Top 100 Books Published in 2025

James (Percival Everett)

Pulitzer Prize for Fiction winner (announced May 2025). Retelling of Huckleberry Finn from Jim's perspective; transformed from supporting figure to full-voiced protagonist.

Intermezzo (Sally Rooney)

Rooney's fourth novel, published September 2024 and a defining literary read of 2025. Two grieving brothers, chess, and the relationships orbiting them.

The Message (Ta-Nehisi Coates)

Coates's 2024-25 essay collection on writing, Senegal, Palestine, and the responsibility of public memory. Critically polarising; influential among writers.

Nexus (Yuval Noah Harari)

Harari's 2024 history of information networks from Stone Age to AI. Argues that humanity's near-term challenge is governing AI-mediated reality.

Knife: Meditations After an Attempted Murder (Salman Rushdie)

Rushdie's 2024 memoir of surviving the 2022 stabbing. Direct, urgent, and (despite the subject) often unexpectedly funny.

Supremacy (Parmy Olson)

FT Business Book of the Year 2024. The inside story of OpenAI vs DeepMind vs Anthropic in the race for AGI. Definitive contemporary AI-industry history.

Co-Intelligence (Ethan Mollick)

Mollick's 2024 guide to working with LLMs as colleagues, not tools. The most-cited business book of 2024-25 in AI-adoption circles.

The Coming Wave (Mustafa Suleyman)

Suleyman's 2023-24 case for containment of AI and synthetic biology. Continues to anchor policy conversations in 2025.

The Anxious Generation (Jonathan Haidt)

Haidt's 2024 argument that smartphones rewired adolescence. Defining education-policy book of 2024-25; UK and Australia debating phone bans citing it.

Slow Productivity (Cal Newport)

Newport's 2024 follow-up to Deep Work. Three principles: do fewer things, work at a natural pace, obsess over quality. Influential among knowledge workers.

Sandwich (Catherine Newman)

Cape Cod family novel about midlife, grown children, ageing parents, marriage. Critically acclaimed 2024 release; long on quiet observation.

Liberation Day (George Saunders)

Saunders's 2022 story collection that continues to dominate post-pandemic short-story discourse. Increasingly studied in MFA programs.

Not the End of the World (Hannah Ritchie)

Ritchie's 2024 data-driven optimist take on climate, food, energy, biodiversity. Important counterweight to climate-doom narratives.

Doppelganger (Naomi Klein)

Klein's 2023-24 reckoning with being confused with Naomi Wolf. Becomes a meditation on the mirror world of conspiracy and brand-self.

Why Machines Learn (Anil Ananthaswamy)

2024 mathematical history of deep learning — from McCulloch-Pitts neurons to transformers. The most readable serious technical history of ML.

The Singularity Is Nearer (Ray Kurzweil)

Kurzweil's 2024 update to The Singularity Is Near. Doubles down on 2029 AGI / 2045 singularity timelines; continues to influence accelerationist thinking.

Elon Musk (Walter Isaacson)

Isaacson's 2023 biography is the reference work of the post-Twitter-acquisition Musk era. Heavily cited in any contemporary tech-history discussion.

Hidden Potential (Adam Grant)

Grant's 2023-24 book on talent vs achievement. Argues skill development matters more than innate ability; influential in education and L&D.

Excellent Advice for Living (Kevin Kelly)

Kelly's 2023 collection of 450 maxims accumulated over a lifetime. Compact, surprising, widely re-quoted on social.

Determined (Robert Sapolsky)

Sapolsky's 2023 argument against free will. Difficult, rigorous, and one of the most widely-discussed neuroscience books of the year.

The Wager (David Grann)

Grann's 2023 narrative history of a British naval disaster off Patagonia in 1741. Reads like a novel; the best historical non-fiction of 2023-25.

Killers of the Flower Moon (David Grann)

Grann's earlier book continued its 2023-25 surge thanks to the Scorsese film. The Osage murders; the founding of the FBI.

The Anxious Generation Workbook

Haidt + Lukianoff 2025 companion that gives schools and parents concrete steps from the original book.

The Bee Sting (Paul Murray)

Murray's 2023 epic novel that won 2025 attention via Booker shortlisting and TV adaptation. Irish family unravelling at slow pace.

