It should be noted as the first thing in this post that I am not doing this again this year. There are a few states that have got harder and harder each year to find something that I want to read for them and every year there are books I end up carrying on with that I’m not enjoying so that I can tick the state off. And this feeds into the next issue: the last two months of the year always turn into a mad rush to get things finished – rather than reading what I fancy. And this is when I end up reading those books that I’m not enjoying so that I can get to the end.
But more importantly I find myself thinking about whether I should read x book now or save it to be a state for next year because I’ve already ticked that state off this year. Sometimes that’s the next book in a series, sometimes it’s a new arrival altogether. I’d even already started a chart for 2026 with the things I had in stock and which states they match to. Add to that the fact that with Beverly Jenkins’ Blessings series seemingly complete and I’m nearly at end of the Cupcake Bakery Series and I’m out Kansas and Arizona and it just makes me feel tired thinking about it.
It’s also one too many things to do – I can try and reduce the to-read pile and I can try and reduce the NetGalley backlog, but I can’t do those two *and* read 50 states and the 50 states is the thing I enjoy least. So it’s going and that’s my New Year’s Reading Resolution. That said, here is the final 2025 list, which I completed at 1.30 in the morning of the 28th – a few days earlier than usual but some of these read with much suffering on my part when I would rather have given up on them.
| Alabama | Murder Boogies with Elvis by Anne George |
| Alaska | Any Trope But You by Victoria Lavine* |
| Arizona | Strawberried Alive by Jenn McKinlay |
| Arkansas | The Murder at the Murder at the Mimosa Inn by Joan Hess |
| California | The Favourites by Layne Fargo |
| Colorado | Dark Tort by Diane Mott Davidson |
| Connecticut | Word to the Wise by Jenn McKinlay |
| Delaware | New Uses for Old Boyfriends by Beth Kendrick |
| Florida | Ghost Business by Jen DeLuca |
| Georgia | Innconvenient Murder by Patti Benning |
| Hawaii | The George Eliot Murders by Edith Skol |
| Idaho | Animal Attraction by Jill Shalvis |
| Illinois | A Farewell to Yarns by Jill Churchill |
| Indiana | A Dark and Twisting Path by Julia Buckley |
| Iowa | Iced in Iowa by Patti Benning |
| Kansas | Calling all Blessings by Beverly Jenkins |
| Kentucky | Beaches, Bungalows and Burglaries by Tonya Kappes |
| Louisiana | To Catch a Raven by Beverly Jenkins |
| Maine | Scared Off by Barbara Ross |
| Maryland | Finders Keepers by Sarah Adler |
| Massachusetts | White House by the Sea by Kate Storey |
| Michigan | Oh Say Can You Fudge by Nancy CoCo |
| Minnesota | Show Don’t Tell by Curtis Sittenfeld |
| Mississippi | Double Knot by Gretchen Archer |
| Missouri | Big Shot by Julie Mulhern |
| Montana | Wish You Were Here by Jess K Hardy* |
| Nebraska | Fangirl the Manga Vol 4 by Rainbow Rowell and Gabi Nam |
| Nevada | A Disguise to Die For by Diane Vallere |
| New Hampshire | A Killer Edition by Lorna Barrett |
| New Jersey | Tastes like Shakkar by Nisha Sharma |
| New Mexico | The Pot Thief Who Studied Ptolemy by J Michael Orenduff |
| New York | Deadly Summer Nights by Vicki Delany |
| North Carolina | The Fiance Dilemma by Elena Armas |
| North Dakota | Murder at the Library by Ellen Jacobson |
| Ohio | The Chow Maniac by Vivien Chien |
| Oklahoma | The Vanderbeekers on the Road by Karina Yan Glaser |
| Oregon | Murder on the Mountain by Ellie Alexander |
| Pennsylvania | Renewing Forever by Kelly Jensen* |
| Rhode Island | A Matter of Pedigree by Leslie Meier* |
| South Carolina | The Art of Catching Feelings by Alicia Thompson |
| South Dakota | My Calamity Jane by Cynthia Hand, Brodi Ashton and Jodi Meadows |
| Tennessee | Taylor’s Version by Stephanie Burt* |
| Texas | Death of a Cheerleader by Marina Evans* |
| Utah | The One with the Kiss Cam by Cindy Steel |
| Vermont | Six Sweets Under by Sarah Fox |
| Virginia | Rockin’ Around the Chickadee by Donna Andrews |
| Washington | Buried in a Good Book by Tamara Berry |
| Washington DC | Buffalo West Wing by Julie Hyzy |
| West Virginia | The Listeners by Maggie Stiefvater |
| Wisconsin | Fear of Frying by Jill Churchill |
| Wyoming | Savage Run by C J Box |
And as this is the last time, here’s a link back to all the lists from previous years: 2024, 2023, 2022, 2021 and 2020, that last one reminding me that this was a pandemic era development and like so many things from the annus horribilis that was 2020 we can quietly let it go. This isn’t quite the last thing you’ll hear about the 50 states – there’s definitely a Recommendsday coming for some of these, but also there’s a bunch of books in series on here that I’m sure you’ll hear more about at some point too.
Verity Reads Books (lots of them) 
A challenge that becomes a chore sounds like one that it’s time to let go of. Well done for completing it over the past few years though.
That’s exactly it – and why I stopped doing the Read Harder challenge back in the day as well. I’m starting to wonder if I’m not a reading challenge person because the aim is always to get the to-read pile down, and it never really seems to work because the pile never complete all the sections of the challenge so I end up buying more!
That’s why I like low key challenges when it doesn’t really matter if you complete them or not. I like the fact that books push me to read things that I might not have done but not having to buy any more books. My non fiction reader is always focused heavily on what I can find in the library.