2025 Favorite Things: Books, Comics, Picture Books
My top choices are in bold. “Chirp” is the app I use for audio books, not the name of the publisher.
Using a different calendar year, Shepherd Books is a platform for readers and authors (think GoodReads with less prejudice). I love how they have labels like steady pace, loved it, emotions, originality, and other quick blurbs about what the reader loved most, the writing style, and the pace. The reason I keep using GoodReads is because they include comics.
Books:
| The Big Four | Agatha Christie | Chirp | Definitely not one of my favorites. |
| The Murder of Roger Ackroyd | Agatha Christie, Narrated by Charles Armstrong | Chirp | It’s take a long time before detective Hercule Poirot appears. However, there is a reason this is a classic. The story comes from the point of view of Dr. James Shepherd. If this was written today, I guarantee some publisher/editor would have forced a rewrite to move Poirot closer to the beginning. |
| Blackbird House | Alice Hoffman | Chirp | Each family that lives in Blackbird House seems to have misery which is said to be caused by the original inhabitants who legends turned into ghosts and a witch. I felt like the story ended abruptly, but I guess the last person to get ownership of the house, Emma, comes to terms with the lack of modern amenities and the alleged cursed property. |
| Illumination Night | Alice Hoffman | Chirp | An intricate story about dysfunctional families. |
| The Widow’s Guide to Murder | Amanda Ashby | Chirp | listened to audiobook; there were a lot of murders and attempted murders in this. |
| The Widow’s Guide to Backstabbing | Amanda Ashby | Chirp | continuing this series on audio; main character Ginny is changing as she adjusts to life without her husband; in this book, she is now in charge of the Little Shore Library |
| Find Me | Anne Frazier | Thomas & Mercer | I highly recommend if you like serial killer thrillers that are more about the psychology than the gore. The protagonist, Reni, has a lifelong battle with complex PTSD. I think Frazier handled that along with grief, depression, narcissism, and other traits honestly with the information on mental health available today. |
| Murder in an Irish Bookshop | Carlene O’Connor narrated by Caroline Lennon | Kensington Cozies | Garda O’Sullivan and her peers (including her superior who happens to be her fiance) solve a perplexing double homicide that are difficult to connect. |
| Yoga Myths | Judith Hasen Lasater | Shambhala | *Non-fiction* – There are certainly some important pieces of information in here about anatomy. |
| Girl, Forgotten | Karin Slaughter, Narrated by Kathleen Early | Chirp | A bit confusing following the different timelines. I hadn’t realized this was book 2 of a series. |
| Sunny Says: Horse Sense from the Horse’s Mouth | Katherine Ramsland | Kindle | Very cute and satisfying picture book about the kind of horse Sunny is and how he found his herd. |
| Missing White Woman | Kellye Garrett | Mulholland Books | I’d been meaning to get to this one for years. It’s easy to see why it got so much praise. At the heart, other than the two deaths, being in the head of a WoC affected law enforcement and influencers who judge her (and Black men)–is the deeper core of this novel. Readers hopefully have their eyes opened that Black people, even when they’re victims, have mistakes of their past in the headlines other than showing sympathy. The “wasn’t an angel” we’ve heard IRL becomes a key obstacle for main character Breanna. |
| The Memory Gardener | Meg Donohue | S&S/Gallery Books | full review; Feels like a refreshing Happily-Ever-After from a book that isn’t a romance though it does have a thread of it. The Memory Gardener will perfectly satisfy fans of Alice Hoffman as was promised. It’s also well-suited for anyone who thinks one mistake in their past has to define their entire life. Donohue shows that there is forgiveness, misunderstandings, and relationships that can be built despite one’s regrettable history. |
| Let’s Move the Needle: An Activism Handbook for Artists, Crafters, Creatives, and Makers; Build Community and Make Change! | Shannon Downey | Hachette | *Non-fiction* — a fantastic book with clearly outlined plans for creating your own local community of people who love artistic outlets and are also motivated to bring attention to societal change |
| Forget Me Never | Susan Wittig Albert | Chirp | revisiting one of my favorite series, this time audio |
