Never let me go - goodness. I remember reading it for a book club when I lived in Singapore, and it changed my life. His writing is otherworldly in this world. I've read 9 out of 10, I feel so proud.
I haven't read any of these and I don't think we have a super similar taste in reading, but I still love watching these videos. It's so nice listening to someone talk about books they love. 😊
Waow alot of these I hadn’t heard of before, that’s always fun! 🤩🌟 Some of my fav from last year was The long walk - Stephen King, A river enchanted - Rebecca Ross and Lessons in chemestry - Bonnie Garmus.
I read Piranesi based on your and clockwork reader's recommendations this year and it was phenomenal, I loved it so so much. Thank you for recommending such a lovely book.
So nice to find another Australian booktuber! I really loved our wives under the sea. You should read the mountain in the sea - it’s more octopus and sci fi but had a similar vibe.
Thank you for all of the amazing content this year!! I always look forward to your videos and get so many good recs from them. My top reads this year were The Tainted Cup, Where the Dark Stands Still, Paladin’s Grace, Emily Wilde’s Map of the Otherlands, Piranesi, and A Crane Among Wolves.
I just finished Orbital this morning and I have a hard time imagining anything hitting me harder than it this year. I had a lump in my throat so many times; it's such a beautiful work. Thanks for this list and your channel!
Hi Christy! It’s been quite a few years since our channels were small and you found mine and I discovered yours. I’ve left UA-cam but have been so delighted stopping by your channel and seeing it grow and change. Finding my way back to reading and having a peak into your reading journey is amazing because our tastes have a lot of similarities. Anyway, it feels so special to know that your journey as a writer is blossoming and I absolutely cannot wait for your novel to be published and to read it! Sending lots of love!
Hi Christy! I LOVE Julia Armfield’s writing. I’m currently reading Private Rites and have to have my pencil in hand the whole time. 3 favorites from 2024 that I haven’t heard you talk about previously (to my knowledge): 1. Winter in Sokcho by Elisa Shua Dusapin 2. How to Be Both by Ali Smith 3. Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado Can’t wait to hear about how your writing is going!
I picked up 1Q84 over Christmas and am loving it! I am halfway through book 1. I am interested in Octavia Bulter so it was nice to hear your review. I read The Fifth Season a few years ago and loved it! I would re-read that series.
My favorite read this year was David Mitchell's "The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet". Jacob is a young Dutch man working in Japan in the 18th century. It was a beautiful experience and has stuck with me all year 💕
Well, what a coincidence! I have started reading Days at the Morisaki Bookshop and I'm quite loving it. I was just thinking whether you have read it and here comes your video talking about it.
Didn't read much in 2024, but my favorite book was actually "Frankenstein". I truly enjoyed it. I think the writing was so amazing. It took me a little bit to get used to it at first and pick up the pace, because I'm not a native English speaker, but once I got used to the writing, it was really an amazing experience. The story was great and surprisingly different from the known clichés. My next reading will be "Dracula".
