"This is a perfect book about a boy named Milo who is bored every day all of the time, until he receives a mysterious package: the tollbooth through which he travels to the Lands Beyond, winding up on a rescue mission to save Princesses Rhyme and Reason. The things Juster does with language in this just blow me away. Incredible and strange as a kid; stunning as an adult. A+ Jules Feiffer illustrations, too!"

"I love spies and this is one of the greats! Like Retro’s Ash, the protagonist of TLDG is a young actress who is a bit lost—very susceptible to the offer of a role in 'the theater of the real,' a.k.a., as a spy working for Israeli intelligence. Her handlers encourage her to lose herself in the part; the longer she lives her cover, the less sure she becomes of what counts as her 'real' self and what’s just a performance."

"This is a slender, spare novel about a woman who is placed, via a magical realist temp agency, into a series of impossible jobs—a mate on a pirate ship, a department store mannequin, a ghost, some boy’s mom—while she waits around for any part of her life to become permanent. It’s all surreal and strange, so great on how flexible your sense of self can feel when your professional status is so vulnerable and ever-shifting."

"[In] Retro, Ash falls in with this hard-drinking private eye she meets in 1937 L.A., so I read a ton of noir to get the mood and language just right. This was one of my favorites. Crackling dialogue, sultry encounters, everyone is smoking and drinking basically all of the time. The plot is totally beside the point. It’s all about atmosphere, baby!"

"Saunders’ short stories are so good on how bizarre and dystopian work can be, and this collection includes one of my favorites (and a big Retro influence): the title story about a man who plays a caveman in this exhibit at a deeply unsettling amusement park. He has to live there and act in character all the time (no speaking English, etc.). I love the way the story shows the ugly, exhausting work of creating recreation for paying customers."

"Retro is a start-up run by this megalomaniacal tech billionaire. Wiener’s memoir of her time working in Silicon Valley—she arrives as a skeptic, gets sucked in and then taps out—really intrigued me. She writes so sharply about the super-specific and weird-but-normalized culture of this very particular time and place. Really helped me see how Retro would operate, with all those big tech perks and powers."

"The epigraph from Retro comes from this classic treatise on how everything would, in the age of television, be packaged as entertainment, distracting all people from the things that really matter and risking everything we hold dear. Everybody was so worried we were turning in 1984, but Postman, correctly, warned that we were headed towards Brave New World instead: a future in which everyone is too hooked on the devices that entertain us to even protest the world’s wrongs. Published in 1985 and truer than it ever was!"

"The narrator is furious, reckless, sexually impulsive, and often impossible to defend. I love that Taddeo never tries to soften her. The book embraces female anger in all its ugliness and power, refusing to make its heroine palatable for anyone else’s comfort."

"Esther Greenwood’s rebellion is quieter than some of the women on this list, but no less radical. I love the book’s dark humor: 'Do you know what a poem is, Esther?' 'No, what?' I would say. 'A piece of dust.' Then... I would say, 'So are the cadavers you cut up... I reckon a good poem lasts a whole lot longer than a hundred of those people put together.' I also appreciate the refusal to sentimentalize female suffering, since so much literature has such a hard-on for that. It captures the terror of realizing that the life everyone wants for you may not be one you want."

"While grieving the loss of her husband hardly qualifies as bad behavior, I love this book because it doesn’t try to make grief noble or inspirational. Didion documents irrational bargains, obsessive thinking, and magical beliefs that followed her husband’s death with extraordinary precision. I like that she describes grief as a form of temporary insanity and allows herself to be unreasonable, repetitive, and consumed by loss. It’s a portrait of a woman behaving the way her grief demands instead of how she’s expected to. It’s one of the most honest books I’ve ever read about what happens when loss is impossible to accept."

"Amy Dunne is one of my favorite villains because she’s smarter than everyone in the room and she uses that intelligence for pure chaos. In the book, however, she is far more deeply disturbed than (I believe) the movie reveals her to be. She’s obsessed with perfection and control and applies this obsession to enact incredible revenge. I love how Flynn weaponizes the expectations people have about wives, victims, and women. It’s dark, vicious, funny, and completely committed to bad behavior."

"I saved the best for last. I am obsessed with Catherine Earnshaw and believe she is one of literature’s greatest monsters. She’s selfish, cruel, romantic, vain, unreasonably horny, and devastatingly human. Her refusal to choose between desire and security is deluded at times, believing she can use her husband's money to raise the status of her true soulmate, and she destroys herself in the process. It’s often described as a book that understands real love not as salvation but as a force capable of ruining lives, but I think that puts the onus on the wrong thing. I think it’s a woman conforming to societal expectations over her own desire that ruins her life and the lives of everyone around her."

Stuff this in your beach bag for a frothy read you won’t want to put down. Years ago, Chloe had a secret crush on Matt, her childhood friend who, at the time, was on the brink of a successful career as a racecar driver. The two grew apart as Matt left to pursue his dreams—until now, when a horrible crash puts Matt on the sidelines.

Meanwhile, Chloe, an F1 expert in her own right, has been appointed as one of the first female team principals. As she navigates sexism and other related workplace challenges, she gets a surprise she didn’t see in any of her rearview mirrors: Matt belongs to the team she’s managing. While Chloe helps Matt rebuild his confidence, the two grow closer. But will Chloe let her guard down so they can drive into the sunset? With underdogs you’ll root for almost as much as the Knicks and workplace romance to boot, Drive Me Crazy is an ideal vacation read.

Olivia Hinckley has waited her entire life for this moment. Finally, she has a chance to exact revenge on the Parkers, the family who ruined her father’s life. In a match before she was born, Erik Parker delivered a hit that not only ended her dad’s professional ice hockey career but saddled him with ongoing health issues. So, when a job comes up to work as the mascot for the very same NHL team that Erik’s son, Brody, plays for, Olivia knows now is her chance to even the playing field…er, ice rink.

The strategy? Get close to Brody to learn the ins and outs of his hockey dynasty family—and maybe break his heart. But as the two get to know one another, they realize they may have more in common than their love for ice hockey.

If you loved the Netflix documentary Glitter & Gold or Taylor Jenkins Reid’s Daisy Jones & The Six, The Favorites belongs in your TBR list. An immersive dual-narrative, drama-fueled look at competitive figure skating, The Favorites explores the sacrifices athletes make to be at the top of their game.

Kat and Heath are basically family. Figure skating partners since childhood, the two have become unstoppable, earning a ticket to Nationals. But when an accident involving their rivals, Garrett and Bella Lin, derails their performance, Kat becomes convinced that training with their biggest competition is the only way to achieve their Olympic dreams. After moving to L.A. to join the Lins, Kat finds herself enthralled by the twins and their mother, who also coaches them, while Heath grows increasingly suspicious of their approach to skating (and resentful of their blossoming bond). As partners swap and shift, unlikely love triangles emerge between triple axels, further complicating the relationships on and off the ice—culminating in a disaster no one will fully recover from.

The second novel in Alexa Martin’s The Playbook series, Fumbled, follows Poppy, a mother, waitress, and force to be reckoned with. After she was abandoned by her boyfriend and her parents when she was 16 and pregnant, Poppy moved to Denver to live with her aunt and make a life for her and her son, Ace. To give him every opportunity possible, Poppy serves tables at the Emerald Cabaret, even though she despises the customers and her coworkers. Still, it’s steady and pays the bills. But eventually, she finds herself swept up in drama regarding Ace’s father, the fictional NFL team the Denver Mustangs, and a secret she promised never to reveal. But with Ace’s identity and her heart on the line, she has to decide whether she’s ready to air the truth, potentially threatening to destroy everything she’s built since moving to Denver, even if it could mean a joyful future for her family.

For those who carry a torch for second-chance romances, believe in the power of Jordyn Woods’ bag, and watched WAGS the first time around, this book won’t disappoint. Martin, who’s married to retired NFL player Derrick Martin, imbues the novel with insider details that elevate the reading experience. You feel like you’re right beside Poppy, cheering for her to make a move.