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow (Gabrielle Zevin)

Zevin's 2022 novel about videogame designers continues to be one of the most-read literary novels of 2023-25.

Demon Copperhead (Barbara Kingsolver)

Kingsolver's 2022 Dickens-inspired Appalachian opioid-crisis novel. Pulitzer + Women's Prize winner; continues as a 2024-25 book-club favourite.

Lessons in Chemistry (Bonnie Garmus)

Garmus's 2022 debut — feminist 1960s scientist-housewife novel that became an Apple TV+ hit. Still dominates book-club selections.

Trust (Hernan Diaz)

Pulitzer-winning 2022 novel — four nested narratives about a fictional Gilded Age financier and his wife. Major HBO adaptation in development.

The Covenant of Water (Abraham Verghese)

Verghese's 2023 multi-generational Kerala novel. Oprah's Book Club pick; one of the most-recommended literary novels of 2023-25.

Babel (R. F. Kuang)

Kuang's 2022 alternate-history novel of translation, empire, and revolution at Oxford. Continues as one of the most-recommended literary-SFF novels.

Yellowface (R. F. Kuang)

Kuang's 2023 satire of publishing, race, and online discourse. Reading-group fodder that's only become more relevant in 2024-25.

Crook Manifesto (Colson Whitehead)

Whitehead's 2023 sequel to Harlem Shuffle. Crime trilogy continues; the third volume expected 2025-26.

Birnam Wood (Eleanor Catton)

Catton's 2023 eco-thriller. Booker winner returns with guerrilla gardeners and a sinister tech billionaire.

Western Lane (Chetna Maroo)

Maroo's 2023 Booker-shortlisted debut. Squash, grief, and family; spare and powerful.

Prophet Song (Paul Lynch)

Lynch's 2023 Booker-winning novel of an Ireland sliding into authoritarianism. Becoming canonical reading in 2024-25.

How to Say Babylon (Safiya Sinclair)

Sinclair's 2023 memoir of growing up Rastafarian in Jamaica. National Book Critics Circle winner; major 2024-25 audiobook.

Master Slave Husband Wife (Ilyon Woo)

Pulitzer-winning 2023 biography of an enslaved couple's escape from antebellum Georgia by passing as white slaveholder and Black valet.

Poverty, by America (Matthew Desmond)

Desmond's 2023 follow-up to Evicted. Argues that US poverty persists because affluent Americans benefit from it. Driving 2024-25 policy conversation.

King: A Life (Jonathan Eig)

Eig's 2023 biography of Martin Luther King Jr. Pulitzer winner; the first major MLK biography in decades to use newly-available FBI files.

Going Infinite (Michael Lewis)

Lewis's 2023 Sam Bankman-Fried book. Notoriously controversial reception — sympathetic at a moment of public revulsion. Read alongside Number Go Up.

Number Go Up (Zeke Faux)

Faux's 2023 crypto-industry investigation. Counterweight to Going Infinite; tighter on the actual fraud machinery.

Cobalt Red (Siddharth Kara)

Kara's 2023 investigation of cobalt mining in DRC. Driving 2024-25 supply-chain regulation conversations and corporate human-rights audits.

Doppelganger (Naomi Klein, paperback)

Klein's 2024 paperback rolled with an updated afterword. Continues to be one of the most-discussed 2023-25 nonfiction books on identity and conspiracy.

Build the Life You Want (Arthur Brooks & Oprah Winfrey)

Brooks/Winfrey's 2023 happiness/positive-psych book that became a 2024-25 phenomenon thanks to The Atlantic column franchise.

Outlive (Peter Attia)

Attia's 2023 longevity manifesto. Continues to drive an enormous wellness-conversation in 2024-25 around 'Medicine 3.0' and Centenarian Decathlon.

Same as Ever (Morgan Housel)

Housel's 2023 follow-up to The Psychology of Money. Argues that what doesn't change matters more than what does.

The Creative Act (Rick Rubin)

Rubin's 2023 meditation on creativity. Continues to be one of the most-gifted books in creative-professional circles in 2024-25.

Right Story Wrong Story (Tyson Yunkaporta)

Yunkaporta's 2024 indigenous-philosophy book on framing, sense-making, and the 'cognitive monoculture' of modern life.