By far the highlight of my year was All the colors of the dark, it was an amazing book and I think you would really enjoy it! Orbital was another favorite of the year :)
I’m finally getting around to Dorian Gray - so excited!:) My favorites from 2024 were If We Were Villains by M.L. Rio and The Other Valley by Scott Alexander Howard. Cheers to more great reads in 2025 & thanks for another amazing/cozy video! 📚 ☕️
my 10 favourite books this year (unordered): - homegoing by yaa gyasi - house of the spirits by isabel allende - network effect by martha wells (actually the entire murderbot diaries....) - tehanu by ursula k. le guin - tales from earthsea by ursula k. le guin - my brilliant friend by elena ferrante - a man called ove by fredrik backman - the sword of kaigen by m. l. wang - a song for arbonne by guy gavriel kay - a game of thrones by george r. r. martin (reread)
While watching I was thinking you should read Strange Beasts of China, so happy that it was in your top two books! I also loved it too, had to re-read parts but once I started re-reading it helped! 😊📚
Such an amaging top 10. 🩷 Thank you for all the inspiration this year, Christy! And Our Wifes Under The Sea was also one of my favourite reads this year. A fascinating and haunting read. 🥰
I also heartily enjoyed Remains of the Day and Piranesi off of this list last year! Everything else has its home on my tbr for now, especially Orbital. I don’t think I even got to read more than fifteen books last year, but I loved what I did read. Dreams Must Explain Themselves: The Selected Non-Fiction of Ursula LeGuin, you might quite enjoy. I found her expansions on the lives of female authors to be a) heartily enjoyable, b) heavily sarcastic, and c) extremely eye opening, but she’s quite unafraid to tackle heavy topics with a very accessible voice. (Dare I say I enjoyed her nonfiction writing more than I enjoyed Earthsea?) Night Train to the Stars by Kenji Miyazawa - short story collection. Wonderful, whimsical, but the titular story did make me cry, as I read it quite soon after the passing of three loved ones in an accident. Very Ghibliesque, sweet and wild. Other than that, only A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers and Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes really stand out - both make you really question what the purpose of life is, one in a lovely way, one in a very melancholic way. Nice vid as always, and I hoped I get to read more from the your recommendations this year, as well as possibly Project Teacup.
I really need to read some Octavia E Butler! I've heard nothing but amazing things! Rebecca is one I actually have on my tbr shelves and I think I'm going to have to pick it up this year, especially because I've loved Jane Eyre since I was a child! Orbital is one that I kept seeing constantly at the end of this year and it's definitely on my wish-list! What a fantastic reading year!!
I also read Strange Beasts of China after you mentioned it on your other vlog and even thought it definitely wasn't a book I'd normally pick up, I got so swept up in it! I definitely agree with you on "how" to read it. I don't think it's a book you can breeze through...
Aaah loving seeing you again. I miss the bookclub! My top 8 books 2024 was The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah, The Other Bennet Sister by Janice Hadlow, The Ornithologist Field Guide to Love by India Holton, Honeybees and Distant Thunder by Riku Unda ( which I think you would love) Curious Tides by Pascale Lacelle, The Witchs Heart by Genevieve Gornichec, The Crescent Moon Tearoom by Stacy Sivinski ❤❤
Another great list I need to add to my TBR. If you're looking for another book like Brideshead Revisited, I suggest Silence by Shusaku Endo (Trans. by William Johnston). A great book about faith with some really beautiful prose. Hope everyone has a great new year!
My favorite read of the year has to be Hooky by Miriam Bonastre-Tur, mostly because of the characters and artwork, and my other favorite is The Unmaking of June Farrow by Adrienne Young. I was so stunned by that book and how beautiful it was that I sometimes still think about the characters
I read Stephen King’s 11/22/63. It was a fascinating time travel story. Political intrigue. A love story that plays a big part. Interesting portrayal of Lee Harvey Oswald.
Beautyland by Marie-Helene Bertino made me think of you while reading, because the prose is so beautiful and unique! It’s literary fiction with just a dash of sci-fi. We follow a young girl growing up believing she is an alien, left on Earth to report on humanity. She writes her observations of what make people human and sends them up via a fax machine. The book has lingered itself into one of my favorite books of 2024, and I think it’s being overlooked on UA-cam ❤
My favourites of 2024: 1) Emily Wilde's Map of the Otherlands 2) The lost story by Meg Shaffer (Narnia- style adventure for grownups) 3) A dark and secret magic (small town/ darkish cottage core Halloween adventure) 4) James by Percival Everett (Huckleberry Finn retelling, Booker Prize shortlist) 5) Small things like these by Claire Keegan (check out the movie trailer with Killian Murphy)
Christy, have you read anything by Claire Keegan? If not, Foster would be a great starting point. I think you’d enjoy her style! Rebecca and Ishiguro made my top 10 as well! ❤
I think you might really enjoy reading Karen Russell's books! They're mostly collections of speculative short stories and she does also have a novel Swamplandia (the vibes are Gothic alligator wrestling)
An author to add to your list is Hiromi Kawakami. I read 3 of her books in 2024; 1. Dragon Palace - a collection of mind blowing short stories; 2. People from my Neighourhood - very short stories which started off mundane but became bizarre 3. The Third Love - this is a full novel which deals with alternate realities and dream worlds, a very good read.