Leighton’s life was just how she liked it: quiet. Until one day, she receives a phone call that changes everything. Her cousin, Skylar, and Skylar’s husband have tragically died, and now she’s been entrusted with the care of their three children. Daunted, defeated, and grieving, Leighton leans on her best friend’s older brother, Hayes, an acclaimed baseball player who’s hoping to revamp his image.

He couldn’t have arrived soon enough. As Leighton becomes devoted to the children, a surprise bid for custody shakes her to her core. In an effort to prove she’s capable of caring for the kids, she and Hayes enter a faux relationship to prove she’s not without a support system. But the two have history, and as they spend more time together, Leighton wonders if their past couldn’t turn into her future.

If slow-burn romances with a side of longing are your thing, pick up this first installment in Piper Rayne’s The Dugout series. With endearing undertones of ‘90s rom-coms like She’s All That and Jerry Maguire, this novel delivers all the feels.

Ever dream about your celebrity crush randomly showing up in your life? Well, for How You Get the Girl protagonist Julie Parker, her fantasies are about to become her reality. A school fundraiser by day and a girls’ basketball coach by night, Julie has long nursed a sweet spot for WNBA legend Elle Cochrane. So, when the superstar strolls into her gym, Julie has to pinch herself to make sure she’s not hallucinating. Arriving at Julie’s gym with Vanessa, her niece who’s recently come into her care, Elle hopes basketball could provide a healthy outlet for the girl.

When Vanessa proves to be a troublemaker, Julie brokers a deal with Elle: Vanessa can join the team, so long as Elle signs on as East Nashville High’s newest assistant basketball coach. From free-throw technique to dribbling drills, Julie is more than prepared to coach her team to the top, but she doesn’t anticipate how much she can learn from Elle about basketball—and herself.

This sapphic sport romance is full of feels. Broadening the characters with believable flaws and fears, readers will cheer for Julie as she’s given license to explore her sexuality and maybe find a nothing-but-net love.

Can you be an underdog and the owner of a professional baseball team? Ask Reese Remington, the 35-year-old who just inherited the Chicago Warriors from her grandfather. The first female team owner in Major League Baseball, Reese is continuously disrespected. In the office, board members sabotage her, and in the dugout, the field manager, Emmett, is on his way to becoming her arch nemesis.

But when Reese proposes cutting loose Harrison Kaiser, the toxic outfielder whose contract is bleeding the Warriors dry, Emmett is surprised with the call, and soon their workplace rivalry evolves into a workplace romance. With a sharp statement on the gender inequity in male sports leagues, no matter where you are on the org chart, Liz Tomforde's In Her Own League is a sumptuous story about trusting yourself and taking risks.

Battling through the rounds at the U.S. Open is a feat for any athlete. For 24-year-old Austin Hardy, the first openly gay tennis player in the competition, the expectations of his family, coach, and community are overwhelming—even as he wins. Austin slowly crumbles under the pressure, threatening to disrupt his game in the process. To make matters worse, Diego Cruz, the No. 2 seed, is ready and willing to kick Austin off his throne.

Isolated and laden with anxiety, Austin looks to the one person who might understand what he’s going through, at least professionally. Despite the potential ramifications for their games, he spends time with Diego and develops a friendship outside of the tennis court. It’s a dangerous alliance, one that threatens to end with someone losing it all.

This debut trains its gaze on the emotional and mental strain athletes often shoulder. With a slow-burn romance and stakes that only continue to go up, up, up, The Open Era’s cliffhanger will have you hoping this is just the first set of a new series.

Former model Cat Cromwell has developed the perfect side gig: She’s a professional heartbreaker, using her looks and style to put cheating boyfriends in their place. Her latest target? An F1 racecar driver who sped away from the altar, leaving his fiancée in the dust.

But her plan goes awry when she learns her mark is no longer with the team, and she’s been assigned to work with Faust, an annoyingly nice driver. Soon, though, Cat begins to yearn for his delicate approach and thoughtful gestures. It’s a balm to the stress of supporting her family and negotiating grief that’s threatened to pull her under. With Faust by her side, Cat learns to relinquish control and let someone else in the driver’s seat for a change.

A scorcher of a read, The Paddock Club offers slow-burn tension that squeals over the finish line most satisfyingly. Madge Maril wonderfully delves into not only misogyny and the stereotypes often assigned to women, but she also presents a look at class, too. Want more? The Paddock Club is actually the second entry into the author’s F1 series. You can check out Slipstream, the first of the series, too.

All Katherine Parker had to do was stick to her plan. Measure her water intake, follow her fierce training regime, and avoid any distractions that could keep her from winning a place in the U.S. Olympic rowing team. Then her boyfriend breaks up with her at the start line of an important race, derailing her strategy, and she finishes last.

Booted from her team, Katherine returns home to lick her wounds and train solo for the Pan Am Games, her last shot to earn a spot on the Olympic team. In need of a coach, Katherine winds up working with Adrian, whose training philosophy majorly conflicts with hers. Where Katherine thrives off metrics, Adrian emphasizes staying in the moment. As the two struggle to blend their training methods, Adrian shows Katherine how powerful it can be to listen to your heart.

A former competitive sprint kayaker, Ann Adams highlights her knowledge of elite sports, training, and rowing throughout Racing Hearts. Sidestepping jargon and digging into the power dynamics of coach-athlete relationships, Adams delivers a page-turner rooted in well-rendered characters and a galloping plot.

Friday Night Lights might have debuted 20 years ago, but it’s still inspiring some of the best (and spiciest!) sports-romance novels around. Take, for example, Ready to Score, a romance that follows Jade Dunn, a coach who has had to fight tooth and nail to be accepted in the world of South Carolina high school football. After years of working to infiltrate the good ol’ boys club, she’s finally received an invitation to a poker game that has the power to seal her spot as the next head football coach. But she can’t focus—namely because her main competition is Francesca, a hot teacher she can’t keep her eyes off.

As Jade and Francesca square off to fill the coveted head coaching role, flames ignite between them, bringing a whole new meaning to the word touchdown. With an unflinching look at the misogyny women experience in the football coaching space, Jodie Slaughter douses the characters in the heady yearning that can only come from crushing on your biggest competition.

Connor has made a terrible mistake. He’s allowed himself to be convinced by his girlfriend, Thalia, to move to San Diego, live with her family, and attend grad school together. He’d imagined the two of them laughing through sun-soaked adventures and date nights under the stars. Instead, Thalia is never home, and her dad is a Class-A jerk, leaving Connor without someone to play soccer with. Until he spies Thalia’s younger brother, Dane, in a pick-up game on the beach. The two hang out, and as time passes, Connor questions things about himself he always considered unwavering. Meanwhile, Dane is grappling with past abuse and trauma he experienced at the hands of his family, forcing him to protect his truth—even if it means missing out on what he’s always dreamed of.

The sophomore novel in Jonah Yorke’s Like Teammates series, Salt investigates the tangled process of self-acceptance, infidelity, and how to build a chosen family. Grab a copy to read between World Cup matches. It won’t disappoint.

“I return to this book because it reminds me that our heartbreak, our joy, and our becoming is communal. These women weren’t waiting to exhale—they were learning how to breathe on their own terms. That lesson never expires, but it’s one Dionne definitely has to learn.”

“The Bluest Eye is not an easy read—and it’s not supposed to be. It is a mirror held up to beauty, shame, and the violence of invisibility. Every time I revisit this novel, I’m reminded that storytelling can be both indictment and prayer.”

“I’m obsessed with Lily King’s writing style. She writes desire and doubt with such elegant restraint that you almost miss how deeply she’s cut you. That emotional precision deeply influenced how I approached Dionne’s awakening.”

“The rawness in The Woman Destroyed is almost confrontational—and that’s what makes it so powerful. I admire the honest interiority of de Beauvoir’s writing so much. It lingers in the uncomfortable space between identity and loss—which resonates deeply with Dionne’s journey. Before revelation, there is a rupture.”

“Every relationship is not meant to last, but some relationships do bear gifts. In my own life, this book is what I got to keep, and in serving me, it has served the deeper interiority of Dionne.”

“All Fours feels like a woman pulling apart the architecture of her own life just to see what else might be possible. What I admire most, and what I tried to channel in my own writing, is its refusal to apologize for a woman’s hunger.”

“I know a lot of times, when we say Kennedy Ryan, we talk about how she explores the freedom of sexuality for Black women, but what resonates more for me is how friendships serve as a cornerstone of these novels, much like how I explore Dionne and Farrah’s friendship in mine.”

You may recognize Lindy West’s name from her wildly popular essay collection, Shrill, which Hulu adapted for TV. Now, the comedian returns with a memoir about her marriage, going poly and getting intimate with her sexuality. Having moved to L.A. for Shrill’s Hollywood production, West feels anything but successful. Faced with unrealistic beauty ideals, West, a champion of body positivity, is battling some major insecurities. Then, once home in Seattle, her husband expresses interest in officially opening their marriage. Oh, and if that’s not enough: She needs braces.

In an effort to make sense of these developments, West embarks on a one-woman road trip from Seattle to Key West and back. Debriefing on reflections and roadside attractions alike, West undergoes a personal reckoning. Rebuilding her confidence and stumbling upon joy in unexpected places, West recounts her journey from midlife crisis to finding new meaning in her marriage. Told in West’s hilarious voice, this memoir is one to live with. From heart-wrenching confessions to newfound empowerment, West provides readers with an unflinching peek into growing up and growing into yourself.

No matter if you’re poly-curious, already open, or in a happily closed ‘ship, Deepa Paul’s memoir is for everyone. Formatted to resemble Q&A (with a very cool friend/big sister), Paul addresses some of the most common questions she’s asked about her open marriage.

Living in Amsterdam with her husband and a teenage daughter, Paul tackles tough topics throughout the book, like her childhood in the Philippines, the infidelity that led to her open marriage, and, as the title promises, how it all works. Written in captivating, at times lyrical prose, Paul bares it all in an unsparing review of the beauty and challenges their open marriage has invoked, while providing practical guidance on helping find the best relationship dynamic for you. But a warning: There are mentions of domestic violence in this book. If that’s a topic you wish to avoid, pick up another recommendation on this list.

The iconic handbook on everything poly, The Ethical Slut is a tactical guide for folks interested in open relationships, polycules and more. Providing updated insights on managing biases, housing logistics, and communication styles, this book offers solutions and suggestions for maintaining healthy, respectful relationships. And honestly, it’s not just for people who want to be open; readers in all sorts of ‘ships can benefit from checking out the book. From tips on conflict resolution, navigating jealousy, and learning how to step into your most authentic self—labels and stigmas be damned—The Ethical Slut belongs on pretty much everyone’s bookshelf. Perfect for perusing with your partner(s) or dipping in for some expert support, the book has it all.

Is it possible to future-proof your marriage? Mitch and Jessica Butler sure hope so. Shaken by the divorces of their three closest couple friends, they decide to get ahead of any issues and open up their marriage—with rules: no repeats and no one they know. As Mitch struggles to embrace their arrangement, Jessica plunges into the deep end, hooking up with a hot bartender. Soon, the Butlers begin to skirt the rules, jeopardizing their marriage and leaving them to wonder whether the experiment is helping or hurting their relationship.

A bingeable read if there ever was, Last Couple Standing is a comedic glimpse at the inner workings of a couple attempting (and at times, failing) to thwart issues before they arise. A ripper of a novel, you’ll breeze through the pages of this warm-hearted book in no time.

One of the buzziest debuts of the year from former Forever Magazine editor Madeline Cash, Lost Lambs features the Flynns, a family on the brink of disaster. Catherine Flynn, matriarch of the clan, wants to open her marriage. After spending time with her charismatic neighbor, she begins to see that Bud, her husband, hasn't been fulfilling her needs for a while. So, she gives Bud an ultimatum: open marriage or divorce. Bud opts for the former. As tensions flare between Catherine and Bud, their three daughters push boundaries, embark on scandalous relationships, and uncover problematic business practices of their father’s employer. (Yeah, you read that right.) The five spiral in and out of one another’s orbit, colliding at the most inopportune times, producing an unexpected side effect: acceptance.

Rich, vibrant, and wonderfully absurd, Lost Lambs depicts the impact of one open marriage on a family of unique individuals. Frequently compared to Jonathan Franzen’s The Corrections, Cash turns up the volume on the family novel. Even better: It’s clear she had fun doing it. With quirks, swerves and surprises, Lost Lambs is a whimsical romp you won’t want to put down.

Hear us when we say with our whole chests: Moms are sexual beings. More, Molly Roden Winter’s debut memoir, delves into Winter’s exploration into an open marriage with her husband, Stewart. Frustrated and overwhelmed from caring for her children, juggling work and showing up as a wife, Winter grappled with her identity as a mother and sexual being. So, after a chance encounter with a stranger at a bar, Molly and Stewart open their marriage. What comes next is a heartfelt exploration of Winter’s pursuit toward reclaiming her sexuality, confronting the roles society assigns to women, and defining herself on her own terms.

Less of a how-to guide and more a meditation on one woman’s experience of an open marriage, Winter doesn’t skimp on the details of her steamy encounters or her conflicting feelings as her husband ventures into the dating pool. Ideal for readers of all stripes, More is an honest field report on the raw vulnerability it takes to remain present in one’s marriage while pursuing pleasure from multiple partners.

Though it may not look like it, loneliness has invaded Chris and Kathryn’s long-term relationship. Having been together for nine years, the couple has developed a shorthand for their communications, sharing every emotion, including who they have crushes on. So, when Chris mentions his attraction to Emily, Kathryn encourages him to explore it. Their foundation is strong, Kathryn thinks. As Chris and Emily get to know each other and Kathryn broadens her search for pleasure, they encounter blowback from their inner circle. Kathryn’s best friend is firmly against the new arrangement, foisting stereotypes and assumptions. Meanwhile, Chris struggles with his desire to return to the comfort of a monogamous relationship with Kathryn and pursue his feelings for Emily.

Told through dual perspectives, readers get to be a fly on the wall as this couple initiates a new phase of their relationship. But as they evolve as individuals, do they still make sense as a unit?

Award-winning journalist, Rachel Krantz knows a thing or two about reporting from the scene. In her debut memoir, she turns the lens inward, focusing on her foray into polyamory during her hot and heavy relationship with Adam, who’s uninterested in monogamy. Showing off her journalism chops, Krantz pairs research and expert interviews with her personal experience. The approach works terrifically, providing at once ground-floor and birds-eye views on her relationship and its toll. While Krantz recalls spicy encounters, she also pulls back the curtain on manipulation and emotional abuse that can occur under the guise of polyamory.

A look at toxic relationships, the incredible support of the polyamory community and dominant and submissive dynamics, Krantz bundles her well-documented (seriously—transcripts and texts are involved) accounts with an honest look at how some relationships can thrive in a poly dynamic, while others merely collapse.

There’s no singular way to grieve. Unmoored by her mother’s death, Frances and her husband, Ben, decide to experiment with polyamory after having a threesome. Benched during COVID, the couple finally explores what else is out there, often bringing in a range of partners and flirtations. But while some encounters are downright hot, others aren’t worth the squeeze. A fresh take on making marriage work in the modern age, Ben and Frances navigate various bumps in the road, learning more about each other and themselves. But when Ben develops feelings for another woman, and Frances starts to yearn for a baby, the couple must assess their lifestyle and if it’s serving them as much as they’d hoped.

Told through a variety of perspectives, readers gain a front-row seat to the beginning of Frances and Ben’s relationship, while also hearing from some of the lovers they bring into their current dynamic. For fans of The Fates and Furies, Gunk or Perfection, this multi-narrative is one not to miss.

So often, love is qualified by sacrifice. But Cat St. Claire refuses to compromise when it comes to her happiness. The 24-year-old is pursuing her MFA in creative writing at American University in D.C. while working on a novel about her parents’ relationship.

Her upbringing is a cautionary tale; Cat dreams of living fully and authentically, without apologies or explanations. After all, she lives in a world constructed to repel the wants of a Black young woman. So she tries to satisfy all her desires. Feeling caged by her long-distance relationship with Jay, Cat suggests they open their relationship. At first unconvinced, Jay complies, and the couple sets up some ground rules to keep the arrangement ethical, like who (if anyone) is off-limits. For example, Cat agrees not to come within kissing distance of his best friend Tristan, a PhD candidate living in D.C. But Cat can’t resist the toe-curling tension she feels around Tristan—and his girlfriend, Nia.

As love triangles shift, deeper questions emerge around race, women’s pleasure, and the cultural landscape that can dictate even the most intimate moments in someone’s life. Rooted in real-world ongoings, this isn’t your typical frothy rom-com, but rather a smart literary romance that doesn’t shy away from the big questions (or spice).

If you’ve been casting about for your book club’s next pick, look no further. The Arrangement is a hilarious, drama-packed novel brimming with lightning-speed dialogue and relatable characters. Having left Brooklyn for the Hudson Valley, Lucy and Owen are excited to kick off their new chapter. The couple and their young son on the autism spectrum settle into a pleasant rhythm: Lucy chops kale while Wyatt, her son, nurses his obsession with the Titanic. She and Owen attend dinner parties. At one such party, another couple announces they’ve opened their marriage. Inspiration strikes: Lucy and Owen agree to open their marriage for six months, thinking the short timeline will help them dodge any issues. But you know what they say about plans: make them, and somebody laughs.

As Lucy and Owen confront obstacles both as a couple and individuals seeking alternative partners, they learn that their plan isn’t as cut-and-dry as they’d hoped. Each will have to decide if, in fact, the grass is greener. A television writer (and seasoned novelist), Sarah Dunn slingshots scenes and one-liners with confidence, delivering complicated characters who’ll make you full-belly laugh.

“When exhausted spitfire Delaney takes a post-medical school trip to a secluded cabin, she crosses paths with Jamal—who happens to be a vacationing sheikh. So tempestuous, so lusty, so classic.”

“In 1899, a Dominican rum heiress sails to Paris to expand her business. Alas, as an unmarried woman of color, every door slams in her face. Enter the Earl of Darnick, a whisky brand owner—and a marriage of convenience. Their chemistry? Beyond.”

“A lovable goofball, Montgomery, is exploring a 16th-century church on the worst vacation of her life, when a knight appears to her at his tombstone. This hilarious encounter kicks off one of the sweetest time-traveling love stories ever.”

“What happens when two bisexual exes, Theo and Kit, accidentally set off on the food-and-wine tour across France, Spain, and Italy? So much tension, you can’t imagine. This one’s for the yearners (and the foodies).”

“I love a destination wedding romance! This one’s set in Tulum, and features a secret fling between Janelle, the maid of honor, and Rome, the best man. Come for their epic chemistry, stay for the multi-layered family drama.”

“A detective story set against the colorful world of Tang Dynasty Chinese courtesans, it features a maidservant, Yue-ying, and a rakish aristocrat, Bai Huang—who work together to solve a dangerous mystery. Absolutely delicious.”

Ari lives in upstate New York with her well-meaning husband and 1-year-old son, Walker. Stuck at home in a small town, Ari spends most of her time feeling alone—even when her husband is home. He’s simply incapable of commiserating (or fathoming) the labyrinth of feelings (wonder, fury, guilt) she cycles through on any given day. So, isolated without a friend in sight, she tries to make sense of the brutality that made her a mother: a caesarean that was wholly traumatizing.

Then Mina, pregnant and unpartnered, moves to town. Ari is immediately besotted. The two hit it off. And, after Mina has a home birth, she and Ari nurture their kids side by side. But, as the two draw closer, Mina starts to consider her future. Told in stark, economical prose, After Birth is at once hilarious and heart-wrenching. For those who slurped down Big Swiss or are in search of a book that validates all the feelings of being a mother, this is for you.

Wrought with grief, Hannah, a recent widower, makes a terrible mistake, landing her daughters in foster care. While navigating the at-times infuriating social services, Hannah learns that she’s not the only person vying for custody of her children. So is Julie, the temporary foster parent, who has taken in children after navigating the heavy storm of infertility. Even still, she didn’t anticipate bonding with the girls so strongly.

But that’s not all. Hannah’s estranged mother is also fighting for custody of her granddaughters in hopes of righting wrongs she made with Hannah. As these three go head-to-head, larger questions emerge about how mothers have little room for mistakes or being human. Perfect for your book club, Hadley Leggett's dramatic, feel-good read will have your group chat exploding with thoughts.

Back with her sophomore novel, Leila Mottley’s newest piece follows a group of “Girls” in a small town in Florida’s panhandle. Shifting through various narrators, readers are immersed in the lives of Simone, Adela, and Emory as they each experience difficult times. Simone, the de facto leader and oldest of the group, is already a mom to twins, but learns she is pregnant again by their father, Tooth. An unreliable co-parent and partner, Simone is unsure of bringing another baby into the world with him. Before it’s too late, she needs to decide whether she wants to continue the pregnancy.

Then there’s Adela, a high school competitive swimmer with eyes on making the Olympic team, who becomes pregnant back at home in Indiana. Sent to spend her pregnancy with her grandmother, Adela is immediately attracted to “The Girls” and their wildness. Soon, she befriends them and becomes entangled in a love triangle steeped in manipulation and dishonesty.

Emory, meanwhile, is juggling so much. From caring for her baby to getting into college, Emory has more than enough on her plate. But when she finds herself attracted to a person other than her boyfriend, Emory begins to wonder what else is out there, if she’s brave enough to look.

Pulling back the curtain and debunking stereotypes of abortion and teen pregnancy, The Girls Who Grew Big is a portrayal of the primal strength of mothers, found family, and resilience against the odds.

It’s the last day of maternity leave before our protagonist returns to work. To mark the occasion, the unnamed narrator has decided to have a “farewell tour” with her small children, Felix and Rudy. With her husband on a work trip, she intends to spend the perfect day with her sons: pancakes, park, and a stop at the library.

The day is anything but perfect. From an abundance of temper tantrums to a shocking discovery in her husband’s gym bag, the protagonist is hanging on by a thread—and it’s not even noon. A Mrs. Dalloway for our era, Natural Disaster is hard not to race through. Marrying humor, tension, and so much realness of raising two under four, Natural Disaster bursts out of the gate and doesn’t stop galloping until the final page. Relatable on so many levels, parents and non-parents will devour this novel.

Nightbitch is exhausted. Her husband is often on the road for work, leaving her with their toddler, who rarely sleeps through the night. Left with few options, she turns to the library where she discovers a book that describes, at least in part, what she’s going through. No, it's not about new motherhood; she thinks she’s turning into a dog.

A former gallerist, the unnamed narrator begins to rethink her stance on motherhood. To her, it might be the grandest art form she hadn't yet considered. So, as Nightbitch progresses through her transformation, readers are given a front row seat to the violence that occurs during birth and resentment (and subsequent guilt) that may follow.

Whether you watched the movie before the book (or vice versa), Nightbitch invites readers to confront uncomfortable truths about parenthood. Framed by an absurdist (and delightful) premise, this bestseller might have one of the most honest portrayals of motherhood—fur and all.

Rocky and her family are at their longtime summer rental in Cape Cod for the week. As the days meander, Rocky reflects on past summers when her children were little, and her parents’s health was less of a worry. But now, with her youngest about to vault into adulthood, she has other things on her mind. Like caring for her parents and dealing with the monstrosity that is menopause, and the long-buried memories that surface with the current. Memories she’s never talked about.

Epitomizing the meaning of a big-hearted novel, Sandwich brims with humor, nostalgia, and a family you might wish would adopt you. With unforgettable characters (fortunately, there’s a sequel if you want more Rocky in your life) and a relatable plot, Newman captures the fleeting chapter of being a caregiver to family members across generations.

You can’t talk about motherhood without discussing the societal pressures placed on parents. In this near-future dystopian novel, newly single mom Frida is exhausted. She’s had several sleepless nights lately and is utterly overwhelmed. So, with a work deadline looming and fatigue settling into her bones, she makes a choice that changes her life: She leaves her toddler, Harriet, home alone for a bit.

