July 2025 Reading

The Kitchen Front and The Demon of Unrest turned out to be my favorite books this month and, as always, I enjoyed a Vera Stanhope mystery by Ann Cleeves. This detective has really grown on me. I listened to four audiobooks in July and am now in the middle of a very long one – 23 hours – which Hoopla will reclaim before I am done (luckily, I have an actual book as well).

WWW Wednesday – July 16

WWW Wednesday is hosted by Taking on a World of Words.

The Three Ws are:

What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you’ll read next?

Favorite Reads of 2024

Wishing you a Happy New Year and many good books in 2025! I read nearly 200 books in 2024 and quite a few were so compelling I kept recommending them to others or thinking about them myself. These are my top ten:

My July 2024 Reading

My two favorite books this month were Mrs. Plansky's Revenge by Spencer Quinn and Small Mercies by Dennis Lehane - one light-hearted and amusing and the other dark and compelling - both memorable.  

Mystery/Suspense

The Risk of Darkness by Susan Hill (2006). I really liked the first two Simon Serrallier books I read in June so read three more in July – compelling police procedurals set in a small cathedral town with a lot about Simon’s family as part of the plot, which adds to their appeal, in my opinion.

Small Mercies by Dennis Lehane – 12/20 Books of Summer

Mary Pat Fennessy lives in public housing in South Boston, working as a health aide at a nursing home, trying to pay her bills and worrying about her children. Her son died of a drug overdose after coming back from Vietnam. Her daughter Jules is going into her senior year of high school, hanging out all night with teens her mother distrusts.

20 Books of Summer 2024

This is my third time participating in the 20 Books of Summer Reading Challenge, which is hosted by Cathy at 746 Books from June 1 to September 1, and gives me a fun opportunity to prioritize some books for summer and not simply read my library reserves as they come in.  This is a week late but I was busy trying to organize the world, or at least, my particular corner of it (middling success so far). I have enjoyed Cathy’s challenge twice before although last year I just read 11/20.  I added one of those unread books to my list.