Recently found your channel and I find your videos so unique, interesting, and calming. I'm finding so much to enjoy and so many books I don't see on other channels/everywhere on social media platforms. Thank you for what you're doing; I'm so inspired and grateful to have found your videos and recommendations. Do you have any channels you enjoy or recommend yourself? Thank you!
One of my favorite books this year was Hard-boiled Wonderland and the end of the world by Haruki Murakami, it was absolutely wonderful, so weird and interesting and masterfully written🫶🏻
You should read Murakami's most recent book The City and its Uncertain Walls. It has a starting point in Hard Boiled Wonderland and then expands on it, it is very well written and very mind bending.
Evelyn Waugh’s name is pronounced Eve-lin as in Christmas Eve. My 87 year old mums middle name is also Evelyn and is pronounced the same way as in Christmas Eve . In England until recently it was usually pronounced this way but the modern pronunciation and American pronunciation is often Everlin , how you pronounced it xxx
Loved 1Q84, and because of this I jumped right into his new book at The City and It’s Uncertain Walls…I should not have done that lol. 1Q84 was just so interesting and the writing was so easy…I never felt like I was reading a 1000 page book…his new book is only 400+ pages and it’s feeling very long. Rebecca is on my 2025 TBR and I just bought Orbital, I’ve been tempted to jump into it. I wonder if you’d like the book I just finished, It Last Forever And Then It’s Over by Anne DeMarcken. It’s super short and really impactful. I really enjoyed it.
Christy if i remember correctly, you were going to read "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe" (if not all the Narnia Chronicles) last year, but I did not hear you talk about them. Did you read them and if so, what did you think? I hope you have a good year. Happy reading
Thank you so much for the video! Very interesting to hear about all the different books. To share a thought on The Wood at Midwinter, I felt uncomfortable with the idea of the publisher charging £9.99 for a book with such a small word count, that was written with the intention of being heard by the public without charge on BBC Radio, which is free in the UK and does not even need a licence fee. Of course it’s important to pay writers and illustrators fairly but when other very small books written by well know writers like this have been released in physical format they have usually donated some or all of the profit to charity. It just felt like a cash grab and greedy (to clarify not blaming Susannah Clarke as it was unlikely her decision but the publishers)
I read 9 books in 2024 and it’s the most I’ve managed in years (AND i have a freaking toddler so how I did this, I do not know lol) So excited to add some of these to my 2025 list! I’m apart of the book club, but haven’t managed to join in on a month yet because of fear of time constraints! So maybe it’s time!! 💙
Would love your take on Ishiguro's The Buried Giant. My wife and I are Ishiguro fans. We both loved Never Let Me Go and An Artist of the Floating World. But we are diametrically opposed on The Buried Giant, as are, apparently, his other readers.
At the time, I found it a bit dull but I'd really love to re-read it; I think (or, at least I'm hoping) i'd appreciate it more now! Never Let Me Go is by far my favourite :)
Tip: buy an ereader and buy new ebooks instead of paperbacks. This solves both the content production thing as well as well ... authors will get paid because their books are bought. I love your conent!
My top 10 books of 2024: Cloud Cuckoo Land (Anthony Doerr) Landmarks (Robert Macfarlane) The Living Mountain (Nan Shepherd) The Boat in the Evening (Tarjei Vesaas) Rooted: Life at the Crossroads of Science, Nature and Spirit (Lyada Lynn Haupt) Art Objects (Jeanette Winterson) The Old Ways (Robert Macfarlane) Wild Geese (Nan Shepherd) Day (Michael Cunningham) Held (Anne Michaels) Of those 10, one was a read - Art Objects.
