RER Wrapped

2025 in Books

Spotify Wrapped has gotten more and more unhinged – and I love it. This year, the app calculated your musical age (mine is mysteriously 79?) and assigned you a bizarre ‘listening club’ persona based on your listening habits, in addition to the usual top artists, number of minutes you’ve listened, etc. It’s all so arbitrary and silly but I have to say I do love remembering the moments I spent replaying certain songs like a maniac, singing in my car at the top of my lungs. It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, you know?

I thought it might be fun to take Wrapped and apply it to my year in reading (this week) and cooking (next installment). Some of the books I’ve written about here before, some I haven’t (and obviously I didn’t cover all of the books I read this year because that would be crazy). 2025 was yet another shit show, but the year in reading was pretty damn good. Books provided an incredible escape for me. May 2026 be less devastating but just as enriching in the literary dept.

2025 RER Wrapped: The Books Edition

Percentage of Books Written by Women: 86%

Books about Cranes: 1
My Life with Cranes by George W. Archibald

Translated Novels: 7
Nothing is Lost by Cloé Mehdi, translated from the French by Howard Curtis
Nothing Grows by Moonlight by Torborg Nedreaas, translated from the Norwegian by Bibbi Lee
On the Calculation of Volume I by Solvej Balle, translated from the Danish by Barbara J. Haveland
Voracious by Malgorzata Lebda, translated from the Polish by Antonia Lloyd-Jones
Sad Tiger by Neige Sinno, translated from the French by Natasha Lehrer
The Lover by Marguerite Duras, translated from the French by Barbara Bray
Butter by Asako Yuzuki, translated from the Japanese by Polly Barton

Short Stories/Essays: 4
Festival Days by Jo Ann Beard
The Odd Woman and the City by Vivian Gornick
Antarctica by Claire Keegan
Show Don’t Tell by Curtis Sittenfeld

Horny Books: 7
The Safekeep by Yael van der Wouden
The Lover by Marguerite Duras
The Line of Beauty by Alan Hollinghurst
Nova Scotia House by Charlie Porter
Vladimir by Julia May Jonas
Prep by Curtis Sittenfeld
Evenings & Weekends by Oisin McKenna

Books That Made Me Want to Poke My Eyes Out: 4
The Guest by Emma Cline
On the Calculation of Volume I by Solvej Balle
Nothing Grows by Moonlight by Torborg Nedreaas
Prep by Curtis Sittenfeld

Books That Moved Me: 22
Gilead by Marilynne Robinson
Heart the Lover by Lily King
Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver
The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver
Notes on Your Sudden Disappearance by Alison Espach
The Wedding People by Alison Espach
The Member of the Wedding by Carson McCullers
Nothing is Lost by Cloé Mehdi
Still Life by Sara Winman
Tell Me Everything by Elizabeth Strout
Voracious by Malgorzata Lebda
Log of the SS The Mrs Unguentine by Stanley Crawford
Sad Tiger by Neige Sinno
Annie John by Jamaica Kincaid
Address Unknown by Kathryn Kressman Taylor
The Line of Beauty by Alan Hollinghurst
Nova Scotia House by Charlie Porter
Empire of Pain by Patrick Radden Keefe
The Light of the World by Elizabeth Alexander
Whale Fall by Elizabeth O’Connor
The Parisian by Isabel Hammad
Festival Days by Jo Ann Beard

Books That Made Me Laugh: 8
Man at the Helm by Nina Stibbe
Happiness Forever by Adelaide Faith
Elizabeth and her German Garden by Elizabeth von Arnim
My Life with Cranes by George W. Archibald
The Wedding People by Alison Espach
The Odd Woman and the City by Vivian Gornick
Log of the SS The Mrs Unguentine by Stanley Crawford
Still Life by Sara Winman

Books About Weddings: 4
The Wedding People by Alison Espach
Three Days in June by Anne Tyler
Seating Arrangements by Maggie Shipstead
The Member of the Wedding by Carson McCullers

Audio Books: 3
I Regret Almost Everything by Keith McNally
Empire of Pain by Patrick Radden Keefe
The Parisian by Isabel Hammad

Books I Re-Read: 1
Gilead by Marilynne Robinson