November is such a dreary month. A quote from my book, “Lost Year. A Pandemic Diary 2020” : “There’s a greyness to the month that I dread.” Yes, back in 2020, for sure extra-awful. Nowadays, I plan for the ordinary doldrums. Cruise to the Caribbean! (Hurricane season should be over?) And read. Here’s the books I read in November this year of 2025 :
- “The Girl He Left Behind” by Beatrice McNeil. If you know me at all from these blogs, you know I like : 1) to read (duh), 2) to travel, and 3) to meet local authors in my travels and buy their books. This is hit and miss – I often don’t even read those books I buy, because sometimes (usually) I don’t check the genre or read the blurb; I really am just interested in the local author support. So I must say I lucked out with meeting Beatrice in Cape Breton this past summer, and reading her book. Storyline is not complicated but enticing. Not tons of characters, but all are fleshed out. In fact, this is the richest book I’ve read in a while, in that I am truly transported to 1980s (and earlier in the backstories) rural Nova Scotia. The only problem I find is that I couldn’t put it down and blazed through to the fairy-tale ending, which surprisingly, felt like a surprise. Highly enjoyable read; I recommend.
Eager for another good book, I pick this one up from “the pile”. My fellow readers, you know what “the pile” is.
- Linwood Barclay can be counted on. “The Lie Maker”. Now this is interesting: poor writer looking for a gig; how about creating and writing backstories for protectees in the witness protection program? Of course with intertwined storylines for the protagonist and fellow cast members. Murders and connections abound and catch our protaganist in the web. Written so well I breezed through it too quickly! Done, and time to look at the holiday Kobo reads.
I just have time to read a freebie on my Kindle. Always a risky read – lots of trash, but sometimes a hidden gem. This one was a little of both.
- “Missing” by Christy Cooper-Burnett. The picture on the cover is a cruise ship, so it caught my attention before leaving on same. However, the story couldn’t be more unlike my own experiences! Young women being kidnapped onboard by a ring of sex slave brokers! Delivering to Mexican cartels! Yikes. Lucky I’m an older broad and not likely to be targeted, haha. A fun, quick read with a corny ending and backstory, but hey, easy to clip through before my own relaxing cruise. Eyes open for the crooked crime ring onboard😉
So travel time, to get into something by a much better writer,
- Conn Igulden in his ongoing series about the emperor, Nero, in “Tyrant”. I’ve waited for this sequel, and wasn’t disappointed. I’ve read pretty much everything by this author and am always enthralled by his research of the times and humanization of the historical figures we think we know.
- “Day Four” by Sarah Lotz was a surprise – I anticipated a trashy easy read to finish my cruising reading so picked this one (again) from the cover of, well, another cruise ship. Again, not reading about what the book was about, I only noticed once things took their creepy turn that there was an endorsement by none other than the master of creep, Stephen King, “..really good. The cruise ship from hell.” Enough said. My husband wouldn’t listen to my descriptions of the ongoing story, saying simply, “Why are you reading about scary cruise stuff while on a cruise?! Why indeed? It was fun.
A great reading month and southern cruise to kill off a usually miserable month. On to December and maybe less time for reading. I have another trip to Europe to attend a Christmas wedding. Who told me retirement would be quiet and I could get all the reading I wanted done? In my experience, there is never enough time for reading!
Tried Michele Sabad’s Books yet? Please take a look. 😉
Stevie Szabad, Author 