Top Ten Tuesday: Books On My Winter 2025-2026 to-Read List


Hosted by That Artsy Reader Girl

 

A sprig of holly lying on an opened hardcover book that itself is lying on some rough rocks at the beach on a sunny day. Just so you all know, I’ve been having trouble leaving comments on some WordPress blogs recently. They ask me to log in even though I’m already logged in, and then when I leave my comment it never appears on the post. If I don’t comment on your post, I am not ignoring you.

The photo I included in this post made me chuckle because the beaches in Ontario are often inaccessible in the winter.

Windy days are common here in Southern Ontario, and in the winter all of that wind can blow freezing water up the shore and onto any sidewalks or piers nearby.

So not only it is well below freezing for us then, the land next to our lakes is often coated in a thick layer of ice that can be incredibly slippery and dangerous.

I’m glad that people in some other parts of the world can take leisurely strolls next to their lakes or oceans in the winter without possibly slipping straight into the freezing water, though. It must be lovely, and I mean that sincerely if also slightly humorously.

With that mental image  firmly in place, here are some books I’m looking forward to checking out this winter.

 

Book cover for “Is This a Cry for Help?” By Emily Austin. Image on cover is a drawing of two pale legs sticking out from behind a gigantic stack of books.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

1. Is This a Cry for Help? by Emily R. Austin

Publication Date: January 13

Why I’m Interested: Book bans are something I’m always curious to read about, especially from the perspective of a librarian who is fighting them.

 

Book cover for How to Lose a Goblin in Ten Days: Tales from Hawthorne Cottage by Jessie Sylva. Image on cover shows flowers growing around a golden mirror or some other similar round object.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2. How to Lose a Goblin in Ten Days: Tales from Hawthorne Cottage by Jessie Sylva

Publication Date: January 20

Why I’m Interested: Honestly, the title is what drew me to this one. I love puns and cozy speculative fiction.

 

 

Book cover for Agnes Aubert's Mystical Cat Shelter by Heather Fawcett. Image on cover shows a drawing of cats of various colours sitting in a large wooden piece of furniture that looks like it may have originally been built to hold china instead. It has little windows and recesses to put your valuables, like cats for example. Ha!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

3.  Agnes Aubert’s Mystical Cat Shelter by Heather Fawcett

Publication Date: February 3

Why I’m Interested: Animal rescue is one of those topics that will draw my attention to all sorts of different books. There’s nothing like reading about an abandoned animal finding a happy new home.

 

Book cover for The Daughter Who Remains by Nnedi Okorafor. Image on cover is a drawing of a black woman being enveloped in a yellow-green mist as she holds both arms up and embraces whatever is happening to her. There also appears to be a snake writhing near her neck for reasons I do not know as I haven’t read this book yet.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

4.  The Daughter Who Remains by Nnedi Okorafor

Publication Date: February 17

Why I’m Interested: It will hopefully encourage me to finally begin this trilogy. I’m generally a fan of Ms. Okorafor’s work and the afro-futurism genre as a whole.

 

Book cover for Onward: 16 Climate Fiction Short Stories to Inspire Hope by Erin Entrada Kelly. Image on cover is a drawing of a sandglass-shaped hole in a cave that opens to show the viewer a bird sitting on a ledge in the cave looking down at a serene pool of water in the forest.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

5. Onward: 16 Climate Fiction Short Stories to Inspire Hope by Erin Entrada Kelly

Publication Date: February 24

Why I’m Interested: To be honest, climate change is not looking good at the moment. I worry about what the future may hold as the Earth continues to warm up. My fingers are crossed that this book will imagine some cleaner, cooler futures for us all.

 

1 Comment

Filed under Blog Hops

One Response to Top Ten Tuesday: Books On My Winter 2025-2026 to-Read List

  1. Some of these have cover art that draw me in… so now I have MORE books to read about and maybe add to my mental TBR. 😉 Hope you enjoy these all!

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *