What have you read/watched/played/created/listened to this year?
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I finally read through all 9 main books of The Expanse and I cannot recommend them highly enough. for fans of the show, the books have so much more. including a 30 year time skip. the events also happen in a slightly different order than in the series, which, to me, changes the overall story more than I expected.
if you like sci-fi that doesn’t skimp on the physics, pick up a copy of Leviathan Wakes (looking at you, Andy Weir fans)
currently reading through Asimov’s Foundation series of novels and I’m loving them so far
The Expanse series is definitely on my to read list. So is the foundation series.
I’m on book 4 of The Expanse right now. +1 from me.
I’ll tell you the same thing my buddy (who originally recommended the series) told me when I was about that far in:
“you’re almost to the part where it starts to get interesting!”
I can’t explain how much that motivated/excited me to keep reading. he was not wrong.
I’ll preface my comment with: I love the series and it’s probably my favorite scifi series of all time. I recommend it any time I hear someone even contemplating reading it.
I think book 4 is the worst of the series and it’s still good. The story progresses really well, I love the planet they are on, most of the characters are good. That said, I hate the chapters from Elvis’s perspective. I don’t like book 4 Elvi, but I like her chapters later in the series and I like show Elvi.
It really is where the series picks up and seriously takes off. I could talk Expanse all day, I love it so much. It’s right up there with Star Trek in my book :)
I commented above that Project Hail Mary was on a list of books I wish I could forget and read again for the first time. The Expanse is THE series I wish I could forget and read again for the first time. It’s so stinking good!
I finished it shortly after the last book came out in 2021 and I still haven’t read anything that hooked me as hard as series that did. I’ve been chasing that high ever since.
I’m waiting for that feeling to reeeally set in before I reach for book 10, which is a collection of the short stories that came out in between novels. I’ve also got the 4 comic book series on my wish list, too. I know Wes is helping write the current series Expanse: A Little Death and that’s enough of a draw for me.
we’ve also been blessed with a new series from the boys behind the pseudonym - the first book is called The Mercy of Gods and I’ve heard good things!
Oh yes! I have the short story collection and I read them in between books on my second time through. They are fantastic! I participated in the Kickstarter for the Dragon Tooth comics, they gave out some cool little things with it. The DT comics are really good too. I will def look into Wes’s stuff, I love that guy. I know Amos is everyone’s favorite character, I like him too, but Miller is my favorite. I wish I could find more scifi noir books with characters like him.
I did pick up the first book in their new series, I haven’t read it yet though. I keep hearing good things, but I want to wait until book 2 is closer because I know I’ll want to dive right in. Unless the authors seriously fuck up the series, or any of their series for that matter, they are pretty much guaranteed to get some of my money. I adore their science fiction stories so much and they are great writers.
Miller and, by association, Thomas Jane will always have a place in my heart. I was so glad I got to witness his story wrap up in the most delightful and unexpected way.
I also just heard TJ was cast as Bones for the final season of Star Trek: SNW, and say what you will about that show, but I, for one, am* looking forward to seeing Jane back on the role of Grumpy Older Guy in Space™
Oh that’s good to hear! I love SNW, that will be fun to see him in.
If anyone wants a read that’ll seriously fuck with your head, try Hardfought by Greg Bear. A somewhat small novella, it takes place thousands of years in the future where humanity is engaged in a fight for survival against an enemy that no-one can understand.
The military patois is thick and barely understandable, with turns of phrases that you are forced to figure out on your own. The physics reads more like mysticism and religious doctrine. The combatants are modified from childhood to become perfect warriors until it is debatable if they are still human. A budding romance between a particularly talented pilot and the civilian analyst tasked to figure out and replicate the successes that produced her - which, ironically, was the humanizing elements of the highly illegal romance in the first place - sets the stage for humanity’s defeat.
And yet, a project started by the enemy in an attempt to understand the humans comes within a hair’s breadth of actually ending the war… until the alien’s own hidebound and ideologically blinkered leaders kill the project out of horror at the heresy it encapsulates.
Its ideas and concepts are maximally dense while the prose itself is sparse to the point of being almost haiku-like. The descriptions alone hew strongly to Chekov’s Gun, with no excess characterizations that don’t directly contribute. I have re-read it over a dozen times in the decades since I got it and every time I have peeled back more layers to find new revelations and themes.
Interesting, I’ll be checking it out.
I really enjoyed the Machineries of Empire by Yoon Ha Lee, a trilogy. Then I read everything else by yoon ha lee, mostly good, the Thousand Worlds series was a bit clunky at the start.
If you want a good David Brin book that isn’t very serious try the practice effect.
I’m taking a long break from him. He frustrated me with how long it took for real pay off but I’ll make sure to check this book out.
All the chapter names are jokes and puns. Some in latin.
Yo! I just finished Project Hail Mary today!
There’s a movie coming out in a few months that might not disappoint. I’m somewhat optimistic since The Martian was a good film.