Shy (Mary Rodgers + Jesse Green)

Rodgers's 2022 oral memoir that achieved cult status in 2023-25 thanks to Jesse Green's enormous footnotes. Broadway lore at its richest.

Cobalt Red — paperback (Kara)

2024 paperback edition that expanded distribution; cited heavily in EU Battery Regulation conformity assessments.

The Maniac (Benjamín Labatut)

Labatut's 2023 novel about John von Neumann, AlphaGo, and the maniacal pursuit of knowledge. Acclaimed across European literary press.

When We Cease to Understand the World (Labatut)

Labatut's 2020 predecessor to The Maniac continues to be widely read in 2024-25. Quantum mechanics history as literary terror.

The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store (James McBride)

McBride's 2023 National Book Critics Circle winner. Pennsylvania immigrant-Jewish-and-Black community in the 1930s. Beloved across reading groups.

Wellness (Nathan Hill)

Hill's 2023 follow-up to The Nix. Midlife marriage, algorithmic identity, post-truth America.

The Fraud (Zadie Smith)

Smith's 2023 historical novel of the Tichborne case. Critical favourite; quieter commercial reception than expected.

Held (Anne Michaels)

Michaels's 2024 novel — multi-generational meditation on memory, art, and love. Carries on the lineage of her Fugitive Pieces.

Lazarus Man (Richard Price)

Price's 2024 Harlem-set novel of a building collapse and its aftermath. The kind of street-level novel only Price writes.

Long Island (Colm Tóibín)

Tóibín's 2024 sequel to Brooklyn. Eilis returns to Enniscorthy 20 years later; among 2024's most-anticipated literary releases.

Headshot (Rita Bullwinkel)

Bullwinkel's 2024 debut novel — eight teenage girl boxers in a Reno tournament. Booker-shortlisted; critically rapturous.

Creation Lake (Rachel Kushner)

Kushner's 2024 Booker-shortlisted spy novel set in southwest France. Surveillance, eco-cults, prehistoric humans.

All Fours (Miranda July)

July's 2024 novel — a 45-year-old artist breaks from her marriage for a fugue of self-discovery in a Best Western. Defining 2024-25 conversation novel.

Tell Me Everything (Elizabeth Strout)

Strout's 2024 novel re-uniting Lucy Barton and Olive Kitteridge. A late-career masterclass in voice and structure.

Pearl (Siân Hughes)

Hughes's 2023 Booker-longlisted debut. Loss, motherhood, an English village, the medieval poem 'Pearl'.

How to Win Friends and Manipulate People (Henry Brody)

Brody's 2024 satirical takedown of self-help. One of the more interesting metaphysical comedy novels of the year.

Cleopatra and Frankenstein (paperback) (Coco Mellors)

Mellors's 2022 New York novel continued to dominate young-literary fiction shelves through 2024-25.

Blue Sisters (Coco Mellors)

Mellors's 2024 follow-up. Three estranged sisters returning to their childhood home after a fourth sister's death.

Margo's Got Money Troubles (Rufi Thorpe)

Thorpe's 2024 novel — single mother, OnlyFans, professional wrestling. Comedy meets economic precarity.

The God of the Woods (Liz Moore)

Moore's 2024 missing-children thriller set at an Adirondack camp. NYT bestseller; major audiobook reception.

We Solve Murders (Richard Osman)

Osman's 2024 new series following the Thursday Murder Club. Bestseller in the UK; comfort-cozy mystery dominance continues.

The Ministry of Time (Kaliane Bradley)

Bradley's 2024 debut — a time-travel-from-the-Arctic-1840s romance that became one of the most-shared literary books of the year.

Service Model (Adrian Tchaikovsky)

Tchaikovsky's 2024 novel — a butler robot becomes the lone witness to civilizational collapse. SFF/literary crossover.

The Tainted Cup (Robert Jackson Bennett)

Bennett's 2024 fantasy mystery — Sherlock-meets-Bas-Lag. First in a planned trilogy; the best-reviewed SFF novel of 2024.

James (paperback) (Everett)

Paperback release of Percival Everett's Pulitzer-winning novel; expanded its already huge 2024-25 reach.

Erasure (paperback re-issue, Everett)

Re-issued alongside the American Fiction film and James. Everett's 2001 satire of literary 'authenticity' is now widely read.