Definitely gonna check out Strange Beasts of China! Speculative fiction with Chinese elements are so rare for me to find, if anyone has other recommendations please let me know 🥰
You might like MONSTER SHE WROTE: The Women Who Pioneered Horror & Speculative Fiction by Lisa Kröger and Melanie R. Anderson. It’s about the women writers who have contributed to and often created the elements of horror and science fiction & fantasy that we enjoy today. So many amazing women writers and novels I had not heard of before! Be prepared that your TBR will grow!! 💖✨
Have you read Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead by Olga Tokarczuk? It’s from 2009 and won the Nobel Prize. It blew my mind. Super detailed like Tartt and Dumarnier. The protagonist is unforgettable.
I have an incredibly nit-picky question about "The Remains of the Day". At one point the main character uses the phrase "begs the question". The phrase "begs the question" is actually not synonymous with the phrase "raises the question", it means something completely different. And I was wondering if the main character's incorrect use of that is a mistake on the part of the editing or a deliberate point on the part of the author. Very picky, I know, but I am curious if anyone has any thoughts on that.
I would say that the two phrases are widely used in British English interchangeably, when you say “which begs the question” rather than an assumption it just means “this makes me think about…”. I believe that the butler is just using the phrase the way that most people would in that setting rather than a mistake by the author.
@ I was going to start with Johnathan Strange because I watched the tv show a few years ago and it broke me. Why do you recommend I start Piranse first?
@@christinacreech1974 Jonathan is just a very very long, very difficult book to read because it's a regency pastiche :-) If you're used to reading books from that time period, then disregard this. It's my favourite of the two and honestly an absolute masterpiece. In my opinion, it’s probably the best fantasy story published since 2000. BUT Piranesi is, in comparison, really short and much more palatable to a modern reader, if that makes sense. However, if you’re super excited for Jonathan Strange, then go for it!
I read Butter in early 2024 and I thought the story was amazing but some of the actual writing was not great (but that may be due to the translation). It is a great story and definitely one of my favourites of 2024.
I’ve had a difficult time hearing much feedback on Parable Of The Talents and therefore put off reading it - aka:::: thank you, added to the TBR ASAP 📖🪱💚
i have been following your project teacup journey from the very beginning and i seriously wish i get to read it one day.
Never let me go - goodness. I remember reading it for a book club when I lived in Singapore, and it changed my life. His writing is otherworldly in this world. I've read 9 out of 10, I feel so proud.
I haven't read any of these and I don't think we have a super similar taste in reading, but I still love watching these videos. It's so nice listening to someone talk about books they love. 😊
Waow alot of these I hadn’t heard of before, that’s always fun! 🤩🌟 Some of my fav from last year was The long walk - Stephen King, A river enchanted - Rebecca Ross and Lessons in chemestry - Bonnie Garmus.
I read Piranesi based on your and clockwork reader's recommendations this year and it was phenomenal, I loved it so so much. Thank you for recommending such a lovely book.
So nice to find another Australian booktuber! I really loved our wives under the sea. You should read the mountain in the sea - it’s more octopus and sci fi but had a similar vibe.
Thank you for all of the amazing content this year!! I always look forward to your videos and get so many good recs from them.
My top reads this year were The Tainted Cup, Where the Dark Stands Still, Paladin’s Grace, Emily Wilde’s Map of the Otherlands, Piranesi, and A Crane Among Wolves.
I just finished Orbital this morning and I have a hard time imagining anything hitting me harder than it this year. I had a lump in my throat so many times; it's such a beautiful work. Thanks for this list and your channel!
🐛Right?! Orbital is stunning. It ranked among my top favorite reads in 2023. I was delighted to see it win the Booker Prize. So well deserved! 🥰
Hi Christy! It’s been quite a few years since our channels were small and you found mine and I discovered yours. I’ve left UA-cam but have been so delighted stopping by your channel and seeing it grow and change. Finding my way back to reading and having a peak into your reading journey is amazing because our tastes have a lot of similarities. Anyway, it feels so special to know that your journey as a writer is blossoming and I absolutely cannot wait for your novel to be published and to read it! Sending lots of love!
