Kieran.Stories

In 2023, I set myself the challenge of reading a hundred books in one year. In no way did reading a hundred books in 2023 make me feel more at ease with the passage of time, but it is something I have kept up. I don’t think it’s necessarily a useful, healthy, or admirable thing to do. I might make 2025 my last year of aiming for the arbitrary hundred. In the meantime, these are my favourite reads from January to the end of June.

Porn: An Oral History by Polly Barton (2023)

I was completely taken in by the formalism, and then it was fascinating to read a series of conversations about the unspoken, and like the best books, I was thinking about Porn when I wasn’t reading it.

The Mystery of Edwin Drood by Charles Dickens (1870)

I have an app on my phone for tracking the books I read. Appropriately, the ending to my notes on Drood are missing, and I can’t remember what I was going to say, or had said in January.

The Coiled Serpent by Camilla Grudova (2021)

Each story its own brilliant piece of invective. Strange, lurid, scatological. Balls to the wall weird. Written clearly and with intent.

Soldier Sailor by Claire Kilroy (2023)

It took me a while to get into the rhythm of this novel, but I was fully in by the end. Hard to write about books you love in a brief paragraph, but needless to say, I laughed, I cried, I was sad when it was over.

Ghostland: In Search of a Haunted Country by Edward Parnell (2019)

I wrote another post about reading Ghostland in Whitby, and how it sort of saved my sanity when things got a bit spooky at our hotel. A great book about memory and ghosts – the older I get, the more I think all great books are about memory.

Shadow Lines: Searching for the Book Beyond the Shelf by Nicholas Royle (2024)

I could read Nicholas Royle write the telephone book. Enjoyed this book as much as White Spines, if not a little bit more. A very generous reading experience, which encourages more reading. Eagerly anticipating the next entry in this planned trilogy.

The Earth, Thy Great Exchequer, Ready Lies by Jo Lloyd (2021)

There is a deep sense of mystery in these stories, especially in the title story, which might be my favourite. I found it challenging and rewarding, and it was unlike a lot of collections I’ve read recently. Elliptical, liminal universes.

That’s Your Lot by Limmy (2017)

Limmy’s second collection feels more assured than his first, and I really hope he writes another book, although I am also a fan of his improvised stories on Twitch. There was a story in this book, ‘The Daysnatcher’, which made me cry in public, and that wasn’t something I was necessarily expecting from Limmy.

The Unconsoled by Kazuo Ishiguro (1995)

This novel took over my life for a while. I was happy to let it take over. It is genuinely unlike anything I have read, and it hit me emotionally in ways I didn’t expect. Ishiguro probably is the best writer I’ve read, and I look forward to reading more of his work in 2025. Number nine… number nine… number nine.

The Benefactors by Wendy Erskine (2025)

Wendy Erskine’s debut novel was an absolute pleasure to read. I usually think it’s bullshit when the marketing for a book is like, “This book is devastating, but also very funny,” as if humour is an added bonus. But The Benefactors is laugh out loud funny. It is also a gripping drama. It isn’t bullshit. It’s probably the best novel published so far this year (that I’ve read, obviously). Short story writers do it best.