| Hangman’s Root | Susan Wittig Albert | Chirp | revisiting one of my favorite series, this time audio |
| No Body, Somebody Else, Out of Body (trilogy) | Susan Wittig Albert | Chirp | one of her shorter mysteries about Ruby, owner of a new age/pagan shop in Texas. |
| Thyme of Death | Susan Wittig Albert | Chirp | revisiting one of my favorite series, this time audio |
| Witches’ Bane | Susan Wittig Albert | Chirp | revisiting one of my favorite series, this time audio |
| Didn’t You Used to be Queenie B? | Terri-Lynne DeFino | Harper Collins / William Morrow Publishing | full review; Terri-Lynne DeFino is a master at breaking down troubled people with enormous regrets and putting them back together one ingredient at a time. That may take decades—skillfully handled through time hops with each chapter. |
Comics:
| Animals: Outbreak | Keith Foster (w), Ed Condon (a), Carlo Romero (covers) | Invader Comics/Kickstarter | Incredibly interesting artistic style that blends impressionism with spatter painting (due to all the blood on every page). This shows how humans are never prepared and that when a fast moving, man-made mutation is released in a massive national park. |
| Black Panther (1988) | Peter Gillis, Denys Cowan, Sam DeLaRosa, Rick Parker, Bob Sharen | Marvel | 1-4 miniseries |
| Black Sight | Stephanie Phillips (w), Conor Boyle (a), Tom Napolitano (l), Will Dennis (ed), created by Phillips & Boyle, Emma Price (graphic design) | Dark Horse | Mostly set in 1964, a woman named Alex finds herself drugged and accused of murder while detained in a bizarre asylum. This a place where Americans are trying to master mind control from a Nazi doctor. |
| Bowling with Corpses | Mike Mignola, Dave Stewart (c), Clem Robins (l) | Dark Horse | A perfect way to experience the world of Mike Mignola without worrying about back stories and legacies. |
| Convert | John Arcudi (w), Savannah Finley (a), Gonzalo Ruggieri (c 2&4), Miguel Co (c 1&2), Michael Heisler (l), Simon Gane (cover), Drew Gill (production) | Image | Uniquely illustrated and colored which changes with issue 3 to be less sharp details & more like water color. Narration of Orrin, the human main character, is through the lettering shown as sweets of his journal paper. |
| Creature from the Black Lagoon Lives (Universal Monsters) | Dan Watters (w), Ram V (w), Matthew Roberts (a), Dave Stewart (c), Trish Mulvihill (c), DC Hopkins (L) | Image/Skybound | There’s a reason Dave Stewart has won and been nominated for so many color achievement awards. Not that Mulvihill’s colors for issues 3 & 4 are unworthy; they’re just brighter compared to Stewart’s pulp, vintage approach. Kate Marsden is in Peru after she was nearly drowned. She’s an investigative reporter (seems to be American maybe). It’s hard to place the time period but maybe 1980s. No cell phones. Kate smokes a lot. She has a blazer with shoulder pads. |
| Dead Eyes | Gerry Duggan (w), Mike Spicer (c), John McCrea (a), Joe Sabino (l), Will Dennis (ed) | Image | I enjoyed this volume and the motivations for Dead Eyes’ actions. |
| Dead Eyes Empty Frames | Gerry Duggan (w), Mike Spicer (c), John McCrea (a), Joe Sabino (l), Will Dennis (ed) | Image | If you love the true crimes about the Gardner Museum heist and the recent Louvre crown jewels heist, this is for you. |
| Death Dog issue 1 | Bryce Ingman (w), Alan Robinson (a), Paul Little (c), Rob Steen (L) | AHOY | Dogs are extinct. Sweet robot dogs made by one company were bought out by a security company to make anti-shoplifting dogs. A police death dog however has the memories of the last robot dog. It remembers a boy. |
| Demon City | Trevor Mueller (w), Marco Perugini (a), Shannon Bennion (c), Micah Myers (l) | Kickstarter | End of Day and demons who came through are allowed to settle in Chicago. Death was murdered so humans can’t die. A new Death appears but he’s murdering the other gods of the Pantheon. Then yet another Death is given the scythe and powers. So much more T&A and dicks than ever expected. |
| Do Not Disturb #1 | David R. Flores and Jarod Hunter Roe, Lorenzo Scaramello (c) | Invader Comics | Ghost cops trapped in a hotel with other dead souls trying to solve the Missing Persons case Halsey took on before his death. |
| Downlands | Norm Konyu | Titan Comics | full review; For a uniquely immersive ghost story that proves the horror genre needn’t be spattered in blood with jump-scares, Downlands will more than satisfy a variety of readers. Whether it’s an interest in ghosts, a hero’s journey, the afterlife, or how events create new legends, Downlands gives a story about how life, dying, and death can be magical. |