I’ve been waiting for this!! ❤❤❤ Happy New Year
Hi Christy! I LOVE Julia Armfield’s writing. I’m currently reading Private Rites and have to have my pencil in hand the whole time. 3 favorites from 2024 that I haven’t heard you talk about previously (to my knowledge):
1. Winter in Sokcho by Elisa Shua Dusapin
2. How to Be Both by Ali Smith
3. Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado
Can’t wait to hear about how your writing is going!
Your recommendations videos are my absolute favorite!!! ❤
I picked up 1Q84 over Christmas and am loving it! I am halfway through book 1. I am interested in Octavia Bulter so it was nice to hear your review. I read The Fifth Season a few years ago and loved it! I would re-read that series.
A nice cup of tea and some book writing, can’t get any better than that ❤!
Nice list! I love how you tend towards magical feeling books. This was how I found your channel. I added Strange Beasts to my tbr.
My favorite read this year was David Mitchell's "The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet". Jacob is a young Dutch man working in Japan in the 18th century. It was a beautiful experience and has stuck with me all year 💕
Well, what a coincidence! I have started reading Days at the Morisaki Bookshop and I'm quite loving it. I was just thinking whether you have read it and here comes your video talking about it.
We don’t have similar reading taste at all but I still love watching your videos, I love your passion!
Didn't read much in 2024, but my favorite book was actually "Frankenstein". I truly enjoyed it. I think the writing was so amazing. It took me a little bit to get used to it at first and pick up the pace, because I'm not a native English speaker, but once I got used to the writing, it was really an amazing experience. The story was great and surprisingly different from the known clichés. My next reading will be "Dracula".
I read my way through your 2023 top books and cannot wait to check some of these out! ❤
ah i'm so early!! love these videos every sunday
Been awhile Christy...so lovely and inspiring to see you today❤
I've been wanting to read Strange Beasts of China - I'm happy to see you enjoyed it!
My first two reads this year were Piranesi and Howl’s Moving Castle. I am definitely going to check out the few that weren’t book club picks!
So many wonderful books on here. I loved Our Wives Under the Sea as well.
I need to try Octavia E Butlers work
By far the highlight of my year was All the colors of the dark, it was an amazing book and I think you would really enjoy it! Orbital was another favorite of the year :)
I’m finally getting around to Dorian Gray - so excited!:) My favorites from 2024 were If We Were Villains by M.L. Rio and The Other Valley by Scott Alexander Howard. Cheers to more great reads in 2025 & thanks for another amazing/cozy video! 📚 ☕️
🐛So delightful to see Orbital make your list! That was among my top reads in 2023. Such a beautiful, meditative book. 🥰
my 10 favourite books this year (unordered):
- homegoing by yaa gyasi
- house of the spirits by isabel allende
- network effect by martha wells (actually the entire murderbot diaries....)
- tehanu by ursula k. le guin
- tales from earthsea by ursula k. le guin
- my brilliant friend by elena ferrante
- a man called ove by fredrik backman
- the sword of kaigen by m. l. wang
- a song for arbonne by guy gavriel kay
- a game of thrones by george r. r. martin (reread)
While watching I was thinking you should read Strange Beasts of China, so happy that it was in your top two books! I also loved it too, had to re-read parts but once I started re-reading it helped! 😊📚
Thanks for sharing your list!
Such an amaging top 10. 🩷 Thank you for all the inspiration this year, Christy! And Our Wifes Under The Sea was also one of my favourite reads this year. A fascinating and haunting read. 🥰
I also heartily enjoyed Remains of the Day and Piranesi off of this list last year! Everything else has its home on my tbr for now, especially Orbital. I don’t think I even got to read more than fifteen books last year, but I loved what I did read. Dreams Must Explain Themselves: The Selected Non-Fiction of Ursula LeGuin, you might quite enjoy. I found her expansions on the lives of female authors to be a) heartily enjoyable, b) heavily sarcastic, and c) extremely eye opening, but she’s quite unafraid to tackle heavy topics with a very accessible voice. (Dare I say I enjoyed her nonfiction writing more than I enjoyed Earthsea?)
