The Best Books I Read in 2024 📚

it might not have been a great reading year but the best books were INCREDIBLE

I didn’t have a great reading year in 2024. I DNFd more books than I’ve ever done before, and I read a lot of books that made me feel just kind of… eh. Some of those DNFd books I know I’ll be coming back to, because the problem was definitely me not them (some of them were my most anticipated releases of the year) and but just in general, I just wasn’t finding a lot of joy from the books I was picking up.

But the ones I loved, I LOVED. Like, haven’t stopped talking about, will make everyone read them immediately, told my wife the plot in instalments after every reading session LOVED them. Let’s get into it!

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The Tainted Cup* by Robert Jackson Bennett

Oh my god. Oh my god?? First of all, “Holmes and Watson style murder mystery in a fantasy world constantly attacked by giant sea leviathans” is something you could use to lure me into a trap like a cartoon mouse, and I’m SO glad that this book executed that setup so beautifully. I was hoping to like this book after hearing Regan describe it (and, frankly, after seeing the incredibly beautiful US cover, which, yes, I went out of my way to order) but oh my god, I loved it. Din (the Watson) and Ana (the Holmes) are some of my new favourite characters. The world is FASCINATING, the mystery involves, like, botanical horror, and it’s a much queerer world and story than I was expecting. I will read literally anything else in this series. My god.

Bookshops and Bonedust* by Travis Baldree

I’ve talked about this before, but while I enjoyed Legends and Lattes (the first book in this series) fine, I didn’t love it like the rest of the bookish internet seemed to. I liked it enough to pick up this prequel, thankfully, because this one I LOVED. We’re following Viv, an orc, back in her adventuring party days (think like D&D style) when she’s been injured and has to rest for a while, against her will, in the nearest town. While she’s there, she makes friends with a grumpy bookshop owner, flirts with a cute baker lady, and brings life back to the bookshop, all while learning about the importance of rest and healing, getting embroiled in a minor local mystery, and meeting a skeleton who lives in a bag. All cosy fantasy should be like Bookshops and Bonedust. A true escapist delight!

The Scholomance series* by Naomi Novik

Another series I gave a second try! I read A Deadly Education back when it first came out and didn’t really vibe with it at the time. I was expecting something more in the vein of lyrical alternative world fantasy, like Naomi Novik’s other books, and this is more of a voicey, our-world-with-magic thing. I liked the alarming school and I liked our main character, but overall decided it wasn’t for me.

Cut to 2024. I’m recovering from covid and unable to read anything longer than, like, an Instagram story without my brain trying to dissolve out of my ears but at the same time itching to get back to books, so I tried rereading some things I’d read before and enjoyed enough but not loved so much that the thought of rereading them was intimidating in my weakened state. Reader, let me tell you: I fucking loved A Deadly Education. I read the rest of the trilogy in an almost literally feverish gulp over the next month and could not get enough. I think the second book is my favourite, which is RARE for me in a trilogy, but, god, what a series. I’m legitimately considering whether I want a tattoo for El.

The Scholomance series is set in the titular Scholomance, the only school for magical kids. Magical kids are extra delicious to monsters, so if they don’t get into this school they have a super low survival rate, and if they DO get into the school, monsters will constantly try to break in and murder them anyway. Kids arrive for their first year and don’t leave again until graduation, so they spend their whole school career in this ominous, sentient school with no adults, trying to teach themselves magic and survive until graduation. Enter El, who’s been told basically from birth that she’s destined to go, like, dark queen Galadriel and destroy the world. THEREFORE, she can’t use anything remotely dark magic-y because she’s worried it’ll start her on her path to world destruction, so she has to do everything the hard way and no one wants to be her friend. She’s grumpy, anti-social, and so fucking dedicated to not turning evil despite the world constantly trying to push her in that direction, and oh my god, I love her beyond all reason.

Also, the school golden boy keeps trying to save her life.

this is sort of their vibe together

It’s all about choices, and what real evil is, and how corruption doesn’t always look like you think it will. I genuinely did not see the direction this series was going in, and I could have read it all again immediately. I’ve written this SCREED without meaning to. Everyone read this please so I have company in my screaming!!!!

Nettle and Bone* by T Kingfisher

I really enjoy T Kingfisher’s horror books so this year I wanted to try some of her fantasy and whoooo, this was a ride. We’re following Marra, the third princess of a kingdom, whose eldest sister marries the prince of a neighbouring kingdom and dies under mysterious circumstances. When her second sister marries the same prince, Marra sets off to save her sister and the kingdom too. Like all T Kingfisher books, there’s a slowly accumulated cast of misfit characters, including a demon chicken, a gravewitch, and a traumatised former knight, and the throughline of undoing corruption is just perfect.

I think when I read T Kingfisher, I feel what people who love Terry Pratchett feel reading his books. I’m definitely reading more of her back catalogue this year.

Also there’s a dog made of bones.

Honourable mentions:

The Warm Hands of Ghosts* by Katherine Arden

In my most 2024 most anticipated reads post I said “I hope this is also gay (pls)” and I am here from the future to say: 🌈🌈🌈

We’re following Laura, a WW1 nurse discharged after an injury, as she returns to the frontlines to try to find her brother. She’s been told he died in the line of duty, but something isn’t adding up. Meanwhile, we’re also following her brother, Freddie, a year earlier, waking up after an explosion to find himself trapped with a German soldier. This is obviously beautifully written, like all of Katherine Arden’s books, and the magic involved feels so of the time, and the only reason this is an honourable mention and not on my main list is, I think, because this is another book I read while ill and therefore have sort of vague but very positive memories of. I know I enjoyed it! But I can’t accurately compare it to things I read when I was less sick.

What Feasts at Night* by T Kingfisher

2024 was a rocky one, reading-wise and, like, everything else wise, and What Feasts at Night was the first book last year I really enjoyed, so it has a special place in my heart and in my honourable mentions.

Another T Kingfisher! I love this weird little series and am so glad it IS a series, after I enjoyed the first book so much last year. In this sequel, we’re following Alex Easton, a retired soldier, as they return home for the first time since their House of Usher escapades in book 1 and their time at war before that, only to discover that something… isn’t right. I love Alex Easton, I love this cast of characters, and I will read any weird house book going.

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So those are all my favourites from last year! What were some of your favourite books last year? And if you have any recs for me based on this list, I’d love to hear them!

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Thank you so much for reading The Cosy Process! I’ll be posting soon about some of the updates I’ll be making here for 2025, but mostly that means that I’ll be launching a paid subscription tier as a way for people to support my work. There’ll be a bonus chatty, tea-with-a-friend style short podcast episode every month to say thank you.

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