After her neighbors hear Harriet crying, they report Frida to the authorities. According to protocol, Frida is entered into a social services program that assesses her ability to mother Harriet. During the investigation, her daughter will live with her ex and his new wife (ouch). The chaperoned visits, also held at her ex’s place (double ouch), do not go according to plan, and soon, Frida is sent to a school where “bad mothers” learn to be good. Should she fail the program, Frida may lose custody of her daughter for good. But with harrowing tests and impossible expectations, an uphill battle stands between Frida and reuniting with Harriet.

Damning and engrossing, The School for Good Mothers forces readers to confront their own biases while engaging in a deeply immersive and propulsive plot. Fans of The Handmaid’s Tale, Chain-Gang All-Stars, and Hum will relish this sharply rendered portrait of parenthood and the systems that surround it.

To some, birth is a beginning. But it’s also, in some ways, an end. The birthing parent’s life as they knew it is over. Soldier ruminates on all the ways her world has changed since having Sailor, her now 4-year-old son.

She confesses this to him as he sleeps—grappling with the whole-body love she feels for him and the grief over losing elements of her former self. But it's not only she who's changed. Her marriage has changed, too. Soldier observes the emotional and mental load she carries compared to her husband. Then, she has a chance encounter with an old friend, supercharging her imagination.

In Soldier Sailor, Claire Kilroy untangles the messy, marvelous, and mundane elements of being a mom. Unsparing yet lyrical, this novel zooms in on the tough parts of parenting while honoring the unfathomable love it can bring, too.

The pressures on mothers are staggering. Still Born pushes against such pressures, illuminating the harsh, unrelenting demands that pregnant people (and new parents) encounter daily. But this isn’t some grim or heady read. In fact, hope seeps through the pages.

Close friends Alina and Laura are tackling their mid-30s. All is going smoothly until life pokes its head out of the sand. Previously, the two bonded over their choices to remain childless. But now, Alina begins to feel an unexpected pull toward motherhood. So, when Alina becomes pregnant and learns her baby likely won’t survive birth, she begins to reconsider her views on mothering. And as the friends move through Alina’s pregnancy, they realize that maternal instincts can stretch far beyond biological ties.

Not everyone gets to play Emily in Our Town. But Lara, the narrator in this Ann Patchett favorite, has had the opportunity multiple times: First in high school and then later with Tom Lake, a theater company in northern Michigan. Cut to the present day, and it’s the middle of the COVID lockdown, and Lara is no longer an actress. She’s a cherry farmer who’s guiltily loving having her three adult daughters home.

As Lara and her daughters pick cherries, the topic of Peter Duke, actor of George Clooney-level stardom, comes up—because, once upon a time, Lara and Peter starred in the same production of Our Town and led a very hot, very heavy romance. However, this time Lara doesn’t hold back, now that the girls are old enough to hear the details. A spectacular account of motherhood and the identity that stretches beyond the label, Tom Lake rolls without a ripple. Lush, vibrant, and intimate, this novel is as intoxicating as it is enthralling.

April Soto had never really gotten out of Philadelphia, becoming a mom in high school. So, when her friends are out partying and planning their futures, April has been caring for her daughter, Noelle. Sharing her home with her mother, grandmother, and daughter, April sometimes feels like the walls are closing in. Especially when her anger takes over. One night at dinner, her rage reaches new proportions, causing April to run out of the house and leave Noelle with her family. At first, she thought she’d be gone a week or a bit longer—enough time to cool off.

As days pass and April experiences the rites of passage she hadn't gotten to, she finds it more difficult to go back. Primarily an epistolary novel, The White Hot captures the frequent disparity between opportunities provided to mothers and fathers, lost youth (and dreams), and multi-generational trauma and love. A snack of a book, this page-turner won’t let you out of its grip once you start reading.

"Romance, escapism, and truth-telling— plus it’s a novel? I sobbed, I laughed, I stopped speaking to my partner in Hawaii because I couldn’t put it down. Yes, there are sexual escapades (with a wonderfully soapy curb), but what lingers is the depth of the protagonist’s longing and July’s commitment to honoring and excavating it."

"Examines his coming of age years with a complicated, often absent father. Flynn grew up in my hometown of Scituate, MA, which makes it feel even more intimate."

"Brilliantly dark, funny, and poetic. The novel details depression during a summer internship in N.Y.C. In light of Plath’s death, the semi-autobiographical novel could read mostly morose, but I sense that she’d want us to feel seen through her writing, and to laugh."

"I happened to be waiting tables for Gabrielle Hamilton, chef and owner of Prune restaurant in N.Y.C., when this came out. I devoured her book but could barely keep eye contact after, out of admiration (which was a problem—she was my boss). Her ability to write about food like confession and confession with frankness is so rare. Her cookbook Prune and follow-up memoir Next of Kin are must-reads."

"I stand by calling this a traumedy. Creepy but clever and often funny. A girl who wants a better life finds a warped version of it…both a warning and a fantasy for kids in dysfunctional homes (and for adults looking back)."

"WASP dysfunction might be one of my guilty pleasures. I love the dialogue and the desperation of a fraying intellectual family in the Midwest trying to appear well-adjusted. A pocket of white American self-delusion."

"A 1997 photo book documenting youth culture in Los Angeles, often centered on girls. A visual coming of age and inspiration for PEN15."

"Written in 2006, it was ahead of its time. Through Bechdel’s candor, she examines a complex father-daughter relationship through her graphic novel, making it feel singular."

"Made into a good movie, but to me the book was a revelation! Partially raised by his mother’s psychiatrist, Burroughs retells his childhood in a way that feels like adult Roald Dahl meets Sedaris. He has the ability to make a distressing memory somewhere you want to stay."

"My first childhood traumedy. The emotional arc of wanting more pasta endlessly until your greed ruins everything (including your community and Strega Nona’s trust) is never not relevant. And funny."

"Irby is unapologetically forth coming with what and how she shares. She mines humor from depression, illness and relationships."

"Tracks mundane absurdism of everyday life while a taking us through a dream world, dissecting abuse, trauma, and a protagonist’s fall into a different life. My all-time favorite novel (Kafka On the Shore is another top)."

In 2020, Jen Hatmaker had the shock of her life. In the middle of the night, she awoke to her husband, Brandon, messaging another woman he was having an affair with. Co-founders and prominent figures of Austin New Church in Texas, news of the couple's divorce incited waves of criticism.

Adrift, Hatmaker took a hard look at her life, her role in her marriage’s failure, and the values of her faith. After much reflection, remorse, and growth, Hatmaker vowed not to be a bystander in the second half of her life. What’s more, she became a staunch supporter of queer rights, pro-choice advocacy and racial equality, further distancing herself from her former congregation—and the evangelical community. Learning how to trust herself and say “yes” to opportunity, Hatmaker proves much can be gained after you lose it all.

This one goes out to anyone who has lost themselves in a relationship. Cherry has only wanted the best for her husband, Tom. She even encouraged him to pursue his comic, Thursday, which features Baby, a character so like Cherry it’s unmissable. Now, as Thursday reaches new heights by becoming a movie, Tom coasts on a high from newfound fame in L.A., while Cherry is home in Omaha, taking care of his dog and spectating at his success from afar.

When the movie trailer drops, featuring a less-than-flattering portrayal of Baby, Cherry struggles to keep a low profile in their hometown, while wrestling with her marriage becoming a dumpster fire. But then she meets Russ, who slowly helps her remember who she is. Big-hearted and tender, Cherry Baby is a loving reminder that divorce is just the end of one chapter—there’s hope (and really good sex) in the ones ahead.

Transwoman Reese used to think her girlfriend Amy was endgame. But then came betrayal…and a baby. Reese is shellshocked (and a little pissed) when Amy decides to detransition and become Ames. As a result, they split up, tossing Reese’s hopes for the future in the garbage. Adhering to the long-respected adage, Reese attempts to get over her ex by getting under someone new. Often. Meanwhile, Ames is getting to know himself—and building a new relationship with his boss, Katrina.

When Katrina reveals she’s pregnant and unsure about motherhood, Ames reaches out to the only person he can trust, Reese. Arguably one of the messiest love triangles to grace the pages of a novel, Reese, Ames, and Katrina stumble toward understanding themselves, one another, and what family can mean when you let go of convention. Read this if you need a reminder that change isn't necessarily catastrophic.

