Mid Year Book Freak Out Tag 2025

Hello everyone. Welcome to Bibliophilia Book Reviews and today I’m going to be talking about my Mid-Year Freak Out Tag for 2025. Like last year, I’m going to talk about all the books that apply to the prompt, not just one. I have already talked about each of these books in my monthly wrap ups so, for the sake of not repeating myself, I will talk about them very briefly here. 

1. Best books

One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez

This book is about the genealogy of the Buendía family, whose lineage is irrevocably tied to the town they live in. Macondo is in its zenith when the Buendía line is at its most fertile and healthy and at its nadir when the Buendías are dying and almost extinct. I loved this book.

City of Thieves by David Benioff

Set during the siege of Leningrad in September 1941, Lev Beniov sets out to find a dozen eggs for a wedding cake. It being a siege, there are of course no eggs in Leningrad. Food is more valuable than gold during a war, and this book reminds us of that lesson.  After being arrested for looting the dead body of a German, Lev is taken to the commander of the Red Army and tasked to find the eggs. But, in order to find them, Lev and his companion, Kolya, a Russian Army deserter, must cross the enemy line.

Daughters of Victory by Gabriella Saab

This book has two timelines: the first is set in the years during the Russian Revolution, after the tsar abdicates the throne, and the immediate civil war between the political parties in Russia vying for power. The main character is a member of the Socialist party and she is fighting to prevent Lenin and the Bolshevik party from seizing power. Lenin, however, is protected by an elusive assassin known as Orlova and she is killing anyone and everyone standing in Lenin’s way to the top. So Svetlana sets out to kill her. The second timeline is set years later during the Siege of Leningrad in 1941 when the Germans attack Russia, and Mila, Svetlana’s granddaughter, falls under the spell of the Resistance movement.

Y Julia Retó A Los Dioses by Santiago Posteguillo

This is the second volume of the Julia Domna duology written by the Spanish author Santiago Posteguillo. Julia Domna was the wife of the Roman Emperor Septimius Severus and she ruled alongside her husband as the first empress of the Severan dynasty from 193 to 211. The first book Yo, Julia (I, Julia) is about Julia’s ascent to power; about her determination to create a dynasty after Commodus death, the last emperor of the Antonine dynasty and who died without an heir. The second book Y Julia Retó A Los Dioses (And Julia Challenged The Gods) is the story of Julia’s descent. Frankly, this book is a little sad because I was watching everything Julia had fought so hard for all her life fall apart in a matter of seconds. It also brought home that without a husband, a woman couldn’t do anything in Ancient Rome. Nonetheless, I still liked this duology very much. 

An Ember In The Ashes by Sabaa Tahir

I first read this book in 2016-2017 and didn’t like it very much. In fact, I was tempted to DNF it several times. I was not a fan of the female protagonist and of the fact that it was shock full of tropes. However, I did like the male protagonist. I tried to read it again around 2020, during the pandemic, and couldn’t get into it again so I put it back on my shelves again. Five years later, I picked it up again, read it, and loved it! I believe that when you cannot finish a book, it is because it is not the right time for you to read it. And this book is a prime example of that.

The Guns of August by Barbara W. Tuchman

Originally published in 1962, this landmark, Pulitzer Prize winning account of WWI recreates the first month of the war. Today, it is the most famous book about WWI. The bungled diplomacy between the Central and Allied Powers, Tuchman states, is what caused the war, and the result was four years of trench warfare.

The Sleepwalkers: How Europe Went To War in 1914 by Christopher Clark

How did WWI begin? This is the question that Christopher Clark sets out to answer in this book. The author sets out to lay out the facts that led to World War I. And those facts start in Serbia and with the Serbs. Originally published in 2012, The Sleepwalkers has become one of the first books about WWI that connoisseurs and scholars recommend reading about the topic, and I agree. I highly recommend it.

Animal Farm by George Orwell

Animal Farm by George Orwell is an allegory of Bolshevik Russia leading to Stalin’s rise in power. The premise of this book is that if you have control of the military, police, and the press you can basically do whatever you want. The unintelligence of the masses also contributes to keep to tyrant on the top. This is scary, and something that is still relevant today. Sometimes it is easier to believe the lies we are being fed than the facts, the reality that you don’t want to face. And people will deliberately blind themselves in order not to do that. That is why I think that this book is very prescient and speaks a lot about the politics going on today. I highly recommend it.

2. Best sequels

A Torch Against The Night by Sabaa Tahir

This is the second book in the An Ember in the Ashes series by Sabaa Tahir and it picks up right after the end of the first book, with Elias and Laia running for their lives. In this book, Helene also becomes a point-of-view character. Torn between her love for Elias and her love for her family, Helene soon realizes that she has been sent on a goose chase just to get her out of the city and out of the way of the Commandant’s (and the Nightbringer’s) true intentions.

The pacing of this book doesn’t slow down from that of the first installment, and the author does a very good job at keeping you at the edge of your seat wanting to figure out what happens next. The stakes get higher and higher, and I liked that. 

3. Recent release you haven’t read yet, but want to

The Will Of The Many by James Islington

I’ve heard a lot of good things about this book. So, let’s see if I like it. I already bought my copy.

The Odyssey by Homer, Translated by Daniel Mendelsohn

This is the most recent translation of The Odyssey and it has received very good reviews. I will take this with a grain of salt, however, because I have thought that I would love a new translation of Homer’s epics based on raving reviews before and proved wrong. So, let’s see how I like it.

