Spring TBR 2026

 

Spring is finally here - new growth, new beginnings, new books! 

I have so many fantastic books on my to be read list that I have been saving for this time of year so let's get it into it.. 

Show Me Where It Hurts by Claire Gleeson

Blurb: How do you survive the unsurvivable?

Rachel lives with her husband Tom and their two children: it's the ordinary family life she always thought she'd have. All of that changes in an instant - when Tom runs the family car off the road, seeking to end his own life, and take his wife and children with him. Rachel is left to pore over the wreckage to try and understand what happened - to find a way to go on living afterwards.

What emerges is a snapshot of what it's like to live alongside someone who is suffering, how you keep yourself afloat when the person you love is drowning, and how you survive irreparable loss.

3 Celebrity Memoirs I Recommend

I have read some fantastic non-fiction in the time I have been away from my blog. 

An area I have fallen in love with is the celebrity biography memoir genre. I love reading the history of someone's life, the ups and downs and the inside information that can be gleaned from the pages. 

I thought I would share some of my favourites from the last couple of years with you in the hopes that it encourages you to pick them up too. 

Mrs Hinch: This Is Me by Mrs Hinch (Sophie Hinchcliffe)

Mrs Hinch is an Instagram icon. If you have never heard of Mrs Hinch, she is an Instagrammer who rose to fame simply by sharing her love of cleaning her home. Her Instagram page has amassed millions of followers who love not only her posts but her. 

I loved this memoir as it gave the reader an insight into Sophie, without the Mrs Hinch persona. 

Reading about Sophie's childhood, her insecurities with her body which led to her having gastric band surgery and almost dying from complications and how she started her Instagram page and changed her life forever. 

I think the reason this book resonates with me is the same for a lot of her followers - it is Sophie's honest voice, her ability to be vulnerable and her incredible positive outlook on life. 

Mrs Hinch drives home the message of happiness in the everyday things in her book Mrs Hinch: This Is Me. 

How I Rated Books in 2025

 In 2025, I had a very busy year. Between work, beginning a master's degree and general life stuff - I was pretty busy. Yet, I managed to read several fantastic novels in that time. 

Although I did not read as many non-fiction or 5-star reads as I had hoped, I feel I read a varied selection of fiction, non-fiction and some graphic novels too. 

If you would like to see my entire year of reading from 2025 broken down by ratings, you are in for a treat! Please enjoy my colourful graphics, which display my reading stats by star ratings. If you would like a more detailed breakdown of some of my favourites of the year and what I am hoping to read in 2026, you can find those breakdowns in my previous posts. 

Please, read on and see how I rated what I read in 2025. (There might be some controversial ones..)

how i rated 2025 by bookblogging78

Book Vs Film: Seven Dials Mystery Agatha Christie

 

I am sure everyone has been eagerly awaiting the Netflix adaptation of The Seven Dials Mystery by Agatha Christie, as I was. I read my very first Christie novel last year with my friend and was shocked by how much I enjoyed it. I then decided I needed to read some more of her fantastic detective novels. 

When I heard that The Seven Dials Mystery was being adapted by Netflix, I decided that will be my next Christie read. I devoured the book in a week. Although at first I felt this story began a little slow, it soon picked up. Secret societies, funny characters and a headstrong female lead hunting out a mystery - what a ride. 

Of course, I had my alerts turned on for the Netflix miniseries, so as soon as it was released, I raced home from work to watch it. 

I was slightly disappointed, but I will explain all in my discussion below as I take you through some of the major differences between the novel and the film. SPOILERS AHEAD

2026 Anticipated Releases

 2026 looks like a fantastic year for book releases. Many of my favourite authors are releasing new titles, there are interesting debut novels being released and some (hopefully) scandalous memoirs too! 

Check out my list below to see what books I am going to be anticipating the release of this year. 

THE TRUTH ABOUT RUBY COOPER BY LIZ NUGENT (Goodreads) 12 March 2026

One of my all-time favourite authors - I can't wait!

Blurb: 

If my sister hadn’t been beautiful, none of it would have happened.