The Bullet Swallower (Elizabeth Gonzalez James)

Magical realist border-western 2024 novel. Critically embraced; the early-2024 literary-debut sleeper.

Splinters (Leslie Jamison)

Jamison's 2024 memoir of motherhood, divorce, and being-a-writer-in-public. Critically lauded essay-style memoir.

Day (Michael Cunningham)

Cunningham's 2023 novel — one Brooklyn family across three days in three years before/during/after COVID. Critically warm reception.

The Vaster Wilds (Lauren Groff)

Groff's 2023 colonial-America-survivalist novel. Hard, lean, and unforgettable; a 2024-25 literary-class favourite.

Solenoid (Mircea Cărtărescu)

Cărtărescu's 2024 English-language Bucharest-set surrealist epic. The European literary novel of the year.

Same Bed Different Dreams (Ed Park)

Park's 2023 novel — Korean history, conspiracy, alternative-narrative novel. PEN/Faulkner finalist; long-tail reading.

Hum (Helen Phillips)

Phillips's 2024 climate-and-AI dystopia. The 'near-future' novel that nailed enough current anxieties to feel uncomfortably real.

Annie Bot (Sierra Greer)

Greer's 2024 debut — a domestic-robot 'wife' learns autonomy. Subtle reflective AI/relationships novel; widely book-clubbed.

The Husbands (Holly Gramazio)

Gramazio's 2024 debut — every man who walks out of the attic becomes the protagonist's husband. Smart romantic-comedy with philosophical weight.

Funny Story (Emily Henry)

Henry's 2024 follow-up romance. New York Times bestseller; the dominant 'romance with literary appeal' brand in 2024-25.

Fourth Wing (Rebecca Yarros)

Yarros's 2023 'romantasy' that dominated TikTok and fiction sales charts through 2024 and 2025. Iron Flame and Onyx Storm followed.

A Court of Thorns and Roses (continuation) (Sarah J. Maas)

Maas's series continued dominating fantasy and romantasy sales through 2024-25 with anticipated sequels and tie-ins.

First Lie Wins (Ashley Elston)

Elston's 2024 adult-thriller debut — Reese's Book Club pick that became one of the year's biggest commercial-fiction hits.

Listen for the Lie (Amy Tintera)

Tintera's 2024 small-town true-crime-podcast novel. NYT bestseller; major commercial-fiction breakout.

James McBride backlist resurgence

McBride's earlier work (Deacon King Kong, The Good Lord Bird) re-circulated heavily in 2024-25 driven by Heaven & Earth.

The Power Broker (Robert Caro, 50th anniversary edition)

Caro's 1974 Robert Moses biography hit 50 in 2024 with a major re-issue and resurgent cultural conversation around urban planning.

Master of Change (Brad Stulberg)

Stulberg's 2023 book on navigating change. Continued growth through 2024-25 as the canonical performance-psych book of the moment.

How to Know a Person (David Brooks)

Brooks's 2023 book on being seen and seeing others. Continues as a 2024-25 corporate-book-club staple.

Atlas of AI (Kate Crawford)

Crawford's 2021 study of AI's material costs — labour, minerals, energy — continued to be widely-cited in 2024-25 policy debates.

Boom (David Roberts)

Roberts's 2024 history of postwar bubbles and the people who profited from them. Sharp Vox-Volts journalism in book form.

Generative AI for Business (Bernard Marr)

Marr's 2024 corporate-AI handbook. Among the most-bought business books for L&D and enterprise rollouts in 2024-25.

Build (Tony Fadell, expanded edition)

Fadell's 2022 book updated with new 2024 chapters on AI products. Continues to be a top-recommended PM/founder book.

How to Make Money on AI (Lukas Petersson)

Petersson's 2024 practical-builder book. Less hype, more concrete revenue models for AI-feature SaaS.

Lean B2B (Étienne Garbugli, 3rd edition)

Garbugli's 2024 edition of his B2B startup playbook. Recommended widely in YC and accelerator circles in 2024-25.

Atomic Habits (James Clear) — continued dominance

Clear's 2018 book remains the top-selling self-help book in the world through 2024-25. Anchor of the 'systems over goals' canon.

The Psychology of Money (Morgan Housel) — continued growth

Housel's 2020 book continues to top finance and personal-development charts globally in 2024-25.