Books read in 2025: No. 44, Books read in 2026: No. 1 -- A Nefarious Plot

by Steve Deace

Started: Dec. 27, 2025

Finished: Jan. 2, 2026

Notes: I normally don't care to read modern Christian fiction or to watch modern Christian movies, mainly because I find them hugely facile. That being said, I did catch the movie Nefarious a while back and found it quite interesting, the plot being about a murderer in prison who proclaims to be a demon and he does indeed seem to be so when interviewed. This particular novel and the author are apparently connected to the movie, though I don't know if the film is based off this book. It does concern me this might just be propaganda, as is much of modern Christian literature, but I'll deal with it if it comes to that.

Mini review: Basically, this is a long post from a demon telling mankind, and especially Americans, how we're all screwed and going to hell. And the only thing we can do about it is to become Christian Nationalists. I don't espouse that viewpoint, but I can't say this book didn't give me a few things to think about. All in all, I preferred the movie based upon this book much more than I did the book itself. Also, this book is more than a decade old, and I don't think it's aged well considering the current political climate here in the U.S. If you're a Christian Nationalist, this might be right up your alley, but otherwise, I don't think most readers would be drawn to it.

Books read in 2025: No. 43 -- See Them Die

by Ed McBain

Started: Dec. 21

Finished: Dec. 26

Notes: I thought I'd wind down the year with one of my favorites fiction series, the 87th Precinct books, and one of my favorites authors. This one is from 1960, one of the earliest of the series, and those tend to be my favorites.

Mini review: One of the things I love about the 87th Precinct series is that each of these novels is vastly different from one another. In this one, a wanted killer barricades himself inside a tenement building and it's up to the cops to get him out and/or to kill him. Another trait about this particular novel is that it didn't focus upon the usual characters, a sign of breadth, in my opinion.

Books read in 2025: No. 42 -- Fear Street: The Wrong Number

by R. L. Stine

Started: Dec. 18

Finished: Dec. 21

Notes: I've been failing at trying to read horror of late, most of my recent reads being more thrillers or mysteries with some horror elements, so I decided I'd plop down with a book I'm fairly sure will actually be horror, though I expect it to be light on the actual horror. Why light? Well, because this is one of those YA or teen horror books that were popular in the early '90s. I've read quite a bit in the horror genre, but I never dropped into this particular trend. Hopefully it'll be a fun read.

Mini review: Once again, not really horror, but mainly a murder mystery. Still, this one was kind of fun in a late '80s, early '90s nostalgic way.

Books read in 2025: No. 41 -- Living Dead in Dallas

by Charlaine Harris

Started: Dec. 11

Finished: Dec 18

Notes: Though I've been trying to read horror of late, I'm fairly sure this won't be it, though I realize there are vampires involved and perhaps horror elements. This series of books kicked off the "True Blood" TV series on HBO more than a decade, and I watched a handful of episodes and thought they were interesting, so perhaps I'll find something here to like.

Mini review: Not awful, for me, not great. The writing reminded me of AI, which only goes to show AI definitely used this author for its learning. The characters were okay, but fairly forgettable. And the worst part was the plot. This was a murder mystery, and the murder is introduced in the first 10 pages. Then the book goes off and basically forgets about the murder while the main characters were involved in what I would call "side missions." Eventually, in the last 40 or so pages, the plot gets back to the murder and the mystery, and it's not exactly solved so much as it is concluded by a bunch of minor characters showing up and putting a wrench into the works. The final chapter, however, was nice and somewhat bittersweet, as a vampire realizes he still has ties to the world of the living. If you've read other books in this series and enjoyed them, you'll likely enjoy this one as well, if for no other reason than it will help you to visit some old friends again. Otherwise, no, this one wasn't for me.

Books read in 2025: No. 40 -- Ring

by Koji Suzuki

translated by Robert B. Rohmer and Glynne Walley

Started: Dec. 2

Finished: Dec. 10

Notes: I've been trying to read horror of late with little success, usually tumbling down the hole of mystery novels and the like, but this one I'm pretty sure will fit the bill since it's the first novel of a trilogy which is the basis for The Ring horror movies in Japan and the U.S.

Mini review: The plot here wasn't bad, but I felt the characterizations weren't all that great, most of the characters not being worthy of much empathy. Also, characters seemed to make vast leaps of logic and guesswork with little to no evidence, and then being proved right. In fairness, this was a translation from Japanese, so it's not impossible there are cultural differences which went over my head. And, though I'm no translator and obviously don't know Japanese, I felt the translating job here was too literal, or at least it seemed that way. Glad I read it, but I think a better translation could have served the story better.

