This is my final post of the year, and for what you are about to receive . . . well, I apologize for the lack of originality! But this is what we bloggers do: we write and write and write and WRITE for you, and then at the end of the year we drag ourselves, burnt out and broken, over to the ol’ laptop and recap what we’ve already written!!! 

Here, then, are my Top Ten Reads of 2025. I’m usually too embarrassed to add my list to those of my fellow bloggers. Some of them read as many books in one month as I cover in six. To those of you who don’t mind my practicing the “slow and steady” approach, I’m happy to report that I read fifty-six books this year. I think the “one book a week” system is perfectly adequate – really I do!

Granted, some of these were close re-reads, like the dozen titles I covered for The Poirot Project, completing my mission to review every Poirot title on the blog. I got pleasure out of each revisit – even, as far as I can remember, Elephants Can Remember – but in putting together my Top Ten list, these titles were out of consideration. (But, oh, how I loved revisiting Death on the Nile!!)

My list is presented in chronological order of reading.

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1. Loose Lips by Kemper Donovan

The Ghost Writer Series is proving to be a delight, both in Kemper’s channeling of Agatha Christie in his plotting and his breezy inclusion of a dozen topical references per page. This second adventure takes place on a cruise, so you can bet that the spirit of Death on the Nile is all over this fast-paced puzzler. (I checked with Kemper, and it’s true!) I can’t wait to find out what happens in the third installment, Sweet Spot, due out in June! And if you haven’t read any of Kemper’s mysteries, I would advise you to begin at the beginning with the Ghost Writer’s debut – The Busy Body.

• The Bride Wore Black by Cornell Woolrich

I’ve only just begun my explorations of several authors on my list, including Woolrich. This classic tale of revenge was nothing like I thought it would be. It was more episodic – but these episodes, depicting how the titular bride got vengeance on each of the men who murdered her husband, were suspenseful, full of surprises, and often quite funny. And then, after the Bride whittles down her hit list, she and the readers are walloped by a killer of an ending. I definitely hope to dip my toe in more Woolrich next year. The question is . . . which one?

• The Chocolate Cobweb by Charlotte Armstrong

Like Woolrich, Armstrong has been on my radar for a long time, but the one title I read in Book Club, The Better to Eat You, wreaked havoc with my digestion! Thankfully, Cobweb is a prime example of domestic suspense, where horror gestates under a veil of normalcy. A young artist suspects that she was switched at birth and belongs with a suitably artistic family. But her attempt to ingratiate herself into this family’s lives brings her face to face with madness and death. Reading this book turned me on so much to Armstrong’s subtle gifts that I soon thereafter picked up The Unsuspected, a classic novel (and film) so good that it deserves to share this spot on the list. Consider yourselves endowed with a bonus!

• Beast in View by Margaret Millar

Maybe the world in 2025 was so dark that I seemed to gravitate toward all these mid-century masters of domestic nastiness. My Book Club differed in opinion over this, the first title where Millar moved away from traditional crime fiction and into something creepier. In spinster Helen Clarvoe, Millar has created a heroine both pathetic and oddly repellent. Helen is being terrorized on the phone by an old “friend” named Evelyn Merrick. Why is Evelyn tormenting her? The answer may have left more readers gasping in 1955 than today, when the book’s surprises have been copied to death. Still, the book is beautifully written and expertly parses out its twists. I can’t wait to dive back into Millar’s work either!

• The Case of the Drowsy Mosquito by Erle Stanley Gardner

One of the greatest pleasures for me over the past few years is taking this deep dive into Gardner’s work, particularly the Perry Mason novels. Realizing quickly that a chronological read would be less pleasurable, due to the comparative falling off of quality during the 50’s and 60’s, I opted to come up with a “theme” each year related to the titles of the Mason books. This year involved a dozen trips to the Mason Menagerie, and I had a good time of one sort or another on each visit. But the top read of all of them was Drowsy Mosquito because 1) it took Perry, Della Street and Paul Drake out of the office and into the desert, where they became part of a closed circle mystery; 2) it put their lives in real danger; and 3) it combined an excellent mystery with some enlightening information about a way of life that Gardner himself espoused. 

Feel like another bonus? Almost as fine was The Case of the Perjured Parrot, which made excellent use of several avian talkers and had a similarly interesting take on happiness. This take even figured into a lovely twist in the mystery itself! 

• The Jealous One by Celia Fremlin

When it comes to mid-century domestic suspense, this really was a year of discovery for me. Friend and fellow blogger Kate Jackson is always covering the great female authors of this sub-genre, and the book addict in me responds accordingly by picking up one copy or another – and then not reading them. This year, I have been working on that, which explains why Armstrong and Millar are on the list. This title by Celia Fremlin came to me because it was a Book Club selection, and it was one of our best ideas of the whole year! 

