Another a year, another almost impossible task trying to each choose our Top 10 Reads of the year! Like past years I won’t be including re-reads, sometimes my opinion of a book could change and evolve after I had read it, so some surprises may be up near the top, as well as perhaps a book or two that didn’t make my reviews on here initially due to genre limitations. But here they are, ready for a countdown! And since it’s the end of the reading year, don’t forget to enter our “Twelve Days of Christmas Giveaway”! Today I’m going to countdown my favorite reads, ten to six.
10. “Dark Sisters” by Kristi DeMeester
This one eeked in at the very last minute, but I had to have it on the list because it so thoroughly entranced me and kept me on the edge of my seat. This witch story that takes on patriarchal religion, misogyny, and generational trauma has a lot of feminine rage, a compelling family line, and a super creepy community that leans into their conservative Christianity while demonizing an entity known as the Dark Sisters that they say brings disease to the women in the town. Kristi DeMeester is a solid voice in horror and this one was a winner!
9. “The Scammer” by Tiffany D. Jackson
It had been a bit since I’d read an addictive YA thriller from Jackson, and we once again get a ripped from the headlines story that not only snares the reader into its web (cults after all!), it also focuses on the way that psychopaths can manipulate people around them to do their bidding and to keep them under their thumbs. Jackson also touches on the fact that marginalized groups that have been the victims of those in power can have their own unique susceptibility to lies and conspiracies because they have been victimized, harmed, and lied to so many times. I really enjoy everything by Jackson and this one was a great thriller.
8. “Everyone Is Lying To You” by Jo Piazza
“Everyone Is Lying To You” Review
My morbid fascination with tradwife propaganda combined with a fun murder mystery and made this super fun and twisty read that had been on my ‘must read list’ ever since I heard about it. Because while the actual tradwife to alt right pipeline scares the crap out of me, I LOVE a good murder mystery that has some witty and biting social commentary. Piazza knows her stuff and I got a good deal of her references, and her scathing critique of the hypocrisies of these influencers (and some of the creepier husbands) was really fun to read.
7. “The Possession of Alba Díaz” by Isabel Cañas
“The Possession of Alba Díaz” Review
Isabel Cañas is one of my favorite horror authors writing at the moment (we actually just read “The Hacienda” for book club so watch out for that review in January!), and “The Possession of Alba Díaz is quite possibly my favorite of her works. I say this as someone who doesn’t generally go for possession stories unless they have some great deconstructions or subversions of the sub-genre, and that’s obviously because this one does all of that really effectively. Mostly because there are bigger threats to Alba Díaz than the demon that is possessing her… Like colonialism and the Inquisition. Throw in a heady romance and you have a winning horror novel for me!
6. “The Buffalo Hunter Hunter” by Stephen Graham Jones
“The Buffalo Hunter Hunter” Review
It’s always a joy to read Stephen Graham Jones’s horror novels, as he brings in a focus on Indigenous culture as well as a true literary flair to his stories that really elevate them, and “Buffalo Hunter Hunter” is another superb tale of terror. I love the way that he weaves an epistolary tale, as well as one that is steeped in folk lore and history, with unreliable narrators and unexpected beats. And a very intriguing vampire! I found this take on vampirism on conjunction with a take down of Manifest Destiny to be especially harrowing, and as we peeled back layer after layer the real life horrors of American violence towards Indigenous People became far more scary than any vampire Jones could throw at the reader. Which is certainly by design. God I love Stephen Graham Jones’s works.
So that’s ten through six. Next time I will give a countdown of my top five. What have been some of your favorite reads of 2025?
The Library Ladies 