Wow ! What a year ! If I normally average in the low twenties, this year I read 38 books. I’m not quite sure what the exact reason was for being more prolific than other years. Maybe it was because I just didn’t watch much TV or movies at all, or it could be I simply got lucky with more fast paced page turners. Whatever the reason, I was on a roll.
Of note, I read my friend Alberto Cañas’ first novel. I also read lots of books that take place at sea or lost on a deserted island, and of course, I tried to read my share of novels about Texas or the wild west.
Here is my 2025 list in reverse chronological order:
- Captives and Companions: A History of Slavery and the Slave Trade in the Islamic World by Justin Marozzi (currently reading)
- Maurice and Maralyn: An Extraordinary True Story of Love, Shipwreck and Survival by Sophie Elmhirst
- The Wandering Hill by Larry McMurtry
- The Sin Killer by Larry McMurtry
- Flesh by David Szalay
- The Tender Bar by J.R. Moehringer
- North Sun; or The Voyage of the Waleship Esther by Ethan Rutherford
- Quizás alguien esté marcando el camino by Alberto Cañas
- The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton (re-read)
- My Friends by Hisham Matar
- Pressure Drop: Reggae in the Seventies by John Masouri
- Open by Andre Agassi
- Down the River unto the Sea by Walter Mosley
- Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World by Jack Weatherford
- The Wide Wide Sea: Imperial Ambition, First Contact, and the Faithful Final Voyage of Captain James Cook by Hampton Sides
- There is No Place for Us: Working and Homeless in America by Brian Goldstone
- A Voyage for Madmen by Peter Nichols
- Eulogy by David Sparks
- Theo of Golden by Allen Levi
- Blessed McGill by Edwin Shrake
- Isola by Allegra Goodman
- The Safekeep by Yael van der Wouden
- The Buffalo Hunter Hunter by Stephen Jones Graham
- King of Ashes by S.A. Cosby
- Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed and Lost Idealism by Sarah Wynn-Williams
- Owning Up by George Pelecanos
- Leo Africanus by Amin Maalouf (re-read)
- The Man who Cried I Am by John A. Willams
- G-Man: J. Edgar Hoover and the Making of the American Century by Beverly Gage
- The Last Days of Ptolemy Grey by Walter Mosley
- Dream Count by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
- The Dream Hotel by Laila Lalami
- The Bonfire of the Vanities by Tom Wolfe
- String Theory: David Forest Wallace on Tennis by David Forest Wallace
- I Who Have Never Known Men by Jaqueline Harpman
- Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President by Candace Millard
- James by Percival Everett
- The City and Its Unknown Walls by Haruki Murakami
So many of these books were great reads, but if I had to pick just a couple as the best, surprisingly I would start Agassi’s memoir Open as my favorite, followed by Dream County, I Who Have Never Known Men, A Voyage of Madmen, and James.
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