| Escape New Jersey | Piper Williams (w), Dave Gutierrez (a), Mo Moussa (i), Dave Lentz (l & designer) | High Vibrational Pirate Syndicate of Western New York | A horror story based in a domestic custody fight with ties to Lenni Lenape legacy. |
| Exorcism Island | Jordan Thomas, Chris Matthews | Comixology Originals | The minimalistic art in each panel has a color chosen for the monochromatic colors with thick black inks. If you loved Darwyn Cooke’s Parker series, the art is reminiscent of those. The story draws you in immediately. There’s no slow build to a possession here. It’s in your face immediately. The Vatican has an island with a team of priests who try to get demons out of people (and animals). The priests are not immune to the possession of a demon. Issue 1 shows one of the priests “die,” but demons can use the dead like puppets for a short time. It’s long enough though to get from the island back to The Vatican in the body of Father Borra. Issue 2 brings a major event as archeologists uncover a cathedral to an evil being known as the Dancing Prince. Chris Matthews does a phenomenal job showing natural bodies even albeit demonic. Floppy parts and fat rolls. |
| Falling In Love on the Path to Hell | Gerry Duggan & Garry Brown (story & art), Chris O’Halloran (c), Joe Sabino (l), Elliott Gray (des), Virginia Duggan (ed), Rich Fowlks (prod artist) | Image Comics | MacRaith from 1877 LA and Asami from Japan die and get pulled into The Corpse Tide. They land on an inescapable “island” which is Purgatory. They have to fight the undead every night when the River Styx dries at sunset. TW: of course there’s man-on-man rape. |
| GI Joe ARAH 21: Silent Interlude | Larry Hama (story & breakdowns), Steve Leialoha (finishes), George Roussos (c), Denny O’Neil (ed), Jim Shooter (EIC) | Image Comics | A Real American Hero is the flagship title for the month of Silent Mission stories. Scarlet is captured by COBRA. I will note that of all the Silent Missions issues this one was harder to understand as a non-Joe reader. The others were fine not really knowing each character’s name. As a reprint, it would have been nice to have an intro page at the front. |
| GI Joe Silent Missions: Jinx | Dani, Dan Watters, Brad Simpson | Image Comics | using a bomb counting down as each page turns was a uniquely clever way to pace the story. This ninja clas in red (was that only to limit the palette to blue, red, and black because COBRA soldiers were also red?) plants a bomb inside an enemy hangar. |
| GI Joe Silent Missions: Spirit (& Freedom) | Leonardo Romero, Cris Peter | Image Comics | This silent issue uses the trope of a Native American being an exceptional tracker; perhaps he was trained his whole life for this. On a mission to rescue some foxes, Project 22 is discovered. A massive robot using animalistic programming or AI. |
| Gracie’s Ghost | Dawn Brown | Image | full review; The ghost assigned to Gracie notices she can’t catch a break. Her ghost reassures Gracie that things get better in life and to learn from the mistakes that she (the ghost) made when she was alive. |
| Hairology | anthology edited by Kat Calamia and Phil Falco and Jamila Rowser; lettering by Taylor Esposito; logo design by Lettersquids | Kickstarter | diverse short comic stories for people of all backgrounds |
| Huge Detective v1 | Adam Rose (w), Magenta King (a), Magenta King & Minimone (c), DC Hopkins (l), Dalts Dalton (epilogue art) | Titan | When I read the first issue, I was intrigued about the reawakening of giants in a human world. There’s still crime and a need for detectives for the humans and Huge alike. The mysterious disappearances of people of both kinds create a team up between Huge Detective Gyant and human Detective Tamaki. The story takes a twisted fairy tale turn. Unexpected but you get a happily ever after. |
| Kingpin: Running with the Devil #3 | Rosenberg, Torres, Laming, Boyd | Marvel | A miniseries I bought some time ago and never opened. It’s about a reporter that Wilson Fisk is trying to hire to write his book in order to show that he was a terrible gangster but is reformed. |
| Little Nightmares: Descent to Nowhere issue 1 | Lonnie Nadler, Dennis Menheere, Dave Lentz | Titan Comics | The artwork is dark and alluring; the story seems depressing with a main character who has “those” ideations. |