What did you think? I won’t say too much other than I found it to be very poorly written.
I thoroughly enjoyed it. I really loved The Martian, and although Project Hail Mary was less grounded in “hard” sci-fi, Weir’s writing style was compelling as ever (on a related note: I had to take a day off work when I read Artemis). He’s the only author I’ve read who can capture in writing the excitement that you get when you make a breakthrough in the lab or get into a flow state fixing a broken gadget.
Fair enough! I’m still working out what kind of hard sci-fi hits for me. This one wasn’t it for sure.
I loved the Expanse though. And Starship Troopers I have a soft spot for.
Read in the last year
Dungeon Crawler Carl books 1-7 by Matt Dinniman (twice). Will reread again when the next book comes out. Found this series last December and it’s one of my favorites now
Dune books 1-4 by Frank Herbert. No interest in continuing, but I can see why they’re famous. This series ate up the majority of my reading time because I found it hard to read in long blocks like I’m want to do.
The Commonwealth Saga by Peter F Hamilton. Sci-fi with a couple of interesting ideas within. Not something I’ll reread. Very male gazey.
Isles of the Emberdark by Brandon Sanderson. Solid entry in the Cosmere. Nice expansion to Sixth of the Dusk. Probably not a great starting point to The Cosmere, since there’s a good amount of cross knowledge utilized in this book.
Night Angel Trilogy by Brent Weeks. Nostalgia reread, read this a lot in high school. More male gazey than I remembered, which is a minor shame. But overall a fun time
Night Angel Nemesis by Brent Weeks. Follow-up to the Night Angel Trilogy. Not as good, the forced first-person compared to the original Trilogy really hampers this one. Sequel is coming out next year
The Black Prism and The Subtle Knife by Brent Weeks. First two books in The Lightbringer Series. Reread, first reread since the whole series came out. The first three books are really good. The last two are a bit rough around the edges.
Highlights from this year include:
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All Systems Red by Martha Wells First in a series of short novels about a cybernetic construct owned by a corporation in a dystopia. I found it extremely relatable and humorous in relation to my own autism. Please do not watch the Apple TV series; it’s a literal hate crime.
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Other Ever Afters by Melanie Gillman A graphic novel of fairytale stories which teach good values.
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Notorious Sorcerer by Davinia Evans Basically cyberpunk in fantasy clothes. Rather than hacking, our heroes deal in illegal magical practices. Very light-hearted and fun, especially if you want read about boys holding hands.
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Unnatural Magic by CM Waggoner Takes the basic premise of Equal Rites by Terry Pratchett and expands on it dramatically. Especially recommended if you’re into wholesome dom/sub relationships.
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The Three-Body Problem by Cixin Liu Humanity makes contact with an alien intelligence and politics ensue. More of a serious/heavy sci-fi.
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You Weren’t Meant to be Human by Andrew Joseph White Extreme body horror. One of the best things I’ve ever read. Deals heavily with mental health, self-harm, and abuse/torture. All of this guy’s stuff is great, but this is the first one written explicitly for adults, so he doesn’t hold back.
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Don’t Let the Forest In by CG Drews Also a horror story dealing with mental health and self-harm, but intended for a younger audience.
All of these except Three-Body Problem are explicitly LGBT-friendly and come with representation euphoria built-in.
Thanks! I’ll be putting at least one of these on my reading list.
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So much. 42 books so far and 32 movies since July. I don’t know how many before that because I imported data into Letterboxd and it messed everything before July up. I feel the full lists would be too long. And Letterboxd includes my ratings and I don’t feel like getting dissed. Looking over it I feel like a lot of my ratings are contentious.
I also played through all Horizon games and DLC again.
I read the following books:
- Neuromancer (Gibson)
- Consider Phlebas (M Banks)
- The Player of Games (M Banks)
- The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction (Benjamin) (reread)
- The Wizard of the Kremlin (Da Empoli) (in French)
- You don’t hate Mondays, you hate domination in the workplace (Framont) (in French)
- Franchise (Asimov)
- Use of Weapons (M Banks)
- Call for vigilance: facing the far right (Plenel) (in French)
- The State of the Art (M Banks)
I wish Banks could have written even more, I loved all the Culture books so much.
I like Banks. I have read Player of Games and Use of Weapons. I would have read more but the lines on Libby were months long. But now I am just acquiring them elsewhere so I intend to read more of his books.
Hope you read it in a comfortable chair
I started a new book series this year.
Started reading T Kingfisher last year, really enjoyable books. The warhammer 40K books are on my list but there’s so many of them!
I love T. Kingfisher books! The Horus Heresy series is good, but I’m getting tired of it. I think I’ll take a break and read some other books for a bit in 2026.
Just finished Project Hail Mary the other day. Really enjoyed it, one of my favs this year.
Others I enjoyed were:
-The Way by Cary Groner. Reminiscent of King’s The Stand but more accessible.
