwestern US
Rusty Sabich is a retired judge in his 70s living in the rural midwest in a lakeside home he shares with his soon-to-be wife, Bea, and her adopted son, Aaron. Rusty and Bea are frantic with worry when Aaron, who lives under their supervision as a condition of his probation for drug possession, disappears only to return a few days later with a vague story about a camping trip with his girlfriend, Mae, that ended with a fight and him hitchhiking home. Suspicion falls on Aaron when Mae hasn’t returned several days later and, when her body is discovered, he is charged with murder. Bea begs Rusty to represent Aaron and, against his better judgement, he agrees to take on Aaron as a client.
Scott Turow’s latest legal thriller/courtroom drama is over 500 pages long and starts off slow but it’s well worth hanging in through the detailed set-up. The trial commences at about the 1/3 mark of the book and that’s where the novel really takes off and establishes once again that there is nobody better than Turow at writing courtroom scenes.
From that point, I found it impossible to put the book down as I was completely absorbed in the case and the courtroom atmosphere and in suspense regarding the outcome of the trial – never once did I feel certain that I knew how it was going to turn out. The specific legal details of the case are fascinating on their own but Aaron’s experience also raises interesting issues to consider with respect to the legal system and whether justice can be provided for those who are presumed guilty.
This is the third installment in a series about Rusty Sabich following Turow’s earlier books Presumed Innocent and Innocent. I enjoyed this book even though it has been many years since I read the previous two (more than thirty since the first one which I read around the time I finished law school) and I don’t remember much other than I enjoyed them immensely so I would say that Presumed Guilty is fine to read as a standalone.
21. Nesting by Roisín O’Donnell
Setting: Dublin, Ireland
On a spring afternoon in Dublin in 2018, Ciara Fay makes a split-second decision to grab a few belongings, strap her two young daughters aged 4 and 2 into the car and leave her emotionally abusive husband. Over the five years of their marriage, Ryan has prevented Ciara from working, isolated her from friends and family, belittled her and gaslit her into thinking she’s the problem.
With no access to funds and no support network in Dublin, she tries to fly to her mother and sister in England but is stopped at the airport and prevented from leaving the country without Ryan’s permission. Ciara has no choice but to seek emergency accommodation and the only place available is at a hotel that sets aside one floor for unhoused families. Over the following months, Ciara finds herself caught up in a seemingly endless loop of bureaucratic red tape and unable to find suitable housing in a tight rental market while Ryan wages a campaign to convince her that returning home is the right thing to do.
This is a suspenseful and propulsive pageturner and I could not put it down – mostly because I had myself tied up in knots worrying about how it would all play out. The odds are stacked against Ciara as she struggles to escape Ryan and keep herself and her children safe and I was rooting for her to find the strength to stay away for good while also angry and frustrated with the court system and the bureaucracy that was letting her down. The author does an excellent job at conveying the impact of emotional abuse and gaslighting on Ciara and how hard it can be to explain to those who don’t have firsthand experience while also highlighting societal issues exacerbated by Ireland’s housing crisis.
Nesting is a well-written and compassionate debut about the harsh realities facing women in this situation. It’s a realistic story of intimate partner abuse and it’s not an easy read but it’s also a moving and hopeful story of resilience, courage and starting over.
Thank you to NetGalley and Algonquin Books for sending a digital ARC of this book for review consideration. All opinions are my own.
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