Earning significant buzz when it first came out in 2023, Good Material introduces readers to broken-hearted Andy, who’s reeling from his recent breakup with Jen. Bereft, he flails through London, attempting to recover. From living on a houseboat to revving up his stand-up routine, Andy isn’t afraid to put it all out there for the sake of moving on (which would be much easier if their mutual friends would stop telling him about Jen’s glow-up).

As Andy trudges through the horror that is singlehood in the modern age, readers watch as he slowly emerges from his misery—just in time for a surprise twist that turns the whole plot on its head. Fans of HBO's Rooster, Bridget Jones’s Diary, and any '90s rom-coms featuring Hugh Grant will relish in Alderton’s sharp wit and endearing characters.

If writing a thinly veiled novel about your cheating husband isn’t cathartic, we don’t know what is. Rom-com aficionado Nora Ephron took inspiration from her marriage—and divorce—to journalist Carl Bernstein with Heartburn. The novel follows Rachel, a cookbook author who’s seven months pregnant, as she discovers (via a worryingly intimate inscription in a book!) that her husband, Mark, is having an affair with Thelma.

Leaving their house in D.C. to return home to Manhattan, Rachel is confronted with how common infidelity is. But after a harrowing experience during group therapy, Rachel goes back to D.C. to see if the marriage can be salvaged. Once there, she’s met with the reality of how serious Mark is about Thelma—leading her to grapple with the difficult truth of leaving someone you love(d) and what it’s like to start anew, especially as a single parent.

Perfect if you love Ephron’s movies (When Harry Met Sally...., Sleepless in Seattle, You’ve Got Mail, etc.) or authors like Emily Henry or Abby Jimenez, Ephron’s novel will have you laughing on one page and sobbing on the next. (That’s a good thing.)

"If you weren’t laughing, you’d be crying" might be a decent subtitle for this humming debut. A tragicomedy if there ever was one, the unnamed narrator, a Chinese-American woman, is finding her footing after learning her husband is having an affair with a woman named Maggie. That is, until she discovers her breast pain is more serious than she thought: It’s cancer. She names the tumor Maggie.

Katie Yee's moving novel follows the narrator as she works through her recovery from cancer, her husband’s betrayal, and the end of her marriage. While she longs to wallow, she has children to care for, groceries to buy, and schoolwork to help with. Life goes on. But somewhere in the mundanity, she begins to reclaim her heritage and pass it down to her children. Once locked in a power struggle with her husband over bedtime, the narrator now has the freedom to tell her children Chinese folktales, as her mother did for her. Beautifully woven throughout the novel, these stories invoke a timelessness that reaches beyond the narrator, reminding readers that stories can persist through the most difficult struggles.

If you’ve ever lurked on an ex’s Instagram or obsessed over how a relationship fell apart, Notes on Heartbreak might be for you. To grasp how she missed the downfall of her long-term partnership, Annie Lord looks back in this memoir, beginning with the end of her relationship. From there, Lord picks her way through the past, searching for warning signs that the relationship was doomed.

As she tries to find the writing on the wall, she recounts the absurdity of dating apps, random hookups, and generally being single in a world of motivational memes. Meanwhile, her ex haunts her on social media, posting as if unfettered by heartbreak. Lord, as you can guess, is very fettered by heartbreak.

Throughout the memoir, Lord takes a hard look at how, increasingly, people are less willing to be vulnerable when dating. This stays with her as she begins to understand and appreciate the other side of heartbreak: that she's hurt because she took a risk. That she leapt into love without a net, enabling her to experience deep care and connection, if only for a time. Read this if you still crash out to the '90s Romeo + Juliet soundtrack (which is totally worth revisiting, if not).

Bringing new meaning to “Till death do us part,” The Perfect Divorce is the follow-up to Jeneva Rose’s wildly popular thriller, The Perfect Marriage. Readers meet Sarah 11 years after defending her ex-husband, Adam, against charges of murdering his mistress (yeah, you read that right). Now, happily married to Bob, Sarah believes the drama is behind her. Then she discovers Bob is having an affair, leading her to file for divorce.

As if working through an increasingly heated divorce wasn't enough on her plate, Sarah learns that Adam’s case has been reopened, bringing an irritating detective back to her world. But that's not all: The woman Bob was hooking up with disappears. Unfolding across Bob and Sarah’s perspectives, The Perfect Divorce definitely belongs in your travel bag this season.

From literary giant Jamaica Kincaid comes an intense story of a marriage on the cusp of collapse. Told through a lyrical stream of consciousness, readers get a front row seat to Mr. and Mrs. Sweet’s marriage. While Mrs. Sweet is busy caring for their children, running the house, and generally ensuring the family’s life runs smoothly, Mr. Sweet harbors absolute contempt for his wife. As the book progresses, tension thickens to the point you could crack it with a hammer.

Unique, unsparing, and experimental, See Now Then is another banger from Kincaid. For those looking to broaden their reading scope, engage with a hearty yet slim novel, or check out work from one of the best in the game, See Now Then depicts the pain and unease that comes when your relationship is on the verge of crumbling.

This novel sounds like the setup of a joke: A private investigator, undercover vigilante, and housewife walk into a dog park. Fortunate for us, author Camille Perri didn’t stop there, delivering a zinger of a novel. Set in the well-heeled D.C. suburbs, Val, the P.I. in the book’s holy trinity, has been hired by a man to determine if his wife, June, is cheating on him. June, meanwhile, has little idea her husband is high-key spying on her—and only a hunch he could be, like, a full-blown jerk.

Obsessed with her dog, June is a regular at Hamilton Dog Park, where prosecutors, lobbyists and stay-at-home dog moms share in the delight of a solid poop (IYKYK). So when newbie Val arrives with a scruffy terrier, Cash (who Val may have adopted for the job), June rolls out the red carpet, appointing herself as head of the welcoming committee. But there isn’t just one fresh face at the dog park that day. Upon leaving the dog park, June encounters Alex, a woman grieving the dog she lost in an ugly divorce. June takes the distraught divorcée under her wing (paw?), encouraging her to consider getting a new pup. As the three get acquainted, Val and the divorcée become suspicious of each other, wondering what they’re hiding.

While the story crests over peaks of unhinged chaos, the plot is full of heart. Proving that sometimes, all you need are a couple of friends (and maybe a dog or three) to find your pack.

Divorce doesn’t define you. To prove this, Leslie Jamison unspools a striking memoir about motherhood, creativity, and, sure, some marriage, too. After an intense relationship with C., she agrees to marry him. But possibly not for the right—or at least traditional—reasons. Rather, she wants to commit to something to quell her wild ways. The marriage devolves.

With sharp precision and compact sentences that pack a punch, Jamison revisits her childhood and crucial moments from her past that led her to marry C. In possession of inscrutable self-awareness, Jamison braids together her personal history and vision for the future. Ideal for someone fresh out of a marriage, new parents, or anyone else curious about how culture and childhood shape us and our relationships, Splinters zooms out to invite readers to look at the full picture.

Whew, does Belle Burden have a story to tell. It’s so insane you might not believe it’s real (but it is). Burden, a New York socialite, had been happily married to James (not his real name) for over 20 years. With the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, the couple and two of their children decamped to their home on Martha’s Vineyard. While navigating new safety measures and the wonkiness of remote work and school, Burden and her husband tackle each new hurdle as a team. But one night, Burden receives a phone call that changes everything: It’s the husband of the woman who’s having an affair with James.

From there, things only get stranger. After declaring he still loves Belle that night, the next morning, she wakes up to James standing in their bedroom doorway to inform her that he’s changed his mind. He’s leaving and doesn’t want their properties or custody of their kids, effectively severing ties with their family. From there, readers follow Belle while she confronts her new reality, navigates truly mind-boggling exchanges with her now-ex, and steps into the role as her children's sole caregiver.

While incredibly privileged, readers may relate to the dizzying whirlwind caused by a harsh ending. A whiz of a read (I devoured it in one sitting!), Strangers tells the true story of one woman’s unwanted journey into finding herself amidst the rubble of her past life.

