My monthly intention is to read a minimum of five books on a variety of topics from different genres. I hope that you’ll enjoy seeing what I read in September of 2025. As always, if you click on the title, you’ll go to the longer post on MORE TO COME.

---

The Black Swan Mystery (1960; English translation 2024) by Tetsuya Ayukawa (the pen name of Toru Nakagawa) is an alibi-deconstruction mystery of the first order. One morning railway workers find the body of a well-dressed, middle aged man just outside of Kuki Station in Saitama Prefecture, shot dead. “Such an impressive mustache . . . what a waste,” one of them says. It turns out that the victim is the much-hated owner of a local mill who is involved in a labor dispute. It seems that everyone in Gosuke Nishinohata’s orbit—including the labor union and a new religious sect—harbored ill feelings for the man, or worse. When the initial investigative team hits a dead end the decision is made to bring in an expert, Inspector Onitsura, who has a special skill at unraveling difficult schemes. Onitsura and his trusty assistant Tanna crisscross Japan, taking trains to track down leads and stay one step ahead of the killer, who strikes again and again in this first-rate addition to the railway mystery genre.

---

Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life (1994; Vintage Books Edition 2019) by Anne Lamott is worth reading even if you are not a professional or serious writer. If you’ve ever wanted to write, this funny, wise, at times cranky, and insightful work is full of wisdom that can support your journey. Lamott encourages her readers and students to get off their duffs, look around, explore, and then write about it. Good writing is about telling the truth, Lamott asserts, and this work is full of truth telling for the aspiring writer.

---

Sex of the Midwest: A Novel in Stories (2025) by Robyn Ryle begins as the residents of Lanier, Indiana (population 12,234) wake up to discover an email in their inbox inviting them to participate in a study of sexual practices. The town is soon abuzz (as small towns often are) trying to figure out how Lanier was chosen and who wrote the email. A legendary basketball coach is convinced the e-mail and the epidemic of STDs at the junior high are both part of the moral decline of the town, and although he has to drag around an oxygen tank he sets out for action. The bartender at the Main Street Bar finds that the email brings back fear of a midlife crisis. A town employee who likes to follow the rules is surprised to find where life’s pathway takes her after receiving the email. “Street by street and house by house, the e-mail opens up the secret (and not-so-secret) lives of one small town, and reveals the surprising complexity of sex (and life) in the Midwest.”

---

A Man’s Head (1931) by Georges Simenon begins when Joseph Heurtin—who awaits his fate on death row—escapes out of the High Surveillance wing of an infamous Paris prison. As he moves toward freedom, Heurtin is being watched by Inspector Maigret, the detective who convicted him of the murders of Madame Henderson and her maid. Maigret has come to believe that he convicted the wrong man and the Chief Inspector devises a plot, much to the consternation of his superiors, to uncover the truth. Along the way, through the twists and turns of the plot, Maigret realizes he has to contend with a criminal mastermind who has nothing to lose and believes he is the smartest person in the room. However, Maigret knows that if he is simply present and carefully listening, the real murderer will eventually tell his story.

---

Everyone on This Train is a Suspect (2024) by Benjamin Stevenson is a modern take on—or at least a big hat tip to—the classic Agatha Christie novel that is a (mostly) clever and always fun murder mystery. The set-up gives you a hint as to both the cleverness and devilishness that Stevenson has in mind: six authors are invited by the Australian Mystery Writers Society to their crime-writing festival aboard the Ghan, the famous train through the vast Australian desert. One of the six is murdered in this locked room (train) mystery, and the other five writers all turn into detectives. Because, as Ernest Cunningham—the debut writer and hero of the series—writes, “together we should know how to solve a crime. Or commit one.”

---

What’s on the nightstand for October (subject to change at the whims of the reader)

• The Civil War by Jeremy Black
• Josephine Baker’s Secret War: The African American Star Who Fought for France and Freedom by Hanna Diamond
• Greek Lessons by Han Kang
• An Odyssey: A Father, A Son, and An Epic by Daniel Mendelsohn
• The Accidental Vineyard: An Old House, New Vines, and a Changed Life in Wine Country by Richard A. Moran
• Maigret’s Holiday by Georges Simenon

Keep reading!

More to come . . .

DJB

---

NOTE: Click to see the books I read in August of 2025 and to see the books I read in 2024. Also check out Ten tips for reading five books a month.

---

Photo from Pixabay.