2025 Ins and Outs

Chapter #38: Welcome to my year of "zest" 🍊

Feeling My Shelf is a newsletter about books, life, and, well, life with books. Grab your favorite caffeinated beverage and get comfy. First up, some recent reads.

I Am The Dark That Answers When You Call by Jamison Shea
My last read of 2024: This twisted, dark fantasy picks up two months after former ballerina Laure embraced the "beast" within her —which resulted in the collapse of the Palais Garnier and the death of her former childhood best friend. She’s now forced to face an evil threatening to consume everything she cares about but spends a lot of time (almost too much time, tbh) adjusting to her new status as a vessel for demon entity Acheron (aka the beast within her.) It starts off slow, then picks up and delivers a satisfying ending. I didn’t enjoy it as much as the first book, but it’s still a worthy conclusion to I Feed Her to the Beast and the Beast is Me.

Hardly Strangers by A.C. Robinson
This was my first read of the year, and it could be summed up with, “Well, that escalated quickly.” Shera and Max meet by chance one night at the bar. They banter a bit before Shera’s date (who later ditches her) arrives. Then Max invites her back to his place, and a lot happens. Everything felt chaotic and rushed, the complete opposite of a slow burn (the bane of my existence), though admittedly, at times, it felt like too much. It was thoroughly entertaining, steamy, and a bit unbelievable, but by the end, I was a fan of Shera and Max (even if they are both a bit…um…out there.)

introducing — my 2025 word of the year

A far cry from champagne and confetti, I rang in the new year with a matcha latte surrounded by scraps of paper and magazine clippings from the previous night’s solo vision board party.

When the shock of it being twenty-freaking twenty-five wore off, I threw on a comfy orange sweater and headed out of my apartment in search of food, delightfully landing on fluffy soufflé pancakes from Flippers. The rest of the day was spent assembling said magazine clippings into a collage that holds my deepest desires for the year, painting my nails as I watched Living Single, reading, and making a last-minute visit to Studs for an impromptu piercing. (I promise to stop impulse buying this year, but I needed one last hurrah!)

a chill way to start the year!

My emotions were all over the place in 2024. Men had me spiraling. Work had me spiraling. Little things had me spiraling. Just a lot of spiraling, okay? So, this year, I want to lean heavily into ZEST🍊—aka my word of the year! It’s more than just the outer peel of a citrus fruit. It’s also a call to do things with enthusiasm and good energy. Laugh. Experience joy. And above all, to prioritize me. I may have forgotten last year, but this is the Alexis show, and it’s time to act like the main character. Channel my inner Spice Girl (but with citrus) and zest up my life.

That said, here are my ins and outs for the year, in no particular order.

Some of my other goals for the year (there are 25 total, because why not?) include:

1. Rediscovering my “zest” for writing. Embracing the fun, awkward, messy parts of creating and fighting the urge to toss things out at the first sign of imperfection.

2. Making an orange dessert from scratch. Born to bake, forced to work. I'm unsure what kind of citrus dessert this will be, so I'm taking all recommendations.

3. Reading a book turning 25 in ‘25. So many good ones were published in 2000! The Princess Diaries by Meg Cabot. White Teeth by Zadie Smith.

4. Becoming a runner and becoming a morning person with a better morning routine. I’ve tried both things before. Maybe at least one habit will actually stick this time.

As usual, many great new books are coming out this year, including Jasmine Guillory’s first sapphic romance, a story about the woman who ignited the Harlem Renaissance, and Emily Henry’s Great Big Beautiful Life. While I’m excited to read them all, I'm most ready for the titles below.

• The Dream Hotel: A Novel by Laila Lalami (March 4): “A riveting and utterly original novel about one woman's fight for freedom, set in a near future where even dreams are under surveillance.”

• Francine’s Spectacular Crash and Burn by Renee Swindle (April 15): “Francine Stevenson's chance encounter with a ten-year-old who shows up at her doorstep after her mother's sudden death spirals into an adventure for the ages.”

• Can't Get Enough by Kennedy Ryan (May 13): Hendrix, a self-proclaimed "rich auntie," (and fan favorite from the previous books!) navigates a budding yet forbidden romance with tech mogul Maverick Bell.

• Coded Justice by Stacey Abrams (July 15): Another Avery Keene novel! This time, following her “down a dark rabbit hole into the breathtaking--and dangerous--use of AI in the medical industry.”

With one fiction read already under my belt, I’m pivoting to non-fiction. Unruly: A Guide to Reclaiming Your True Self by Shelah Marie is a self-help book that “invites you to build a life where no part of yourself is left behind.”

The 10 best romance novels of 2024, according to EW. The cookbook club Is the new dinner party. Speaking of which…here are some great cookbooks to add to your collection. This was the moment when I realized I hadn’t read any of Barack Obama’s favorite 2024 books. How co-writing a book threatened the Carters’ marriage. The best self-help books for personal growth in 2025.

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