Books read in 2025: No. 39 -- The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo

by Stieg Larsson

translated by Reg Keeland

Started: Nov. 15

Finished: Dec. 2

Notes: Trying to read horror of late but failing, so I'm giving this novel a try. I've seen the movie years ago but recall next to nothing about it other than a serial killer was involved, but I'm not expecting this to be horror as much as a thriller. Still, I've been meaning to read this for a while, so I'll give it a try. Also, I'm getting ready to go to the hospital for a few days for surgery, so I wanted something to read that isn't too short.

Mini review: Yep, there was a serial killer, but this was not horror but a mystery novel, and not necessarily a murder mystery. Oh, there are plenty of murders, mostly in the background, but they're not really the gist of the tale. Or are they? I mean, they sort of are but they also sort of aren't. One mystery leads to the revelation of a bad person doing very bad things even though they weren't necessarily responsible for the original mystery. And then there are several sub-plots which, in my opinion, I did not feel helped the novel; I could've done without the first 50 or so pages of this novel as well as the final 50 pages, because most of the real action happens between. All that being said, I'm glad I read this one, because it was over all quite a decent read.

Books read in 2025: No. 38 -- Billy Summers

by Stephen King

Started: Oct. 25

Finished: Nov. 15

Notes: I've been trying to read horror of late, so naturally I turned to the King of horror. To be honest, I'm not sure this one actually is horror, but with King it usually is, or at least is horror adjacent.

Mini review: No, not horror, but not a bad story, sort of modern noir. A hitman is hired for a job which takes him months to complete, and to fill his time he decided to write a fictionalized biography of sorts, so this novel jumps back and forth between the that biography and the events of this work. Eventually the hitman's job is performed, but he finds he has been double crossed, but he's not going to let things lie. To say more would be to give too much away. I wouldn't say this is King's best work, but it's still a decent read. King fans will want it, those who don't know King or who don't care for him could do worse. I will say this one has a bittersweet ending, but one with a touch of hope.

Books read in 2025: No. 37 -- Under a Graveyard Sky

by John Ringo

Started: Oct. 14

Finished: Oct. 25

Notes: I've been trying to read more horror of late, so why not a novel where zombies have taken over the world and to survive humanity has had to take to the oceans? It's also a nice bonus that I've been meaning for a while to check out this author.

Mini review: If Tom Clancy had written a zombie novel, it would have been this one. Hell, the USS Dallas submarine even shows up. More action than horror here, but this was a fun read, and apparently the first in a series. I'll have to look for more of these books.

Books read in 2025: No. 36 -- Gone Girl

by Gillian Flynn

Started: Sept. 22

Finished: Oct. 14

Notes: I've been trying to read more horror of late, but I honestly can't say if this book qualifies or not. I don't even remember why I bought it other than I had listed it on my Books I want to Read list. I don't even remember why I placed it on that list, but something must have drawn me to it. Anyway, I know there's been a movie of this novel, though I've not seen it, and I seem to have spotted some blurbs online about the movie at least having horror elements, so maybe it'll fit in with my current reading attempts.

Mini review: A wife goes missing and all the clues seem to point at the husband, as might be expected. But this is a complicated story where nothing is at it seems. Without giving anything away, I will say the true villain here is one of the most devious, though not necessarily bloodthirsty, I've read in fiction in a long while. Ultimately, this is a story about bad people who deserve one another. I can now see why this one made my list of books to read.

Books read in 2025: No. 35 -- Strange Weather

by Joe Hill

Started: August 30

Finished: Sept. 22

Notes: The couple of novels from Hill that I've read in the past were pretty good, so I'm looking forward to this collection of four novellas.

Mini review: This one took me quit a bit longer to read than I felt it should have. The four tales here are all quite excellent, written very well, but one of them, "Loaded," affected me and I had step away from it for a while. I have read plenty of horror over the decades, even darker works not necessarily related to the genre, but this story about mass shootings just hit a mark with me; it's a good story, but it's not one with a happy ending. I don't know. Maybe it's because of the number of shootings in the news of late, but usually material like this doesn't affect me in such a manner. This time it did. Ah, well. Anyway, these tales are worth reading.

Books read in 2025: No. 34 -- A Question of Time

by Fred Saberhagen

Started: August 23

Finished: August 30

Notes: I've read pretty much all Saberhagen's fantasy literature (at least all of which I'm aware), and I recently read one of his sci-fi novels, but he also wrote a series of novels based upon Dracula, the original novel and the character. This is my first time reading one of those.