4. Biggest disappointments

Bruno, Chief of Police series

Though I liked the first book in this series well-enough, I was disappointed by the following two installments and DNF’d it in April. This is sad because I really wanted to love this.

Say You’ll Remember Me by Abby Jimenez

This is probably my biggest disappointment of the year. I usually really like Abby Jimenez’s books, but this one was not good. I DNF’d it after the umpteenth reference to Rhysand from ACOTAR.

The Iliad by Homer, translated by Emily Wilson

I couldn’t finish this translation of The Iliad by Homer. If you’ve been reading my posts for a while, you know that The Iliad is one of my favorite books of all time. And when this translation came out last year, it received tons and tons of raving reviews. So I bought a copy. But when I finally picked it up, I was bored and falling asleep. In wanting to make the poem clearer for younger audiences, the author dispenses with all the beauty of the language and makes it too simple. However, I do recommend it for high school students and encourage them to pick this one up if it makes them love the poem like I do. Some people actually do need a simpler language, I recognize that. This one is just not the translation for me.

5. Biggest surprises

Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert

I couldn’t get into this book when I first tried to read it in my early twenties. And I wouldn’t have picked it up again if it hadn’t been for one of my book clubs. This was the book we read in March. I did not love it, but Emma’s story got to me more than I thought it would and now I understand why this book has had the impact in world literature that it has had.

Animal Farm and 1984 by George Orwell

I was not expecting to like George Orwell honestly. I picked both of these books up for one of my book clubs, and originally, I was not going to read them at all. I do not read dystopian novels much, if at all, and I genuinely thought that I was not going to like them. But I have been reading a lot about the world wars lately and decided to give them a chance. And I loved them. Does this mean that I am more open to reading dystopian novels now? Not really. I think these two were gems in sea of rocks but I cannot say that with too much certainty. I am fully aware that there might be another that I love as much. So maybe? Not sure.

6. New favorite author(s)

George Orwell. Orwell’s writing hooked me from the start. And that was definitely a surprise. I thought I wasn’t going to like Animal Farm and 1984.

7. Newest fictional crush

Unfortunately I do not have a fictional crush this time around.

8. Newest favorite character(s)

Julia Domna. She was a very intelligent, strong-willed, and determined woman. She was also clever; she knew what was going to happen before anybody else did. By studying the history of Rome assiduously, by watching what was happening in politics during her lifetime, by reasoning about men’s lust of power and behavior, she predicted the future and was prepared for it. She was a role model for other women.

9. Books that made you cry

I don’t think I read a book that made me cry this time.

10. Book that makes you happy/laugh

The Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer. The Miller’s Tale, for example, is hilarious. I said earlier that sometimes what we need to love a dense work of literature like The Iliad and The Canterbury Tales is a simpler and cleaner translation. And while this did not work for me with The Iliad, a book that I have read ad nauseum, it did work for me with The Canterbury Tales. Peter Ackroyd’s retelling is superb.

11. Most beautiful book I’ve read

I think that the most beautiful book I have read in these past six months is Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert. The covers of the paperback editions of An Ember in the Ashes are simple but very pretty as well.

12. Books I want to finish

I want to finish An Ember in the Ashes; as of now, I still have to read Books 3 and 4 in this series. I also want to finish Moby Dick by Herman Melville. I will confess that this is one of those books that you want to read but are too afraid to pick up for me. I have heard a lot of good things, but also that it has more information about whales that a lot of readers care for. I’m currently 31% into it.

13. Books I did not like

The Madonnas of Leningrad by Debra Dean

This book is written in third person present tense, and I am not a big fan of this combination. However, in this book it does work a little. The main character is an elderly woman with Alzheimer’s, and third person present tense is used to relate her memories as a young woman in Russia working as a tour guide in the Heritage Museum during the war. This point of view gives those memories, which will eventually be relevant in the current timeline when she is older and sick, some immediacy and urgency. And I think that this is very well done. Still, I didn’t love the book. The ending is rather lackluster and the way the author joins the two timelines together at the end is wanting.  But I did enjoy the passages in which Marina steps into the rooms of her memory palace and describes the art displayed on their walls. I’d never read a book in which art is so prominent like this but the story itself didn’t have the impact I thought it would. 

It’s Getting Hot In Here by Jane Costello

Unfortunately, I didn’t like this book very much. Although, I wanted to like it. The story itself isn’t bad, and the protagonist is hilarious but she is the one carrying the weight of the story. The male protagonist, on the other hand, is flat. And I mean cardboard flat. This makes the romance, in turn, stale and boring. There is no fire. I also didn’t like how the book repeatedly highlights the stereotype that says women going through perimenopause are too old to find love. Finally, the ending was very lackluster and disappointing.

The Sound And The Fury by William Faulkner

This book is about the fall of the Compson family, which itself symbolizes the fall of mankind depicted in the Bible. It is divided in four parts that overlap, interweave, and jump around in time. The book also explores complex themes of family, race and the decay of the Old South, something that if you’re not familiar with, can also make the novel very difficult for readers to grasp; particularly to those, like me, who didn’t grow up in the United States. I was not fan.

Brave New World by Aldous Huxley

Personally, I did not like this book. I get, however, why it is included in lists of classic literature books you need to or should read. Today, society seeks an existence centered on comfort or pleasure as a goal in life, and this hedonistic existential pursuit in life is exactly what Huxley is criticizing. But no matter well he criticizes it, that doesn’t mean I have to like it and I didn’t.

That is all for this year’s mid-year book freak out tag. I hope you enjoyed it.