2024 Books in Review

There was a time I’d read 50 books a year. I can’t seem to do that anymore. In 2024, I read 33 books. Of those, 11 were rereads (in most cases, it had been decades since I last read them). Only six titles earned my 5-star review, but only one got a 1-star review. Let’s start with the bad.

The Fabric of Our Souls by K.M. Moronova was not what I expected it to be. For some reason, I started the book believing it was going to be some existential book about finding a deeper meaning, but instead it was just a whiny goth romance that bored the crap outta me.

The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss wasn’t a 1-star, but it was an aggravating novel about a man/wizard who suffered but was never really in any danger. Everything he put his hand to was easy for him, to the point he was incredibly boring.

The best new-to-me book that I read was definitely The Extraordinary Life of Sam Hell by Robert Dugoni. I loved everything about this book, even the way every possible loose end was tied up at the end. Sam was an interesting and compelling character I was fully invested in.

Other notable new reads were my first excursion into the worlds of Brandon Sanderson with his Mistborn series, which I really liked. A couple of the books got 5-star ratings. The Year of What If was another steller entry by Phaedra Patrick

I reread Ursula K. LeGuin’s Earthsea books. Let me elaborate. I have loved the original trilogy since junior high school. I bought and read Tehanu when it first came out and didn’t like it at all. This time, though, it was like reading it for the first time, and I got it. The same with the newer final volume in the series.

I read more Joanna Penn books on writing and marketing and I recommend everything she puts out.

After years of waiting, I finally read Alice Walker’s The Color Purple and, honestly, was underwhelmed. I have to wonder if the book’s reputation is more about the sex than the story. It didn’t hold a candle to Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God.

The best book I read in 2024 was another very old friend I first met in junior high but hadn’t revisited in many, many years. To Kill a Mockingbird may be THE great American novel.

Those are the highlights and low points of my reading for last year. What were your best and worst reads of 2024?