-Remnant Population by Elizabeth Moon. Sci-fi based on a distant planet with an old lady narrator. Refreshing change of pace from teen narrators. Really enjoyed it.
-The Book of Strange New Things by Michel Faber. A first (well not quite first) contact story from the perspective of a missionary sent to evangelize the aliens. A bit heavy on the narrator’s inner thoughts, but very creative. Should make you reflect on your priorities and whether God and his Promises make sense outside of earth’s context.
-The Carpet Makers by Andreas Eschbach. Another one that I found to be a nice change of pace from my usual sci-fi thrillers. Beautiful writing. Worldbuilds an entire galactic universe by weaving together short stories about various citizens.
-All the Water in the World. Dystopian climate sci-fi following the child of a museum scientist on her journey away from the flooded rooftops of NYC. Narrator driven and contemplative story about finding and protecting our humanity in a broken world.
There is a list of books that I wish I could forget and read again for the first time, Project Hail Mary is one of them. I loved that book so much that I talked my father in law into reading it and he loved it. I’m probably going to reread it once before the movie comes out. I’m so excited for the movie because I love the book and I’ve been a fan of Ryan Gosling since his Young Hercules days.
It really was excellent. I was so happy with the final decision he made. I’m excited for the movie too! I thought they did a great adaption with The Martian so I’m hopeful.
It doesn’t share the thriller level intensity of Project Hail Mary, but the type of scientific speculation reminded me of Spin by Robert Charles Wilson. Slower paced but a great read if you haven’t read it.
Thanks! That’s a book I’ve never heard of, I’ll definitely check it out.
I haven’t gotten around to reading anything of King’s yet. In what way is the Stand not accessible?
I haven’t read a lot of King either but I read The Stand in honor of the pandemic. I also typically like ‘on the road’ adventure stories so I thought it was a good bet. It’s a long book. It has a lot of characters and puts a lot of time into developing each of them so the whole thing feels very meandering at times (though not quite tedious in my opinion).
Here’s most of what I watched in 2025(not all released in 2025).
Movies
- A House of Dynamite
- The Amateur
- The Bad Guys 2
- Ballerina
- Black Bag
- Blue Moon
- Bring Her Back
- Captain America Brave New World
- Cunk on Life
- Elio
- F1
- Friendship
- Good Boy
- Good Fortune
- The Gorge
- London Calling
- M3GAN 2.0
- Fantastic Four First Steps
- Materialists
- Mickey 17
- Minecraft Movie
- Mission Impossible - The Final Reckoning
- The Naked Gun
- Nobody 2
- Novocaine
- Primitive War
- The Running Man
- Roofman
- Sinners
- Superman
- The Watchers
- Thunderbolts
- The Toxic Avenger
TV Shows
- Arcane
- Black Doves
- Common Side Effects
- DAN DA DAN
- Fallout
- Farscape (Just started)
- Frieren
- The Last of Us
- Last Samurai Standing
- Love, Death & Robots
- Magic and Muscles
- Marvel Zombies
- Monsieur Spade
- Mrs. Davis
- Murderbot
- The Night Agent
- Pantheon
- Platonic
- Poker Face
- SAKAMOTA DAYS
- Scavengers Reign
- Shrinking
- Silo
- The Recruit
- Wednesday
- WITCH WATCH
- Zero Day
- Zom 100
Games
- Red Dead Redemption II
- Witcher 3
- Star Renegades
- Tower Wizard
- Noita
- Chained Echoes
- Severed Steel
- skate.
- Glyphica
whatd you think of noita?
Love it. I just wish I was better at it lol. I’ve played about 35 hours and still do poorly but I still think it’s fantastic.
https://imgur.com/a/2dDS7Z6 I really wish storygraph gave us a nice wrapped list or even a grid mode… Can you tell I have a genre? Went on a book crawl in my city where I visited about 28 book stores and really got back into reading for fun.
I use storygraph and get a yearly wrap up or stats for the calendar year. This is my 2024
I’ve read 49 books so far this year. Some of my favorites include:
Road to Ruin by Hana Lee
Consortium Rebellion trilogy by Jessie Mihalik
All That We See or Seem by Ken Liu
Annie Bot by Sierra Greer
Kushiel’s Legacy trilogy by Jacqueline Carey
I Got Abducted by Aliens and Now I’m Trapped in a Rom Com by Kimberly Lemmings
Jules & Bun series by J.M. Griffin
Run by Blake Crouch
Awesome! I’m going to check these out.
Since I’m an audio book guy I really only read one book this year, I was a Shelby Foote on the second year of the civil war so I used it and chased down most of that battles in the VA/MD/WV area.
I did however listen to 261 audio books
One of the best things I ever did for myself was realize that I’m not “less than” other readers or book enjoyers because I only have time for audiobooks.
I have been able to dive back into a hobby that was a vital part of my childhood and teenage years with fervor and I feel like I’m such a better person for it.
TV and such are every bit as good as books, and it’s a real shame people get elitist about it. Different mediums offer a variety of storytelling techniques.
