November’s Reads
Running total books/audiobooks/short stories read in 2025 by month end: 132.
In a 360 degree reversal from last month, I DID want to read this month, which was great. I kind of instantly countered my good intentions though by immediately signing up to several heavy going doorstoppers that have recently been making headlines. I tried to lighten these up with a couple of of my trusty short reads, but I really did want to get through the books, so really did focus on them. In addition to the heavier reads, this is a busy time of year, with events such as Bonfire Night, and the encroach of Christmas. Family visits and other busyness intensified, and reading became a bit of a balancing act. The weather also turned incredibly cold, and there was more work around the house and garden preparing for winter. The end result was that, even with the full month, I only hit 5 stories, with 3 being full length books, 1 short story, and 1 theatrical Audible adaptation.
Once again, I have no five star reads this month, but I read nothing that was poor, and a lot of it was riveting. Four of the reads are bestsellers, and one a classic King short story that has become a (Shudder channel) Creepshow episode.
The Creepshow story is “Gray Matter” by Stephen King. I loved the character building in this one, it was very solidly a Stephen King story (great characters and a healthy - or unhealthy - dose of horror), and it is possible to see a little of the early development of his writing in this short offering.
The first big hitter on my list this month is “Nobody’s Girl: A Memoir of Surviving Abuse and Fighting for Justice” by Virginia Giuffre. This is a horrific memoir and a terrifying catalogue of abuse, beautifully interposed with moments of recovery, growth and family life. If I have a gripe on this one, it is that the protagonist has experienced so much abuse, it feels as though they (very understandably) struggle to differentiate between normal family life and abuse after the event. There is limited assessment really of how incredibly difficult it must have been for them all to live in this situation and move forward. By the close of the memoir, the reader desperately wants there to have been justice, and there simply isn’t that on any significant scale, making it that much more heart-breaking. The post-memoir meltdown of the author’s family life, and later death by suicide, feels the worst possible result of the trauma suffered.
I finished Nobody’s Girl, and the same evening (yes, you heard me. The. Same. Evening.), I dived straight into Andrew Lownie’s “Entitled: The Rise and Fall of the House of York”, which was probably a massive error of judgement. Good grief. My blood was boiling within a couple of chapters. This is a great book; it is a rollicking, riveting, edge of your seat read, and the only reason I did not give it 5 stars is because some of the content has been factually disputed. On the other hand, it is Melania Trump and Prince Harry doing the disputing, neither of whom are in the best graces of the public right now, so who can say which bit is the PR stunt? Andrew Lownie is a very well respected historian, and the end result of the book is actually that the huge incidents almost do not matter; it is the smaller things that truly show the Yorks up as being entitled, such as verbal attacks on decent, hardworking staff who had been employed by the Royal Family for many years.
My Book Club Read this month was “Slewfoot” by Gerald Brom. Brom is an artist, and this book had been on my TBR for some time, I was very excited to finally read it. The story was nothing like I expected; for some reason the reviews I had seen so far made me think it was a brutal, unrelenting horror, but this is more of a fairy tale with a strong horror element. I very much enjoyed it, there are some amazing quotes, but there are also a couple of small places where I either thought, wait, what? That’s a bit too arty to hold me. Or there was the odd place where I thought come on, they’d never have let a woman say or do THAT. This is a tiny thing, did not alter my love of the story, and this book is 100% a need to read with a fabulous female lead. I also thoroughly loved the ending, one of the only books this year where I straight up loved the ending.
The last story I would like to mention is the Audible Only theatrical adaptation of Agatha Christie’s “The Mysterious Affair at Styles”, adapted by Anna Lea, which is great fun to listen to for a few hours! Peter Dinklage introduced himself as Poirot for the first time in this presentation, and the whole cast are clearly enjoying themselves throughout.
Next month is December, which is both Christmas, and the last month of my self-imposed year-long reading challenge. While I only finished 5 reads in November, I am also halfway through another 2, which will appear in December for the review. I will not be taking any more dark reads I do not think, but expect to finish up some part way read series, move back to favourite worlds and characters, and go for a warm, cosy reads to carry me through the festivities. I am very much looking forward to the final month!