| Love Languages | James Albon | IDW/TopShelf | full review; It’s been quite some time since I’ve read a story that surprised and included romance. James Albon used vibrantly, loosely colored scenes filled with details about Sarah’s ex-pat British life in France when she meets Ping, a Hong Kong au pair. |
| MLP: The Sweetest Collection | various | IDW | There are days when you need to heal and My Little Pony comics will hopefully, always be there when you need them. |
| More Weight | Ben Wickey | Top Shelf Comix | full review; The drama and tragedies of families fighting causing the accusations in the first place was done well. Each character is unique visually. It’s noted at the end of a VERY long book that the creator is a descendant of Mary Easty, one of the accused. |
| Mothra 1-4 | The team managed to pull off a way to make time traveling necessary to keep Mothra alive with two new recruits to be the princesses. | ||
| Oyasumi: A Cat’s Purrpose | Kimmi and Geoffrey Legito Geelen | Kickstarter | I cried reading this book! |
| Patrick McDonnell | The Gift of Everything, The Gift of Nothing, Guardians of Being, Shelter Stories: Love. Guaranteed | Mutts.com | MUTTS picture books collecting the comic strips and others that stand alone like Shelter Stories are tender, sometimes heart-wrenching. |
| Pizza Witch | Sarah Graley | Image/Skybound | Fantastic, fun, has lots of adventure and conflicts with interpersonal relationships. |
| Poorcraft: (food on a budget) | Nero Villagallos O’Reilly; characters created by C. Spike Trotman | Iron Circus | A fantastic resource from 2021 that not only walks someone through how to grocery shop and organize a kitchen on a budget, but also has a lot of diverse ethnic recipes. |
| Psychic Investigators: Evil Exterminators | KT Healey (they) | IDW | full review; Gabe is close to his Tía (aunt) who lives with him and his mother. When his Tía dies, Gabe leans hard into something he shared with her–belief in the supernatural and spiritualism. Psychic Investigators: Evil Exterminators delivers characters who come from different backgrounds, beliefs, ages, and (if I’m right) the maps if neurodivergence and mental health. |
| Scary Godmother | Jill Thompson | Excellent puns. Whimsigoth galore. Extra attention to details: baking mitt is shaped like a crocodile; Boozle the ghostly cat spirit; Orsen and Hannah’s friendship; Hannah learns to be brave and responsible; Jimmy learns a lesson about being a bully; page numbers in the comics are inside skulls. | |
| School Bites: Cutting Class | Holly G | Broadsword Comics | It doesn’t matter if you’re a fairy, monster, or vampire – there’s high school drama. |
| Shadowplay: Midnight School | Sam Fonseca | Top Shelf | full review; It’s not often that a comic—in this case a fully contained OGN—or any book can bury its audience in such a quagmire of hopelessness that it is also able to pull them back out. |
| Spawn Universe Black Ritual the Book of Nyx | Thomas Healy (w), Nat Jones (a/c), Andworld Design (l) | Image Comics | A confusing place to jump-on. Set in NYC where Nyx has seen how she gets murdered. The Puritan is after her. |
| Street Sharks #1: Jawsome Justice | Stephanie Williams (w), Ariel Medel (a), Valentina Pinto (c), Jonathon Dobbso (color asst), Jeff Eckleberry (l), Nathan Widick (designer), Nicolas Niño (ed) | IDW | Silly and fun, for fans of the less philosophical versions of TMNT. Great for young readers in a TMNT pastiche. |
| Superguy | Anthony Iannaccio (w), Joey Murphy (a & l) | Kickstarter | An honest interpretation of how an average, crotchedy middle-aged man would be if he were also a superhero. |
| Thanksgiving | writer Mark Russell (X-Factor, Second Coming), artist Mauricet (Howl), letterer Rob Steen and publisher AHOY Comics | AHOY | Even serial killers have families |
| The Exorcism at 1600 Penn | Hannah Rose May (w), Vanesa Del Rey (a), Jordie Bellaire (c), Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou (l) | IDW | The layouts are creative which unfortunately can make it hard to follow the dialog. The pages change from color to black and white. |
| The Gift of Everything | Patrick McDonnell | Little Brown Young Readers | (technically a picture book) From the world of the MUTTS comic strip, Patrick McDonnell shows how Mooch (a cat) searches high and low to find the perfect gift for best friend Earl (a dog). Mooch learns an important lesson by the end that every moment spent with loved ones and observing the awe of the natural world make up the perfect gift. Those are the kinds of impactful gifts that show someone how special they are. |