"Smith is a great novelist—warm and funny. Following her mother's death, an indie rocker and her father go on the Alaskan cruise her parents were supposed to take on their 40th anniversary. Smith always leaves her characters in a better place than she found them."

"This one is scary! What would happen if some children got off their cruise ship and had to find their way back home? Terrifying! I read this book before my children were old enough to get up to some hijinks, and now it sounds even scarier. Maile Meloy is one of my very favorite novelists, and this book proves she can write suspense with the best of them."

"This is probably Agatha Christie's most famous novel—the ever-dapper Hercule Poirot is simply trying to take a vacation, but when a beautiful young woman is murdered, he has no choice but to solve the crime. Literally, what else could he do? Agatha Christie is the absolute queen of mysteries, and if you haven't read one in a few decades, now is a great time to dive back in."

"Laura Lippman is one of my favorite contemporary thriller writers—her books are always sharp and funny and delightful. A former assistant to a PI goes on a Parisian cruise, meets a man, and then the man winds up dead! I hate it when that happens!"

"This is not the boat trip of anyone's dreams. A married couple set sail for a trip around the world, only to have their boat destroyed by a whale. The rest of their voyage is on a tiny raft, where they just try to survive. (They both survive.) What is more interesting is not the eating of fish and the desperation, but what happens to a marriage at sea? I think that's why this book was such a big hit; everyone loses their mind thinking about being stranded in the ocean with only their spouse."

"The granddaddy of all sea-faring books! Maybe you read it in high school, maybe it's been on your TBR list forever. Maybe this is the year you read Moby Dick! There's a reason Melville's classic has stayed relevant all these years. The open sea is a thrilling place, full of danger! A rollicking good time."

"Like A Marriage at Sea, Gaige's 2020 novel tells the story of a couple who decide to set sail together, in this book, with their two small children in tow. If it all went right, that wouldn't be a very interesting novel, now would it? Gaige is a beautiful writer and goes back and forth between the married couple's voices to tell their story. Warning: maybe the least likely to make you want to go sailing."

Based on the 1621 Vardø witch trials in Norway, this eerily prescient novel follows Maren, a young woman besieged by grief. Standing on the coast of her remote Nordic town, she can only watch as a storm throttles the sea—and the fishing boat with the village’s men on board, resulting in their watery deaths. As she and the other women on shore confront the unforgiving climate and rebuild in the absence of their partners, fathers, brothers, and sons, they strike a unique harmony, completing chores and tasks formerly prohibited. But their independence is short-lived when a government official comes to oversee the women’s work, act as a missionary, and ensure nothing gets out of hand. Obviously, everything gets out of hand.

Maren is caught in the center of this domestic storm: She befriended Ursa, the official’s wife, whom he married during his travels to the village. And, as their bond strengthens, more of their friendship is threatened, especially as the official begins to suspect some of the village women are conducting witchcraft.

Verla wakes dry-mouthed and woozy. After taking stock, she ascertains that she’s been drugged and transported to a dingy cell…somewhere. Soon, another prisoner, Yolanda, whirls into the room. The two then confront their reality: While they were unconscious, they were abducted to an unknown location. Then they meet the others. Composed of 10 women formerly ensnared in sex scandals, none of the women can recall how they arrived at the defunct sheep station that’s (possibly) in the Australian Outback. What they do know is that they are at the mercy of two male prison guards who have no issue putting the women to work in the grueling heat while also fixing meals and generally ensuring that no one dies at the hands of this nightmare. Time passes, and the prison's foundation begins to crumble.

On its 10th anniversary, The Natural Way of Things remains as relevant as when it first came out. Inspired by a real, troubling institution that existed in 1960s Australia, this dystopic novel is an incisive examination of gender, sexuality, and power dynamics. Charlotte Wood inserts the reader straight into the jaws of her story, never relenting until the devastating end. If you raced through I Who Have Never Known Men or The Handmaid’s Tale and are looking for something with the same bite, this book belongs on your TBR.

Jesmyn Ward, one of the best living writers in the U.S., crafted this historical fiction tale about redemption, escape, and survival. Annis descends from warriors and is plied with her stories about her ancestors and combat traditions from her mother, Sasha. Enslaved in the Carolinas by a horrible abuser, Annis is the daughter of the man who terrorizes her mother and eventually separates them. He sells her mother as punishment for arguing against his criminal desires, and soon enough, he sends Annis on the same deplorable Louisiana enslaved persons trade. The only way to get there: on foot.

As Annis and other enslaved people embark on the horrific trek, she meditates on the stories her mother told her about her grandmother, Mama Aza, and encounters several spirits along the way. But there is one entity, Aza, who is at once the most disturbing and severe. Though distrustful, Aza claims she previously guided Annis’s mother and grandmother. After Annis journeys south, where she's sold to the heartless owners of a sugar plantation, an opportunity presents itself—and Annis enters the unknown, using every skill she has to begin anew and possibly, free.

Unspooled in Ward’s unfaltering and lyrical prose, Let Us Descend teems with Annis’s drive for survival, tapping into her ancestral strength, the otherworldly intervention of Aza. Blending Ward’s command of magical realism to draw a sharp portrait of reality, this is a novel that demands to be sat with. A wonderful option to be read with a friend or book club—interpretations and impressions are sure to abound.

Uniquely qualified to write a book about survivalist reality TV gone awry, Blair Braverman taps into her experience as a long-distance dog sledder and one-time contestant on Naked and Afraid. Her novel, Small Game, features Mara, a teacher at a wilderness school, where she mostly teaches rich people how not to die during a night camping. But when she's offered a chance to compete on the competition series Civilization, the reward money is enough to convince her to move forward.

Soon enough, she finds herself with four other contestants dropped in the middle of an unknown forest with no food, each armed with a single tool. As filming progresses, the competitors are shocked to discover that their producers, camera operators—the whole team—have seemingly abandoned her and the rest of the cast in the forest. Unsure whether this is a component of the show or if something larger is awry, Mara must tap into her strengths (finding edible plants, etc.) and weaknesses (trusting anyone) to live long enough to find out the answer.

With her extensive background, Braverman renders a searing portrait of human connection, resilience, and endurance.

Marguerite de la Rocque is born into French nobility in the 16th century. Though steeped in privilege, the young aristocrat encounters hardship early in life when she becomes an orphan and is placed under the guardianship of her cousin, Jean-Francois, who squanders her fortune. As Marguerite matures, she becomes profoundly aware of the dissonance pervading her life. For one, she brims with thoughts and ideas but has no one to share them with—especially considering her role is to be seen, not heard. She carries the weight of a noble title yet is destitute. And then her cousin forces her to accompany him on his voyage to Canada. Things only get worse.

Abandoned on a windswept island with her lover, Jean-Francois’s secretary, and her lifelong companion, Damienne, a servant who acts as the primary maternal force in Marguerite’s life, the three must confront the unyielding and frigid climes of the island. As Marguerite’s noble persona fades, she steps, finally, into her own personhood. But while shelter and food are scarce, sacrifices and heartache are in endless supply. And it’s a gamble if she’ll get off the island to reveal her true nature to the others who forced her to suppress it.

With flavors of Game of Thrones (or any of its spin-offs)—minus the fantasy—Isola is a haunting story based on a real woman. This briny book will hook you with its propulsive prose and so much tension it’s like watching an Oscar winner get announced. Read this if you’re itching for a book that will set sail your imagination with an utterly compelling plot.

If you’ve been meaning to cut down your backlist, start here. The third novel from national treasure Ann Patchett is steeped in so much atmosphere that humidity lifts off the page. Dr. Marina Singh lands in Brazil to find her former mentor, Dr. Annick Swenson, after learning her colleague with the same task—finding Annick and discovering what she's researching for Vogel Pharmaceuticals—has died.

Marina is led through the Amazon, dodging anacondas and whatever else is lurking in the rainforest’s shadows with the help of Easter, a local deaf boy. As they wind through mosquito-laden rivers, the air thickens as memories of a tragic loss swarm in Marina’s mind. Haunted and hot (is there any worse combo?), Marina stumbles on something that may impact women’s fertility forever. But, with dangerously fickle side effects, Marina must decide what sacrifices are worthy and which are a waste of her dwindling time in her mission. A remarkable piece of fiction, State of Wonder is super-charged with illustrious descriptions and complex characters faced with unthinkable dilemmas.

