Is it ever too late for a monthly recap post? Not in my blog. This is the recap for the last month of 2025, the final piece in my month in books entry for that year. Unlike other winter months, December was hectic, as it always has been — what with the almost-weekly (sometimes more than once) events hounding my days: birthdays, friend gatherings, holidays, and my much awaited Porto trip. I was surprised that I was able to slip in some reading time, to be honest. Reading has always been a beloved hobby of mine, but when life gets in the way, I will always choose being present and living it. Despite that, reading will forever be a respite from when life gets too hard or too overwhelming. And I am glad to be able to access the comfort that this brings whenever I need it.
My December in Books
This December, I read 4 books:
- The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna – 4.5/5☕
- Death and Dinuguan (Tita Rosie’s Kitchen Mystery, #6) by Mia P. Manansala – 3/5☕
- Glucose Revolution: The Life-Changing Power of Balancing You Blood Sugar by Jessie Inchauspé – 4/5☕
- Winter: The Story of Season by Val McDermid – 4/5☕
Let’s start with the last of my witchy reads: The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches. I was pretty late to this party as I remember a time when it was all over my feed and everyone was reading it. It was charming as advertised and I really liked how the story turned out. I also love the idea of regular witches living among people without magic, and how Mika (the protagonist) was able to hide in plain sight — without even trying (she posts videos online ‘pretending’ to be a witch). I didn’t really care too much about the romance here, for some reason, and the reveal by the end was predictable, but a happy one. I quite liked it. The main thing that irked me when I was listening to it (audiobook) was Jamie’s accent, which is definitely not a Belfast one. A small thing, and I can’t believe I am this person now lol.
Next up is Mia P. Manansala’s Death and Dinuguan, the sixth and FINAL instalment of Tita Rosie’s Kitchen Mystery. I’ve been following along this series since the first book’s publication (Arsenic and Adobo) in 2021, and now, here we are: I can’t believe this is the end. I admit that one of the major reasons I continued with this series was because I feel sentimental towards it; despite everything, it is still so nice to be able to recognize familiar parts of yourself in books, even if it is viewed in a Fil-Am lens. This book is comfort, and anything Filipino will always feel like home, especially when done right. I was a bit sad that the last instalment was a bit underwhelming but I still quite enjoyed the whole series as a whole. The thing about sticking out for a book series is that you get into a familiar cadence as soon as all the recurring characters and places pop out of the pages. This is always a joy when it happens.
The third in this list is Glucose Goddess, a non fiction book about glucose and how to balance it out. If you’re not familiar with her Instagram (@glucosegoddess), I highly recommend it. This book is a condensed version of it: an informative take on glucose and how it affects a lot of things, even those that we don’t know about or expect. This book also presented 10 easy hacks to do in order to start balancing your glucose and making it work for you. You can probably check online for it and you’ll see them summarized but the way this book was presented and and written was worth buying this one. It also has recipes included, so that’s 2-in-1. I love how Jessie writes: to-the-point and simple. I also like the addition of graphs to properly demonstrate how specific foods affect one’s glucose spikes. I am a person that likes to know the why and how of things before I can actually implement anything effectively so this is very useful to me. This is very much data-driven, even if a relatively small sample size was used, the results of the experiments in this book are undeniably important. I was listening to this during my gym sessions and bought a physical copy to annotate and tab so I can remember easily. There are definitely a lot of things from here that I want to start implementing in my diet slowly. Note that while different food can affect each person differently, all of it might not be applicable to one person, so it’s better to exercise caution when you try it out.
And the last book of 2025, Winter by Val McDermid — a seasonal book that I brought with me to Portugal during my end-of-year vacation. At each turn of the solstice/equinox, I try to select and read at least one seasonal book. It adds a lot to how I experience the seasons and it is a tradition that I’ve cherished since I started it. Winter was great, and it being a non-fiction is a definite plus. Pages after pages of lush descriptions and wonderful illustrations (by Philip Harris), one could get a good sense of how much this season means to McDermid. Memories and reflections on living and a childhood whose winters were spent surrounded by the frozen Scottish landscape (which, btw, what a place to grow up in!). I read this all through my Porto trip which turned out to be very sunny, so it was hard to reconcile with the cold, hard, and grey winters described in the book. But it was still very nice to sit in a café and enjoy the syrup-slow comfort that is this book.
This passage in particular struck a chord with me, a quiet meditation on a season that seemed slow but demands a lot from us:
Winter makes greater demands on us. We’re muffled up in woolly jumpers and big boots, raincoats are never enough to keep us warm for long, and we lose the light so quickly that even simples pleasures liker a woodland walk are constrained by the early dark. Rain, snow, fog, ice, drizzle and bitter winds conspire against our best intentions. That’s why we embrace whatever excess we can find.
Glad to have finished 2025 strong with this. ✨
What’s next?
Of course there’s the yearly tradition: my year in books! I am already currently drafting it. But in the meantime, please enjoy my last year’s take: My 2024 in Books + Top 10 Reads of the Year & 2025 Reading Resolutions. See you in the next post! 😊
Other Month in Books posts for 2025: Q1 | Q2 and Mid-Year Check-In | Q3 | October & November
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