Books of 2024 and 2025

The last two years have been a disaster, reading-wise. I blame Harry Potter! Since getting into that fandom, which is rife with excellent fic (by which I mean, stuff that’s excellent by tradpub standards), there’s not been a day when I didn’t read — fic. Consequently, there were far fewer days when I had time to read things other than fic. And little by little, my tolerance for fic that isn’t all that excellent increased, while my tolerance for tradpub stuff that isn’t super-gripping and/or relatable, decreased; so that nowadays, I read even such fic that rates below average on my personal quality scale, and struggle to finish regular books that would’ve given me no trouble a couple years back.

This is not ideal. As someone who considers themselves a writer, I need to drink from a much, much deeper pool of literature. And I’m trying! Just not very successfully. So far, I’ve finished 9 books this year; I dropped one, and I’m currently reading another. That’s really quite sad and does not bode well for my all-year totals. Last year was no better; I finished 10 books, plus one I dropped. In 2024, I finished 12 books, plus one I dropped. Of the 22 books in 2024 and 2025, 6 were the Harry Potter books. 🫠 And I am yet to finish the series! The last book remains, waiting its turn on my ever growing TBR list, even though I’m supposedly a fan? Incredible.

Anyway. Let’s do this.

Yuri!!! on Ice

Seven years after getting a heartfelt recommendation for this wonderful little series, and nearly ten years after its release, I finally watched it this January and fell in love with it so fast and so hard, it puts to shame all my previous fandoms.

I’ve grown used to having something to watch, so yesterday, I started watching Yuri on Ice, which I’ve known about forever. It’s very anime. But lovely!

Yuuri is a top Japanese figure skater who’s about to give up on his skating career after the huge disappointment of placing last in the Grand Prix Finals, when a video of his practice, where he skates the routine of his lifelong idol and crush, the reigning World Champion, Viktor Nikiforov, goes viral. Viktor sees it, falls in love with it, and offers to coach Yuuri. There’s a third character, another Yuri, only Russian, who’s madly jealous of these developments, and though he’s only 15, he turns into a fierce rival for Yuuri.

I’m amazed at how readily this… cartoon… stirred my feels, when Heated Rivalry, with all its many and indisputable wiles, just… didn’t.

January 4, 2026

I’ve been to Figure Skating World Championships in Prague!

A number of firsts are contained in that title:

My first time at a sports event
My first time watching figure skating live
My first time as a fan of real people
My first time posting about IRL things on this site

Ground Control

Penniless after leaving his family, Draco turns to smuggling to make ends meet. Harry buys weed from him, but can’t get high. That’s how it starts, anyway.

This story began as one of the several WIPs that have been marinating in the back of my mind for a very long time and it was in danger of never getting fully written. Many thanks to Poppy and to the organizers of the Santa is Coming trans charity event in the Drarry Pit for inspiring me to finish it! I ended up falling in love with it, and with our boys, all over again, and I hope you will, too. 🥰

Read here, or on AO3.

Dragon Age: The Veilguard

Several years back, when I saw the trailer for this game, I hastily concluded the Dragon Age series was over for me. The characters looked cartoon-like, the presentation hopelessly overstated and melodramatic, Varric had apparently turned into a brunet, and I just wanted nothing to do with any of it. Not even the occasional glimmer of Tumblr enthusiasm on my dash could tempt me. But then a friend talked me into getting the game during the winter sales, and once I started it, I could barely put it down.

Purple Plush

It’s not the first time some enterprising teenage vigilante planted a cursed object in Draco’s path, but none of the attempts so far have been quite so bizarre.

Written For Jungatheart as part of the winter holiday gift exchange over at the Drarry Creative Collective discord.

Read here or on AO3.