Following my first 52 books a year challenge back in 2024, I did it again last year and am doing so for the third time in 2026. I forgot to post the 2025 list and pick the winners, but here it is!

Once again it was an eclectic mix of old favourites, new discoveries and books I stumbled across serendipitously in street libraries and other places.

Like the previous list, rather than pick an overall “best” book, here are several 2025 award winners. The “Book of the year” wasn’t necessarily the most enjoyable or the best written, it was just the one that really stuck in my mind and was incredibly different to anything else I’ve read – and despite being hundreds and hundreds of pages long, it kept me engaged until the end.

• Book of the year – Lavengro by George Borrow
• Best “old favourite” non-romance – The Good Companions by JB Priestley
• Best “old favourite” romance –Emily by Jilly Cooper
• Best new author discovery – The Caravaners by Elizabeth Von Arnim
• Best children’s book – Thursday’s Child by Noel Streatfeild
• Best non-fiction – Recipes from an Old Farmhouse by Alison Uttley

Books read in 2025

1. A Morbid Taste for Bones by Ellis Peters
2. Diary of a Provincial Lady in America by E M Delafield
3. Georgics by Publius Vergilius Maro
4. The Drowners by David A Anderson
5. The Making of a Marchioness by Frances Hodgson Burnett
6. The Mystery of the Spiteful Letters by Enid Blyton
7. The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark
8. Kiss Chase by Fiona Walker
9. The Enchanted Castle by E Nesbit
10. Mrs McGinty’s Dead by Agatha Christie
11. The Good Companions by JB Priestley
12. Susan Takes a Hand by Anne Hepple
13. The Rule of Three by Agatha Christie
14. Quick Service by PG Wodehouse
15. Caldicott Place by Noël Streatfeild
16. Miss Buncle Married by DE Stevenson
17. Enter a Murderer by Ngaio Marsh
18. Tales from Moominvalley by Tove Jansson
19. Miss Mole by EH Young
20. Life, the Interpreter by Phyllis Bottome
21. Mansfield Park by Jane Austen
22. The Caravaners by Elizabeth Von Arnim
23. The School at the Chalet by Elinor Brent-Dyer
24. Recipes from an Old Farmhouse by Alison Uttley
25. Treasure Hunt by Molly Keane
26. Later Days at Highbury by Joan Austen-Leigh
27. Our Spoons Came From Woolworths by Barbara Comyns
28. Lavengro by George Borrow
29. Thursday’s Child by Noel Streatfeild
30. Moondial by Helen Cresswell
31. Swallows and Amazons by Arthur Ransome
32. The Brontës Went to Woolworths by Rachel Ferguson
33. Fish Preferred by PG Wodehouse
34. Susan Settles Down by Molly Clavering
35. The Two Miss Abbotts by DE Stevenson
36. The Winter of Enchantment by Victoria Walker
37. A City of Bells by Elizabeth Goudge
38. Why Shoot a Butler? by Georgette Heyer
39. Miss Plum and Miss Penny by Dorothy Evelyn Smith
40. Friday’s Child by Georgette Heyer
41. Emily by Jilly Cooper
42. The Haunting Season: Ghostly Tales for Long Winter Nights by Various
43. Jane Austen in the Classroom by Louise Flavin
44. Surfeit of Lampreys by Ngaio Marsh
45. Secret Seven Fireworks by Enid Blyton
46. Poirot Investigates by Agatha Christie
47. Marriage by Susan Ferrier
48. The Spice Woman’s Basket by Alison Uttley
49. The Santa Klaus Murder by Mavis Doriel Hay
50. Murder for Christmas by Francis Duncan
51. The Christmas Book by Enid Blyton
52. Mystery in White by J Jefferson Farjeon.