Night Train to the Stars by Kenji Miyazawa - short story collection. Wonderful, whimsical, but the titular story did make me cry, as I read it quite soon after the passing of three loved ones in an accident. Very Ghibliesque, sweet and wild.
Other than that, only A Psalm for the Wild-Built by Becky Chambers and Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes really stand out - both make you really question what the purpose of life is, one in a lovely way, one in a very melancholic way.
Nice vid as always, and I hoped I get to read more from the your recommendations this year, as well as possibly Project Teacup.
I really need to read some Octavia E Butler! I've heard nothing but amazing things! Rebecca is one I actually have on my tbr shelves and I think I'm going to have to pick it up this year, especially because I've loved Jane Eyre since I was a child! Orbital is one that I kept seeing constantly at the end of this year and it's definitely on my wish-list! What a fantastic reading year!!
I also read Strange Beasts of China after you mentioned it on your other vlog and even thought it definitely wasn't a book I'd normally pick up, I got so swept up in it! I definitely agree with you on "how" to read it. I don't think it's a book you can breeze through...
Aaah loving seeing you again. I miss the bookclub! My top 8 books 2024 was The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah, The Other Bennet Sister by Janice Hadlow, The Ornithologist Field Guide to Love by India Holton, Honeybees and Distant Thunder by Riku Unda ( which I think you would love) Curious Tides by Pascale Lacelle, The Witchs Heart by Genevieve Gornichec, The Crescent Moon Tearoom by Stacy Sivinski ❤❤
Never Let Me Go is one of my favourite books! If you’re looking for a similar vibe from Ishiguro, I recommend Klara and the Sun
Another great list I need to add to my TBR. If you're looking for another book like Brideshead Revisited, I suggest Silence by Shusaku Endo (Trans. by William Johnston). A great book about faith with some really beautiful prose. Hope everyone has a great new year!
My favorite read of the year has to be Hooky by Miriam Bonastre-Tur, mostly because of the characters and artwork, and my other favorite is The Unmaking of June Farrow by Adrienne Young. I was so stunned by that book and how beautiful it was that I sometimes still think about the characters
I read Stephen King’s 11/22/63. It was a fascinating time travel story. Political intrigue. A love story that plays a big part. Interesting portrayal of Lee Harvey Oswald.
Beautyland by Marie-Helene Bertino made me think of you while reading, because the prose is so beautiful and unique! It’s literary fiction with just a dash of sci-fi. We follow a young girl growing up believing she is an alien, left on Earth to report on humanity. She writes her observations of what make people human and sends them up via a fax machine. The book has lingered itself into one of my favorite books of 2024, and I think it’s being overlooked on UA-cam ❤
My favourites of 2024:
1) Emily Wilde's Map of the Otherlands
2) The lost story by Meg Shaffer (Narnia- style adventure for grownups)
3) A dark and secret magic (small town/ darkish cottage core Halloween adventure)
4) James by Percival Everett (Huckleberry Finn retelling, Booker Prize shortlist)
5) Small things like these by Claire Keegan (check out the movie trailer with Killian Murphy)
Christy, have you read anything by Claire Keegan? If not, Foster would be a great starting point. I think you’d enjoy her style!
Rebecca and Ishiguro made my top 10 as well! ❤
I've read A Little Luck by Claudia Pineiro and really liked it so much. I'll definitely read Elena Knows this year
I read 15 books in 2024 (including the Fifth Season - loved!), my hands down left-reeling favourite was Unsettled Ground by Claire Fuller ✨💛✨
I think you might really enjoy reading Karen Russell's books! They're mostly collections of speculative short stories and she does also have a novel Swamplandia (the vibes are Gothic alligator wrestling)
An author to add to your list is Hiromi Kawakami. I read 3 of her books in 2024;
1. Dragon Palace - a collection of mind blowing short stories;
2. People from my Neighourhood - very short stories which started off mundane but became bizarre
3. The Third Love - this is a full novel which deals with alternate realities and dream worlds, a very good read.
Recently found your channel and I find your videos so unique, interesting, and calming. I'm finding so much to enjoy and so many books I don't see on other channels/everywhere on social media platforms. Thank you for what you're doing; I'm so inspired and grateful to have found your videos and recommendations. Do you have any channels you enjoy or recommend yourself? Thank you!
