Cultural Wednesday
50+ Travel, Arts, Culture and London Life

Cultural Wednesday’s Best Books 2025

I love a good book. Fact or fiction it doesn’t matter. Here are my best books 2025. One of my great blogging joys in my summer and best book lists, together they make a comprehensive list of my favourite reads in 2025. Perfect present inspiration for bookworm in your life. My absolute best book of 2025? The Artist by Lucy Steeds which is in my Summer line up.

Some books were sent to me by publisher and others I paid for. I only ever review books that I enjoy.  Contains affiliate links, if you click on the blue words and buy a book from Bookshop.org I will get some money
Cultural Wednesday's Best Books 2005 graphic with six book covers behind. War Babies by Chris Manby, Upon a White House by Peter Ross, Two Roberts by Damian Barr, Poppy Girls by Kirsty Dougal, Twelve Days of Christmas by Susan Stokes Chapman and I Shop, Therefore I am by Mary Portas

Best Fiction Books 2025

Fiction I has taken me to Glasgow, Greece, Scarborough and New England and back in time to the Napoleonic and Second World Wars.

The Two Roberts by Damian Barr

Robert MacBryde set off for his first day at Glasgow School of Art after years of working in a shoe factory.  On the journey he met Robert Colquhoun also on his way to to to the Glasgow School of Art.  From then on they were inseparable.  They graduated top of their year.  Took the London art market by storm.  The Two Roberts by Damian Barr is a novel woven from the factor their lives.  I loved this tale.  It left me wanting to see their work. By happy coincidence you can see Robert MacBryde and Robert Colquhoun: Artists, Lovers, Outsiders at Charleston in Lewes until 12 April 2026. 

The Poppy Girls by Kirsty Dougal

Carrie, Sarah and Mabel are on the cusp of going to University.  World War Two starts in between the end of school and the start of university.  As the Dunkirk evacuation and bombing of London starts the girls need to stay close to home.  Set in the Poppy Factory in Richmond, a fascinating insight into place where Remembrance poppies are made. 

Queen Esther by John Irving

Confession time.  I have never read a novel by John Irving.  Until this autumn.  Queen Esther is a sort of prequel to Cider House Rules featuring the St Cloud Orphanage.  Queen Esther is one of the orphans and the story follows her and sons.  Second confession, I found it hard going.  Not sure if that is because I have not read Cider House Rules.  Maybe I should now read some vintage John Irving about which many people rave and see what I have been missing.  

Old Girls Go Greek by Maddie Please

Maddie Please writes excellent, sunny, optimistic books about women in their 60’s embracing life.  In Old Girls Go Greek we meet Meg Foster who is emerging from divorce, has moved to the countryside and joined an art group.  A space opens up on the group’s painting trip to Greece and Meg decides to join them.  

The Twelve Days of Christmas by Susan Stokes Chapman

Not just for Christmas.  Susan Stokes Chapman takes the Twelve Days of Christmas and weaves a tale. Set in the Bridgerton era it is a delight of snow, balls and touch of mystery.  Heartwarming and perfect read on dark nights. 

Deadly Dancing at the Seaview Hotel by Glenda Young

Scarborough is drenched in childhood and teenage memories for me. It is always a joy to revisit either in real life or via fiction. Deadly Dancing at the Seaview Hotel by Glenda Young is the fourth cosy crime novel set at the Seaview in Scarbrough.  A whodunnit featuring ballroom dancing and spray tans all set on the North Yorkshire coast. As with all the others I consumed in one sitting. Excellent sparkly cosy crime.

Best non fiction books 2025

The A1, my parents generation, shopping, neolithic sites, female artists, statue of women and accessible marketing are the subjects of my best non fiction books 2025.

The History of Art In One Sentence by Verity Babbs

Does what it says on the tin in an informative and funny way. If you have ever wondered what makes Baroque, baroque and not Rococo? Or how Op Art and Pop Art are related then this is for you.  All beautifully illustrated and presented in a neat pocket sized book. 