Ruby Cooper and her sister, Erin, live an idyllic life in their close-knit church community in Boston. But when Ruby is sixteen, she is involved in an incident that causes her family’s world to implode.

Across decades, the fallout leaves a wake of destruction behind Ruby in Dublin and Erin in Boston.

Not that Ruby wants to think about the past.

But it can’t stay a secret forever.

Best Books of 2025

 

I haven't posted on this blog in years, although I have definitely been reading a lot... 

One of my resolutions this year is to spend more time getting back into my hobbies and things that I enjoy - hence why I am returning to my blog! I have missed talking about books on here a lot, although I have still been enjoying reading others' posts, TikTok's and Instagram posts. 

So I thought what better time to return than the beginning of a fresh new year, and with a post on my favourite books that I read in 2025. I managed to read over 100 books in 2025, but only a few of them were 5-star favourites. 

My Favourite Books of 2025: 

I think no one will be surprised, as I am sure this is on a lot of people's favourite books of the year lists. 

I am a huge Hunger Games fan and was waiting patiently for this to be released ever since it was announced. 

I absolutely loved this book. Haymitch was such a perfect character from the series to focus a book on, as when we met him in The Hunger Games, he was a very negative, jaded character who then went on a character arc. But I have always wanted to know how he got to be that person. 

This book gave us the perfect insight into Haymitch - his life before the games, during the games and after the games. I loved reading about his interactions with other characters (Maysilee Donner, my absolute favourite!) and seeing a few cameos of familiar characters or familiar names. 

This book had me hooked - I could not stop reading. Honestly, I think there is so much potential for Suzanne Collins to continue building upon this series, whether it is stories of the characters we already know, like Snow and Haymitch or someone we haven't encountered. 

I think if Suzanne Collins writes anything else in this universe, I will 100% read it. Very much looking forward to the movie!

Lisa Jewell is an author I discovered during my break from blogging, and wow, she is a new favourite author of all time!

None Of This Is True focuses on two women whose lives become incredibly intertangled during the recording of a podcast. 

Craziness ensued, and I could not predict anything that happened. Lisa Jewell writes such readable thrillers with crazy characters and unpredictable endings ... I am still reeling over the ending of this one!

Lisa Jewell is definitely an author I will be reading all of their back catalogue in 2026 .. hopefully!

One of the most talked about and covered up books of 2025! Careless People.

From an ex-employee at Facebook/Meta, Sarah Wynn-Williams dives deep into the horrors that were acceptable at the company during the time she worked there. 

I think everyone had some idea that Facebook/Meta is not a "good" company, but I had to pause so many times while reading this book to recover from the shocking details. 

From harvesting people's data without them knowing and repurposing it, using Myanmar as an experiment on controlling people's perspectives, corrupt government backhanders, sexism at work, and so much more. 

This was an unforgettable book that, if you are at all interested in business or peeking behind the horrible Meta curtain, I urge you to pick it up. 

This novel focuses on our main character, Tricia, who is house hunting with her new husband. While going to a viewing, a snowstorm hits and she and her husband are stranded and must stay in the empty house. The house once belonged to a successful Psychiatrist who disappeared 4 years ago. As Tricia moves through the house, she stumbles upon tape recordings of the psychiatrist's meetings with her patients.

Never Lie by Freida McFadden is the best book by her that I have read so far. She is also one of my new auto-read authors. 

This book had my jaw on the floor. Every twist shocked me; the characters were so well written, and the tape recording transcripts broke up the text and added another layer to the story. This is one of her best books, in my opinion, and I will always recommend this one. 

So those are my favourite books I read in 2025. Let me know if you read any of these, or what your favourite books of 2025 were! Hope 2026 is a brilliant year for us all. 

Announcement: Book Bloggers Secret Santa!

Hi everyone! So Christmas is fast approaching and I really enjoy hosting the Book Bloggers Secret Santa every year so I can't wait to do it again!

I really love the book blogging community and feel that this is the perfect way to help make friends with bloggers, increase that sense of community and also fill you with that warm fuzzy feeling you get when you give someone a gift you know they will love!