Mini review: A girl from a wealthy family goes missing near the Grand Canyon. Investigators are called in after law enforcement proves ineffectual. Vampires are involved. Time Travel. And more strange stuff. Not exactly horror fiction, but definitely fiction of the weird variety. A nice change of pace.

Books read in 2025: No. 33 -- Sunshine

by Robin McKinley

Started: August 14

Finished: August 22

Notes: I've been trying to read more horror of late, and to tell the truth, I'm not sure this is horror, though the back cover copy does mention a vampire. In fact, I'm not sure why I picked this novel up in the first place. Did I hear good things about it? Was it a gift? Did someone suggest it? I don't know, but I'll give it a try.

Mini review: Turns out, not exactly horror, but in the general direction. Almost vampire romance, but not quite. Anyway, in a world much like our own, vampires and werewolves and sorcerers and magic are known to exist, but they're not extremely common, at least for the day-to-day individual. As background, 10 years in the past there was a war between humans and vampires, and the humans won, sort of. The vamps basically went into hiding but are still out there stirring up trouble. The protagonist here is a young woman who is a baker, her specialty being cinnamon rolls, and as the story unfolds, she has something of an unusual family line. I'll not go into more so as not to spoil anything, but I do have to say this one was written quite well; in fact, there were times I had a hard time putting this one down, which is unusual for me. My one drawback was the climax, which felt too ... hmm, I'm not sure of the word ... maybe "cerebral" or "emotion-based" ... but those don't feel accurate; basically, there's a huge confrontation that includes a lot of action, but nearly all the action is left to the reader's imagination. Still, good book all the way around.

Books read in 2025: No. 32 -- Abandon

by Blake Crouch

Started: August 8

Finished: August 13

Notes: I've not read much of Crouch's work, but what little I have read (and it's been a long while, more than a decade), I found pretty solid. So, since I'm reading horror of late, I thought I'd give him another go.

Mini review: In 1893, every single member of a mining town in the mountains of Colorado goes missing with no clues left behind. Fast forward to 2009, and a group of 6 travels to the area in search of answers. It sounds supernatural. Perhaps it is. Perhaps it isn't. I won't tell. But I will say, this was a pretty darn good novel. The action jumps back and forward between two timelines, something I normally despise, yet here it works quite well.

Books read in 2025: No. 31 -- The Traveling Vampire Show

by Richard Laymon

Started: August 2

Finished: August 8

Notes: I've read a fair amount of fantasy and sci-fi so far this year, so I thought I'd turn for a while to one of my earliest genre loves, horror. I used to read a lot more horror than I have in recent years, so this should be a nice change of pace, and kicking things off with Richard Laymon can't be bad.

Mini review: This one is a slight not toward Badbury's Something Wicked This Way Comes. It's the 1960s, and a Traveling Vampire Show comes to a small town, and of course some curious young teens have to go look into things because ... well, because they're curious young teens. This one reads quick, and the writing is pretty solid, but it's definitely a slow burn of a horror novel. A few odd things happen, but there's really not much of a horror element until the last eighth of the tale, and then not everything is explained (though I don't have a problem with that). Not a bad read, but I usually prefer my horror fiction to have a stronger build than this one.

Books read in 2025: No. 30 -- 7 Figure Fiction: How to Use Universal Fantasy To Sell Your Books to Anyone

by T. Taylor

Started: July 28

Finished: August 2

Notes: I've read absolutely no non-fiction this year, and I'm feeling the urge. So I decided to check out this one. I'm less interested in the financial aspects, though that does have its appeal, and I'm drawn more toward this author's notions of "Universal Fantasy."

Mini review: Beginning fiction writers especially mind find some solid advice here, but I felt this one wasn't quite for me. For one thing, I felt the notion of "universal fantasy" wasn't well defined, though there were tons of examples given from literature, television, and film. Maybe "universal fantasy" is self explanatory, but I've seen the term used elsewhere and it wasn't exactly the same as what I found here. Secondly, I didn't feel there was a whole book's worth of information here. For me, the author's ideas could have been fleshed out in a blog post, though maybe a long blog post. I found all the examples given to be less helpful and more tedious. But that's just me. The author did her job well enough that I purchased her book, so there's something to be said for that. Don't let my grousing leave you thinking this is an awful book, because it's not ... I just didn't find it right for me. Did I pick up some advice, or maybe a different way of thinking? Yeah, I suppose, but I really didn't find much new here. Others might experience otherwise.

