Karen Tanenbaum

I believe it was actually the phrase "go down in my haunted basement" that I found...suggestive

Honorable mentions: The Rose Field by Philip Pullman, The Starless Sea by Erin Morgenstern, The Shadow of the Leviathan series by Robert Jackson Bennett, Hell Followed After Us by Andrew Joseph White, and Alien Clay by Adrian Tchaikovsky.

The covers of my 5 favorite books of 2025: The Everlasting by Alix E Harrow, Someone You Can Build a Nest In by John Wiswell, Ladies in Hating by Alexandra Vasti, The Incandescent by Emily Tesh, Piranesi by Susanna Clarke.

This year I set a goal of reading 50 books. Then I got in the groove of being able to listen to fiction while doing chores and suddenly...I had read or listened to 91 books in 2025. Here's my top 5!

I just finished No Gods, No Monsters and am excited I will be able to read the whole thing!

...look forward to the already-published sequel. That being said, I am a bit surprised at the win for this book. All the books this year were quite strong, but my vote would have gone to Someone You Can Build a Nest In. That one's going to stick with me the longest & was the most surprising.

...an engaging read, Sherlock Holmes meets Shadow & Bone with a dash of Pacific Rim Kaiju just for extra spice. I've been on a murder mystery kick lately so it quite fun to see a take on the genre that also went in for fantasy world-building. I enjoyed the main character a great deal and...

...which for some reason was not available at any libraries within 100 miles of Peoria, either in physical or audiobook form. I got about 2/3rds of the way through it before it was, of course, announced as this year's winner. Hopefully it will be more available from here on out! I found the book...

...interrogating questions of purpose and sentience and free will against the backdrop of a post-human robot wasteland. Both were excellent reads, but I believe Alien Clay will linger longer, taking up space in my brain. Finally, I get a hold of The Tainted Cup by RJ Bennett...

On the other hand, both novels do have a wryly humorous male-identified main character grappling with existential questions, so maybe they aren't that different after all. Alien Clay went hard on the creeping, invasive dread of biological contamination while Service Model was a bit more abstract...

Hugo Award novel nominee reading progress: Finished the project just 2 days late. 😆 First of all, before the ceremony, I read Service Model by A Tchaikovsky, a book so different than his also-nominated Alien Clay that I boggle to imagine what that man's brain is like from the inside...🧵

We did do some No Thank You Evil with them when they were younger, but it's been awhile. This is definitely their first Grown Up RPG. Very interested to see how it goes, and I am loving the somehow perfect yet unexpected choices presented to the players throughout the setup period.

Just starting Service Model now, will post again when I finish it!

And the whole vibe of it never quite gelled for me. It always felt like there was a great story just slightly offset from the story I was actually reading.

The Ministry of Time by K. Bradley: Ok, I love Connie Willis and can usually roll with narratives of British bureaucracy carrying on in the face of fantastical events. So I should have enjoyed this more than I did. There were some good bits, but I found the main viewpoint character uncompelling...

...as well as depicting codependency, abuse, trauma, and recovery in a fantastical setting (a theme this year?).

Someone You Can Build a Nest In, J Wiswell. I picked this one up without knowing it was a nominee, just intrigued by the monsterous queer love story. It. Is. So. Good. Also pitched to my particular interests. At times laugh out loud funny, it nails an outsider observation of humanity's absurdity...

...The ecology of Kiln is fascinating and Tchaikovsky does an excellent job of transforming the initial fear of the alien way of life into admiration and acceptance.

Alien Clay, A. Tchaikovsky: Somehow, despite Tchaikovsky's inhuman ability to drop multiple books a year, this was the first I had heard/read of him. I really enjoyed this, not just because it speaks to my anti-fascist ideals. The protagonist is full of dry humor and keen observation...cont'd

A Sorceress Comes to Call, T Kingfisher: Read this awhile back before it was nominated because I love most stuff by Kingfisher/Vernon. I found this one to be a good read although not one of my favorites. It does an almost too-good job of depicting trauma and abuse under a fairy tale facade.

For some reason The Tainted Cup was not available as either physical book or audiobook via my library system, which was able to provide all the others. Here's my reviews of the ones I have read so far

This year I am attempting to read all the nominees for the Hugo award for Best Novel before the award ceremony. I'm at 4/6 finished, reading #5 and waiting on the mercy of the USPS to see whether #6 arrives in time. 🧵

The two left feet are just the *chef's kiss*

Also some people think you really shouldn't go out in public dressed like that. 😆

Black and white cat curled up on a blanket, with pink toe beans showing on one paw.

Obligatory "I'm new and figuring this out" post. Cat bean photo because it's the internet.