Fremlin has a way of imbuing each situation with a sense of horror and a sense of humor. Her tale of a housewife who starts to think her outgoing new neighbor is out to subsume her whole life – husband, mother-in-law and friends – is a brilliant exercise in paranoia – or is it?!?!?!? – as well as a hilarious skewering of suburban mores. Men compete at sports and finance; the women here try to top each other as to who can make the most delicious snacks for club meetings or who had the most painful labor? 

More Fremlin is certainly on the way: my Secret Santa was most generous and gifted me with four more books – one of which I was instructed to open at Halloween! Which I did, and reviewed for you here. 

• The Murder Game by John Curran

One of the best non-fiction books to come out this year is from our friend and fellow Christie scholar John Curran, who presents his own take on the history of Golden Age crime fiction with a focus on the varied ways authors turned the whole genre into a thrilling competition between writer and reader. It’s awash with scholarship and it’s a great big fun read!! The result for me is that, while I have “matured” enough that I would just as soon be fooled when reading a good puzzle, I have started to seek out books and games that I can set my mind to solving. That led me to buying Maureen Johnson’s You’re the Detective: The Crawling Hand Murder – A Solve-It-Yourself Mystery, which I thoroughly enjoyed (but didn’t solve!!) and a couple more items which you’ll be hearing about in the New Year. So, thanks to John for both an absorbing narrative and for rekindling that old “armchair detective” spark within me – this is a book that I will revisit often!

• The Killer Question by Janice Hallett

I’ve been singing praises for Hallett’s epistolary novels for the 21^st century (the missives all spring from technology) since The Appeal came out in 2021. Each of the novels that came after had their charms, but for me none of them quite matched The Appeal’s, er, appeal. The Killer Question arrived this year and is easily my second favorite. Its take on pub quizzes is hilarious, and the mystery that interweaves through every text, email and WhatsApp chat is complex and surprising. A visit with Hallett is becoming a much anticipated annual thing for me, and I’m thrilled to announce that next year’s title will be returning to the old stomping grounds of The Fairway Players in The Silent Appeal. I can’t wait!!

• The Kahuna Killer by Juanita Sheridan

My second nomination this year for the Best Reprint of 2025 is also my second visit to Sheridan’s work. The Chinese Chop introduced readers to Lily Wu, one of the rare female Asian detectives of the last century. While Chop takes place in New York City and explains how Lily came to meet and befriend her Watson, neophyte author Janice Cameron, The Kahuna Killer moves them both back home to Hawaii. Sheridan brings the islands to life and here delivers an even stronger mystery. I only hope more and more people will come to know these books because, halfway through the all too small canon, I have reserved a special place in my heart for Lily and Janice.

1. My Grandfather, the Master Detective by Masateru Konishi

It has been a banner year as far as honkaku mysteries go. I’d like to think that we bloggers who championed the translation into English of Japanese mysteries in the GAD style are a little bit responsible for these works gaining such popularity that the number of translated works seems to have increased proportionately with each passing year. Unfortunately, this has coincided with my own complicated feelings about the sub-genre. Nothing I read this year really sent me – although I’m glad I read all of these books. 

At the last minute, however, a modern honkaku mystery arrived in the form of this, Masateru Konishi’s debut novel (translated by Louise Heal Kawai), and it is different from any honkaku I’ve read before. It combines appreciation for the classic tropes of the masters with the delicacy of the modern Japanese novel. (How many titles come out in Japan that center their plots around loving books?!?) This is actually a connection of mystery stories bound by the central relationship between sweet Kaidu, a young schoolteacher, and her beloved grandfather, a wise man who finds himself in the throes of early onset dementia. 

It’s a lovely idea to present us with a man so fundamentally wise that he can sort out the solutions to murders, disappearances, and other fantastic crimes despite his disability. But Masateru goes us one better: Grandfather’s hallucinations actually help him discover the truth, and by channeling his unusual “powers” he not only finds justice where the police cannot, but his relationship with Kaidu becomes more than that of a failing elder and his helpless relation. Are the mysteries as complex or gruesome as those of the likes of Yokomizo or Ayatsuji? Not at all. But the celebration of the Golden Age is very much present, and I enjoyed the gentle approach to crime in this one. It seemed a perfect honkaku for the holidays.

What were some of your favorite reads of 2025? I would love to hear your recommendations in the comments below, as well as your thoughts on any of the books I mentioned above. And, goodness me, what literary pleasures await us in 2026?!? Which new/old authors will I discover, and who will merit a revisit? That’s for you and I to find out together in just a few days. In the meanwhile, thank you for being a part of Ah Sweet Mystery this year.

May you have a healthy and happy New Year! I’ll be back with my New Year’s resolutions on the 1^st!