| The Girl Who Draws on Whales | Ariela Kristantina (story & art), Sarah Stern (c), Bernardo Brice (l), Kassandra Starkell (designer), Will Dennis (ed) | Comixology | A beautifully visual hero’s journey about an island girl saving her people from genocide. She is helped by magical whales, a giant water serpent, giant sea turtles, a boy who was raised by the villain, and others. The coloring uniquely lays over delicate lines like wet on wet watercolors. There are occasional pages with a totally different folk art style. |
| The Mummy (UM) | Faith Erin Hicks, Lee Loughridge | Image/Skybound | Beautiful styling of 1920s Egypt with rich British colonizers excavating artifacts |
| TMNT 2024 relaunch 1-6 | Jason Aaron and many different art teams | IDW | As someone who never read nor watched TMNT, I was surprised at how interested I became in the first four issues where one brother would be highlighted. Donatello has clearly been through some shit. |
| Toddler-pocalypse | George O’Connor, Diana Porter, Alex Cormack, and many more | Kickstarter/ComixTribe | It’s not what you’d expect for a book with “toddler” in the title. |
| Trumpets of Death (Les trompettes de la mort) | Simon Bournel-Bosson, translated by Edward Gauvin | Lerner Graphic Universe | full review; Absolutely wonderful! |
| Usagi Yojimbo: The Crow v.40 | Stan Sakai | Dark Horse | As its own introduction states, you can jump-on any Usagi Yojimbo volume. I had been hearing about this series for years. I’ve noticed Sakai at cons. I know he and his books are legendary. Because of that, I had a fear that I would never understand it if I hadn’t been reading all those volumes for all these years. I love the balance of how characters like Usagi and his cousin Yukichi are noble samurai following a strict moral code; yet their friends are bounty hunters, Gen and “Stray Dog,” who appears selfish on the surface but are capable of growing and caring. This is especially true for Stray Dog who ends up guiding a young orphan criminal to a safe orphanage where he can get off the streets and be around children making a real family. It’s at the end we learn Stray Dog’s real name and his softer side. As for the villains, Jimmu & his crow are technically the Big Bad Guys, but they don’t get much time in the story. The antagonist is Inuyoshi, a crime boss who owes Usagi a favor. He is complex, showing both honor and cruelty. I like the emoticons showing when a character has died (there is real death even for something that looks so kid-friendly) and only one sliced off head more graphicly shown. |
| Vampires on Mars 1-4 | George O’Connor (w), Fernando Pinto (a), Ellie Wright (c), Justin Birch (l), James Emmett (ed) | Homeless Comics | Humans can’t make it to Mars, but vampires can. If you were on the crew, you would welcome this? |
| We’re Taking Everyone Down With Us issue 1 | Matthew Rosenberg (w), Stefano Landini (a), Roman Titov & Jason Wordie (c), Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou (l) | Image | Pulpy sci-fi with spies and a mad scientist |
| Where There’s Smoke, There’s Dinner | Jennifer Hayden | Top Shelf Comix | full review; A picture book for adults; There’s satire, honesty, judgment, and lots of self-deprecation that gently eases as she begins to be a kitchen witch. |
| You’ll Do Bad Things | Tyler Boss (w), Adriano Turtulici (a), Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou (l), Courtney Menard (ed), Dylan Todd (design) | Image | Artwork that sucks you in and a story of a writer haunted by his worst day; a mysterious serial killer enters the picture IRL. “He wants to write a story with a happy ending, but every time his fingers clack across the keyboard, it always ends in his character’s death. Worse yet? These tales of blood and barbarity that flow so freely from Seth’s mind are starting to happen in real life.” Set in NYC, each issue starts with a horrific slashing murder. Though there’s a B plot about the police investigation, author Seth losing his muse and ability to write anything other than murder is the A plot. Seth’s publisher is not coincidentally named “Charon,” like the ferryman of Hades. |
Founder and Editor-in-Chief of AmberUnmasked.com and Vodka O'Clock Podcast. Author of The Farrah Wethers Mysteries, comic book short stories, prose, and non-fiction. Cosplayer and figure model.