jacey | Books Read in 2015 - A Retrospective (Reply)

It's that time of year again. My fiction reading is always severely restricted when I'm writing, particularly when i'm at the first draft stage. I've done a lot of writing this year. I finished off Crossways, which came out in August and made a start on Nimbus which will be the third Psi-Tech book. Then I edited Winterwood, adding about 20,000 words of new material, then immediately began on the sequel, Silverwolf. I'm now 90,000 words into the first draft.

Surprisingly I still found time and energy to read and blog thirty five novels (okay, a couple of them were novellas, so, sue me!) This was the year I discovered Diana Gabaldon. Yes, I know a lot of you recommended her to me at least twenty years ago, and you were right - she knows how to keep the pages turning. New to me this year and authors who will definitely be on my future reading lists include C.E. Murphy, Judith Tarr and Genevieve Cogman. Old favourites included: Lisa Shearin, Joe Abercrombie, Patricia Briggs, Anne Aguirre, Kevin Hearne and Terry Pratchett.

I managed to get all the way through a graphic novel, the reprint of early Modesty Blaise strip cartoons, The Gabriel Set Up, written by Peter O'Donnell and illustrated by Jim Holdaway. I think I managed better with the spare style of black and white drawings originally done for newspaper publication, than I do with the lavish colour graphic novels of recent years where I often have difficulty interpreting what's happening.

My biggest disappointment was Erin Morganstern's The Night Circus, which I'd heard good things about. The writing itself was lush and sensual, but it was too plot-lite for me and I didn't feel deeply involved with the characters. I've never got on all that well with literary novels, but if that's your thing, then you may disagree with me completely over this book.

Anyhow, for better or worse, this is what I read in 2015. Each one of these is book-logged here.