I always get the best book recommendations from Jen Campbell! I also love Leonie (The Book Leo) 💛
@@christy-anne-jones Thanks so much! I will check both of them out :)
Babel by RF Kuang was my favorite book from 2024! I also really enjoyed The Daughters of Izdihar and The Weavers of Almaxa by Hadeer Elsbai.
My favorite reads from 2024 were The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley and Annihilation by Jeff Vandermeer. So good.
elena knows blew me away one of my faves of 2024 as well 🫶🏽
One of my favorite books this year was Hard-boiled Wonderland and the end of the world by Haruki Murakami, it was absolutely wonderful, so weird and interesting and masterfully written🫶🏻
You should read Murakami's most recent book The City and its Uncertain Walls. It has a starting point in Hard Boiled Wonderland and then expands on it, it is very well written and very mind bending.
@philippayne2443 oohh that's sound great, thank you!! I'll definitely read it
Evelyn Waugh’s name is pronounced Eve-lin as in Christmas Eve. My 87 year old mums middle name is also Evelyn and is pronounced the same way as in Christmas Eve . In England until recently it was usually pronounced this way but the modern pronunciation and American pronunciation is often Everlin , how you pronounced it xxx
Loved 1Q84, and because of this I jumped right into his new book at The City and It’s Uncertain Walls…I should not have done that lol. 1Q84 was just so interesting and the writing was so easy…I never felt like I was reading a 1000 page book…his new book is only 400+ pages and it’s feeling very long. Rebecca is on my 2025 TBR and I just bought Orbital, I’ve been tempted to jump into it. I wonder if you’d like the book I just finished, It Last Forever And Then It’s Over by Anne DeMarcken. It’s super short and really impactful. I really enjoyed it.
Christy if i remember correctly, you were going to read "The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe" (if not all the Narnia Chronicles) last year, but I did not hear you talk about them. Did you read them and if so, what did you think? I hope you have a good year. Happy reading
My book of the year was Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver, highly recommend!
Thank you so much for the video! Very interesting to hear about all the different books.
To share a thought on The Wood at Midwinter, I felt uncomfortable with the idea of the publisher charging £9.99 for a book with such a small word count, that was written with the intention of being heard by the public without charge on BBC Radio, which is free in the UK and does not even need a licence fee. Of course it’s important to pay writers and illustrators fairly but when other very small books written by well know writers like this have been released in physical format they have usually donated some or all of the profit to charity. It just felt like a cash grab and greedy (to clarify not blaming Susannah Clarke as it was unlikely her decision but the publishers)
I read 9 books in 2024 and it’s the most I’ve managed in years (AND i have a freaking toddler so how I did this, I do not know lol) So excited to add some of these to my 2025 list! I’m apart of the book club, but haven’t managed to join in on a month yet because of fear of time constraints! So maybe it’s time!! 💙
LOL the Saltburn moment had me dying
Would love your take on Ishiguro's The Buried Giant. My wife and I are Ishiguro fans. We both loved Never Let Me Go and An Artist of the Floating World. But we are diametrically opposed on The Buried Giant, as are, apparently, his other readers.
At the time, I found it a bit dull but I'd really love to re-read it; I think (or, at least I'm hoping) i'd appreciate it more now! Never Let Me Go is by far my favourite :)
Can you please explain your take on Strange Beasts of Yan Ge? I think i didn't get a lot of the story. xD
Read lots of books in 2024 my two favorites were Ella enchanted and Babel
I also put Orbital in my top 10. I am really surprised at how much anger some booktubers seem to have towards it 😅
The legacy of the elves by Andrzej Sapkowski you should read it, love the book
Tip: buy an ereader and buy new ebooks instead of paperbacks. This solves both the content production thing as well as well ... authors will get paid because their books are bought. I love your conent!