Books read in 2025: No. 29 -- King's Ransom

by Ed McBain

Started: July 26

Finished: July 28

Notes: It's been too long since I've experienced one of my favorite authors and his 87th Precinct novels, which definitely is my favorite fiction series. Thus, I'm jumping back in.

Mini review: Kidnappers attempt to nab the son of a wealthy fellow but accidentally grab the wrong kid. Geez, that would be my luck if I ever turned criminal. Anyway, it's up to the gang of the 87th Precinct to find the kid and catch the kidnappers. This one started slower for me than many a novel in this series, but it sped up swiftly and the pace kept building right until the end. Not my favorite of these books, but still a darn fine read. This one was a little different in that a few characters beyond the usual detectives played rather large roles, a nice change of pace ... but each 87th Precinct novel is unique.

Books read in 2025: No. 28 -- Berserker

by Fred Saberhagen

Started: July 18

Finished: July 26

Notes: I've read plenty of Saberhagen over the years, and enjoyed it, but it's always been fantasy. So, it'll be interesting to pop into his military science fiction series which was quite popular back in the day.

Mini review: Imagine a seemingly sentient, highly intelligent Death Star with only one goal: to destroy all life. That's a Berserker. And in this book, there are hundreds of them swarming our galaxy and at war with mankind in the future. This book is really a collection short stories that tie in well with one another, sometimes with familiar characters showing up in later tales. And while war is the backdrop for all these tales, the war itself isn't necessarily the subject matter of each story here. They all work quite well, written strongly and catching various glimpses of this war against demonic machines. The only story for which I did not care was the very last one, and even it had a fine ending.

Books read in 2025: No. 27 -- Retief's War

by Keith Laumer

Started: July 12

Finished: July 18

Notes: I've never read any works by this author, but I do recall his series of Retief novels were fairly popular during my childhood. So, thought I'd give one a try.

Mini review: Humans seemingly control the government on an alien planet with multiple intelligent species of creatures that look as if they are part insect and part electronic, almost like robots. An outside force stirs up trouble and attempts to take over the planet, but the locals band together to find back. Into all this steps Retief, a diplomat, but he's a diplomat with much in common with the likes of James Bond. This one reminded me quite a bit of the men's action novels from the 1970s which I used to read when I was a teen. But I hated almost every moment of reading this one, at least until the end. I actually enjoyed the final 30 pages quite a bit. The writing style didn't do much for me, and too much didn't seem to make any sense and there was hardly ever any explanation or even descent description, which is rather jarring consider all the different alien races which looked nothing like humans. But I'll admit some of that was the point. This was meant to be a quick, action read and little more. That can be forgiven. What I just about couldn't forgive is that the main character never really seems to be in any danger. Oh, he faces plenty of challenges, even physical ones, but at least in this novel he is never really tested in combat, at least not as far as I'm concerned. He seemed to talk his way out of everything, and that and more than a fair share of luck seemed to save the day most times. But what really irkked me was that the main character didn't really seem to be all that much of a smooth talker, it's just that everyone around him was an idiot, and I do mean everyone. Still, as much as I felt bogged down by this novel, the ending did pick things up quite well and wrapped it all up in a pleasing and even mildly amusing manner.

Books read in 2025: No. 26 -- The Integral Trees

by Larry Niven

Started: June 30

Finished: July 12

Notes: It's hard to believe, but I've never read any of Niven's work despite having been aware of him for decades and his early fame in sci-fi circles. This being one of his more popular works, I'm hoping it'll be pretty strong.

Mini review: I'll have to admit it took me a while to wrap my head around this one because there were so many characters thrown at the reader right up front and because the world(s) involved were so unusual that it took me a fair amount of consideration before understanding, though it helped there were illustrations at the front of the book. Basically, a number of tribes of humans have descended from space travelers far in the past, and now they live among giant trees that float throughout a donut-shaped area of space that is habitable. Sounds weird, yes, but it works. It's actually a pretty good story with something of a quest feel and a battle and characters who sometimes are surprising.

Books read in 2025: No. 25 -- The Mercenary

by Jerry Pournelle

Started: June 24

Finished: June 30

Notes: Since I'm reading sci-fi of late, I thought I'd take a turn to some action-oriented material. I don't believe I've read this author before, so this should be a learning experience.

Mini review: In the future, Earth's governments are withdrawing from colony planets and leaving those local governments to fend for themselves. In that situation, mercenaries find they are needed. I expected action, but most of what I got was politics. Oh, there was some action, but most of it came in the form of battles and there's not a lot of close-up action, almost like reading military reports. The main character is interesting, however, and the writing style is decent though not great. I can't say I'll be tempted to read more from this author, but I also didn't despise this novel.