Year-End Lists

Literary Hub: 43 Favorite Books of 2025

[see also 38 Favorite Books of 2024 • The 38 Best Books We Read in 2023 • Our 38 Favorite Books of 2022 • Our 48 Favorite Books of 2021 • Our 65 Favorite Books of 2020 • The 20 Best Novels of the 2010s • The 20 Best Works of Nonfiction of the 2010s • Favorite Books of 2018]

• Isola
  Allegra Goodman
• Perfect Victims and the Politics of Appeal
  Mohammed El-Kurd
• The National Telepathy
  Roque Larraquy
• Dream State
  Eric Puchner
• One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This
  Omar El Akkad
• Ultramarine
  Mariette Navarro
• North Sun

  Or, The Voyage of the Whaleship Esther
  Ethan Rutherford
• True Mistakes
  Lena Moses-Schmitt
• Perfection
  Vincenzo Latronico
• Sad Tiger
  Neige Sinno
• Gifted & Talented
  Olivie Blake
• Audition
  Katie Kitamura
• Fish Tales
  Nettie Jones
• Great Big Beautiful Life
  Emily Henry
• The Road to Tender Hearts
  Annie Hartnett
• The Director
  Daniel Kehlmann
• The Slip
  Lucas Schaefer
• Mafalda
  Quino
• Murderland

  Crime and Bloodlust in the Time of Serial Killers
  Caroline Fraser
• Bug Hollow
  Michelle Huneven
• The Scrapbook
  Heather Clark
• The House on Buzzards Bay
  Dwyer Murphy
• The Original
  Nell Stevens
• Fools for Love

  Stories
  Helen Schulman
• Maggie; or, A Man and a Woman Walk Into a Bar
  Katie Yee
• An Oral History of Atlantis
  Ed Park
• A Truce That Is Not Peace
  Miriam Toews
• The Season
  Helen Garner
• Ripeness
  Sarah Moss
• The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny
  Kiran Desai
• Heart the Lover
  Lily King
• Shadow Ticket
  Thomas Pynchon
• Herculine
  Grace Byron
• A Mouthful of Dust
  Nghi Vo
• A Guardian and a Thief
  Megha Majumdar
• The Ten Year Affair
  Erin Somers
• The Everlasting
  Alix E. Harrow
• The Great Work
  Sheldon Costa
• The Queen of Swords
  Jazmina Barrera
• Girls Play Dead

  Acts of Self-Preservation
  Jen Percy
• Something from Nothing

  A Cookbook
  Alison Roman
• House of Day, House of Night
  Olga Tokarczuk
• The Lord
  Soraya Antonius