Christy, have you read Moonbound by Robin Sloan? I think you would love it.
Is 1Q84 as weird as After Dark? Cause i loved After Dark and want more of that stuff 👀
It's weirder and much, much longer but it's really good!
@@midorilove07 Agree. I recently reread After Dark and enjoyed it but it is quite tame compared to 1Q84.
😂 the name of Evelyn Waugh is used as a joke in the film Lost in Translation where an actress uses it as a pseudonym when staying at hotels
My top 10 books of 2024:
Cloud Cuckoo Land (Anthony Doerr)
Landmarks (Robert Macfarlane)
The Living Mountain (Nan Shepherd)
The Boat in the Evening (Tarjei Vesaas)
Rooted: Life at the Crossroads of Science, Nature and Spirit (Lyada Lynn Haupt)
Art Objects (Jeanette Winterson)
The Old Ways (Robert Macfarlane)
Wild Geese (Nan Shepherd)
Day (Michael Cunningham)
Held (Anne Michaels)
Of those 10, one was a read - Art Objects.
Where do we send books/care package?😊
Definitely gonna check out Strange Beasts of China! Speculative fiction with Chinese elements are so rare for me to find, if anyone has other recommendations please let me know 🥰
You might like MONSTER SHE WROTE: The Women Who Pioneered Horror & Speculative Fiction by Lisa Kröger and Melanie R. Anderson. It’s about the women writers who have contributed to and often created the elements of horror and science fiction & fantasy that we enjoy today. So many amazing women writers and novels I had not heard of before! Be prepared that your TBR will grow!! 💖✨
Have you read Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead by Olga Tokarczuk? It’s from 2009 and won the Nobel Prize. It blew my mind. Super detailed like Tartt and Dumarnier. The protagonist is unforgettable.
I have an incredibly nit-picky question about "The Remains of the Day". At one point the main character uses the phrase "begs the question". The phrase "begs the question" is actually not synonymous with the phrase "raises the question", it means something completely different. And I was wondering if the main character's incorrect use of that is a mistake on the part of the editing or a deliberate point on the part of the author. Very picky, I know, but I am curious if anyone has any thoughts on that.
I would say that the two phrases are widely used in British English interchangeably, when you say “which begs the question” rather than an assumption it just means “this makes me think about…”. I believe that the butler is just using the phrase the way that most people would in that setting rather than a mistake by the author.
Can’t wait to read the strange beasts of China!
I would love to see you talk about Bunny by Mona Awad
Its interesting Parable of sower and talens are Jesus Parables in the bible.
Okay, I guess I’ll read Suzanna Clarke this year.
Start with Piranesi 😊💛
@ I was going to start with Johnathan Strange because I watched the tv show a few years ago and it broke me. Why do you recommend I start Piranse first?
@@christinacreech1974 Jonathan is just a very very long, very difficult book to read because it's a regency pastiche :-) If you're used to reading books from that time period, then disregard this. It's my favourite of the two and honestly an absolute masterpiece. In my opinion, it’s probably the best fantasy story published since 2000.
BUT Piranesi is, in comparison, really short and much more palatable to a modern reader, if that makes sense.
However, if you’re super excited for Jonathan Strange, then go for it!
@ That makes sense! I think I’m going to read both of them! 🤩
Your 'Favorite Reads of 2024' video is amazing! What would you recommend to start 2025 with-a feel-good read?
❤❤
I loved Butter by Asako Yuzuki, I think you’d really enjoy it too (if you haven’t already read it)
I read Butter in early 2024 and I thought the story was amazing but some of the actual writing was not great (but that may be due to the translation). It is a great story and definitely one of my favourites of 2024.
zero interest on books, Just you and your smile are intresting
1Q84 🫶
I’ve had a difficult time hearing much feedback on Parable Of The Talents and therefore put off reading it - aka:::: thank you, added to the TBR ASAP 📖🪱💚
"but without any of the really, erm... 🛁" 😅