The North Road by Rob Cowen

Ancient pathways fascinate me.  Drovers paths.  Roman Roads. Canals.  Rivers. Most entrancing of all the paths to me is the A1.  I have lived along it.  My grandparents lived on it.  I have driven or been driven along it times without count. So The North Road by Rob Cowen was irresistible to me.  Rob and his family have also lived their lives alongside the A1.  The North Road is my kind of book.  Part history, part travelogue, part pyscho-geography and part fiction.  My only disappointment?  He didn’t mention the glimpse that you got of the row of poplar trees in my grandparents garden just outside Wetherby.  Now I write that sentence I realise that we probably couldn’t see the actual trees and that it was something that my parents said once and then became a thing.  

War Babies by Chris Manby and Simon Robinson 

My parents were both born in the 1930s.  That means that much of their childhood was dominated by World War II.  No sweets. Tape on the windows.  Bomb shelters.  Friends and relations killed both at home and abroad.  Much as been written abut parents generation who fought and kept the home fires burning but very little about the the children who grew up under the shadow of war.  War Babies by Chris Manby and Simon Robinson does just that.  Each chapter takes about one aspect of war; evacuation, bomb shelters, disrupted education, bereavement and then has the first person testimony of a person who experienced those things as a child.  Brilliant buy it to read yourself and as a present for someone who grew up during the war.

Mrs Kauffman and Madame Le Brun by Fanny Moyle

Earlier this year I was transfixed by a painting by Elizabeth Vigee Le Brun, Marie Antoinette’s favourite artist in a selection of paintings from the Barber Institute currently on show at the Courtauld Gallery. So I was unable to resist when I saw Mrs Kauffman and Madame Le Brun by Fanny Moyle.  It is a lavishly illustrated book that tells the story of the two wildly successful 18th century painters.  They both briefly lived in Rome at the same time and became friends.  A fascinating glimpse into the world at the time of the French Revolution.  If you fancy seeing the work of Angelica Kaufman the National Portrait Gallery has a fine selection of her portraits.  You can come face to face with Madame Le Brun either at the Courtauld or the National Gallery.

I Shop, Therefore I Am by Mary Portas

Back in the day lunch on 5th Floor of Harvey Nicholls was a favourite way to launch the weekend. I Shop, Therefore I am by Mary Portas bought memories of those lunches flooding back.  Mary was the woman who shook up not only the window displays at Harvey Nichols but was also part of the team that made the store THE place to shop.  I Shop, Therefore I am tells the story of Mary’s Harvey Nicks years.  A highly enjoyable glimpse behind the scenes of a 90s icon.

Upon a White Horse by Peter Ross

Peter Ross writes fabulous that books that I would like to have written myself and have adored reading.  So far he has written about graveyards and churches. In Upon a White Horse he journeys around Ancient Britain.  We walk round standing stones.  Marvel at Stonehenge.  Trot alongside chalk horses. Another book I would have loved to have written and adored reading.   Next time I would like him to write about the ancient pathways that criss cross Britain.  Drovers paths.  Roman Roads. Ley lines … just in case he reads this. https://tidd.ly/4nGLUSj

London’s Statues of Women by Juliet Rix

Back in 2021 one in six of all London’s statues were depicted women.  Things are a little bit better now. London’s Statues of Women by Juliet Rix is an excellent guide to statues depicting women in London.  There are many photos along with descriptions and potted histories of the women.  An excellent book to make plans for London jaunt.  

The Smart Marketers Guide to Digital Accessibility by Sassy Wyatt

Have you ever wondered what “Alt Text” means?  It is a decription of an online image.  You won’t see it if you are scrolling social media or reading an internet page ordinarily.  If, however, you were using a screen reader to “see” the pages, Alt Text would provide a description of what the image shows.  That makes the world of difference to a blind or partially sighted reader.  All this and more is laid out in The Smart Marketers Guide to Digital Accessibility.  Sassy is a travel journalist, Accessibility consultant and blind.  She knows of what she writes.  Her guide spells out how we can all be more inclusive and how being so benefits us all, not just the blind and partially sighted.  

These are Cultural Wednesday’s Best Books 2025, what have been your favourite books of the year?

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