A young girl is a wild thing. Tamed by societal expectations, rules, and at times, hard lessons, it's rare for a young woman to regress to her original state. Unless, that is, you’re a character in a Lauren Groff novel.

Such is the case for the main character called "the girl" in this 17th-century-set novel. Fleeing a small settlement, gripped by famine in Virginia, she ventures into the wilderness with little protection, food, or direction. The girl finds herself dazzled by the beauty of the woods and bewildered by the constant demand to maintain her safety. As her journey continues, she sheds her terrible past and the scars of belonging to a colonizer settlement, transforming into something simpler: a creature living in the natural world.

Encountering only a few people along her quest, The Vaster Wilds widens its worldview with intentional flashbacks. The others who do cross her path are so well rendered that you might forget they’re only designated a chapter. With an ending that may leave you in tears, this novel is a triumph, perfect for reading outdoors in the fresh spring air.

From Charlotte McConaghy, author of Wild Dark Shore, Migrations is a climate fiction novel about a woman pursuing the last migration of terns to Antarctica. Because there’s nothing like a little adventure to escape your past, Franny talks her way onto a fishing boat headed south to follow the seabirds on their final voyage. This may be her only chance to see them, now that rising sea levels have led to the extinction of most birds, animals, and fish.

Franny, flighty as a bird, has a hard time feeling caged, causing her to flitter away whenever she detects the walls are closing in. Confined to the small fishing boat, she grapples with her violent past and a complicated tragedy that drove her to track the flock. Typical of McConaghy’s skill of depicting complex women who spend little time worrying about being likable, Migrations rings with lyrical prose that helped make Wild Dark Shore a standout.

In the 1970s in Uruguay, queerness was condemned by the government, punished with rape, torture, and/or imprisonment. With their lives on the line, five vastly different women, from a housewife to a teenager, leave the town of Montevideo and find a haven, a small hut, in Cabo Polonio, a discreet fishing village. Drawn to a distant shack, they finally have a respite from the horror unleashed by the military. But, to remain safe (and to keep anyone from looking for them), they must return home. So the women dodge and finesse their way out of being discovered, returning to Cabo Polonio to make the hut a home, enjoy fire-charred fish, and negotiate with the moody coastline.

The craggy landscape mirrors the women’s growth as they come to rely on one another not only to keep their secrets safe, but to resist external forces that cause them to shrink from their truth. Despite the low-frills lifestyle in Cabo Polonio, they thrive in one another’s presence. Here, they navigate heartache and love, disappointment and self-discovery, all the while tending to their modest home. Told from various perspectives and shifting timelines, Cantoras pays homage to queer folks’s resolve, found family, and the refusal to live in fear and oppression. Pick this one up if The Great Believers by Rebecca Makkai ruined you (like, in a good way), you’ve rewatched Pose 10 million times, or if Atmosphere by Tara Jenkins Reid was on the top of your 2025 favorites.

If The God of the Woods by Liz Moore and Stephen King’s classic Misery had a spunky little sister, it’d be What Wild Women Do. Screenwriter Rowan and her husband, aspiring novelist Seth, have booked a cabin deep in the Adirondacks to kickstart their respective writing projects. One day, during a hike, they come across a dilapidated camp. Through some casual rummaging, they learn that the site operated as a women’s wilderness camp in the 1970’s led by socialite, Eddie Calloway. A newly turned feminist, Eddie reopened the camp to encourage women to embrace their wildness and commune with nature. But it all came crashing down when Eddie mysteriously vanished. 40 years later, and Rowan is transfixed by the mystery and soon finds herself hunting down clues that may explain Eddie’s disappearance.

Spanning multiple timelines narrated by Rowan and Eddie, this mystery-thriller book is categorically unputdownable. With a satisfying ending set deep in the wooded atmosphere, you’ll want to pass this one around the campfire when you’re through.

If you can’t get enough of reality TV books, add this to the top of your list. Participating in a competition series, Lily arrives at the Compound with nine other “girls.” They're meant to tidy up the Compound until “the boys," who were dropped in the middle of the desert, arrive. As the contestants do their best to follow the game’s rules, they also must complete “personal tasks” to be rewarded with items like food, makeup, and robes. And as the game progresses, the personal tasks become more intense, especially when contestants start getting banished. See, no one wants to have to return to the world outside the Compound: It’s a hell pit.

As elimination competitions become more dangerous in this dystopian read, so too do the stakes of not winning (including missing a water shipment). The group numbers drop, some by choice, others by darker forces. Who knows if Lily will be able to live with what she must do to be the last person standing? A blend of The Hunger Games, Love Island, and Squid Games, The Compound is a delicious thriller-satire that’ll make you rethink signing up for any reality show.

"A marvelously strange novel that purports to be a gourmand’s treatise, with roving interludes on bellinis and the philosophy of pleasure, before revealing itself, almost imperceptibly, to be a story about murder."

"I love a single-sitting book, and this novel is sensuous and transportive while remaining spare and economical…hard to pull off! It follows a self-taught cook finding his place in a restaurant kitchen, offering little wisdoms like: 'right away, cooking entails other people; it entails the presence of others contained within the cake like the genie in the lamp.'"

"Perhaps I have a preoccupation with food and murder, but this book about a seductress accused of killing men she feeds is utterly propulsive and the hungriest a novel has made me in years. It inspired a snack I love: fresh white rice drizzled with soy sauce and a pat of the eponymous salted butter."

"Oh Laurie, my north star. So comforting to read her chiding, incisive, and hilarious writing. I often think about the scene where she labors over a pasta that turns out so gluey even her stoned friend suggests going out to dinner. I love reading a chapter before bed each night, pure comfort."

"So strange, twisting, and immersive. Zhang describes food in such embodied, sensory detail that I feel like I am right there beside her chef narrator, folding cream into shortcakes even as the world surrounding her succumbs to dystopia."

"As the culture of food becomes increasingly saturated, monetized, and hard to parse, I turn to Ruby for guidance. She untangles the moral panic, diet fads, and wellness dogma shaping how we eat, which is heady stuff, but what she writes goes down like a milkshake. I’ve been able to make sense of my own appetites through her work."

"My dear friend and chef Evan Hanczor gave me this book, a theological meditation on food and living by a priest. I return to it in small snippets when I’m feeling down. 'One real thing is closer to God than all the diagrams in the world.'"

If your group chat has been dogging you to read this book by author/filmmaker Miranda July, now’s the time. A married, perimenopausal artist in L.A. decides to road trip to New York to clear her head and jumpstart her work. But less than an hour from home, she pulls off the freeway into a small town, where she meets a mechanic. Soon, they begin a torrid, sexy scheme—kind of. Torn between their undeniable attraction and their marriages they’ve been working to resuscitate, it’s unclear what will come of them. A book on sexual (re)awakening, creativity, and marriage, All Fours went viral for a reason. Come for the steamy encounters, stay for the unhinged everything else.

Folks who devoured Will There Ever Be Another You? by Patricia Lockwood or have a soft spot for Rachel Cusk will especially enjoy this nutty novel.

A sprawling epic, everyone should try (it is, in fact, really long) at least once to read Anna Karenina. This iconic love story features a rotating cast of characters and so much drama it might leave you saying, Traitors, who? Set in 19^th-century Russia, Anna Karenina is a married aristocrat who’s visiting Moscow from St. Petersburg. She’s come to town to help her brother salvage his marriage after his affair with the governess was discovered. While in Moscow, she meets Count Vronsky and the two race into an affair of their own.

But when Anna and Vronsky return to Russia from a trip to Italy, she finds that she’s been exiled by her former social circle because of her affair. And so goes the sprawling story of Anna and Vronsky—one of betrayal, forbidden love, turmoil, and class. With rich subplots that could be standalone novels, intricate character development, and scene setting by one of the best to ever be in the game, Anna Karenina is an all-time classic sure to sink you into its moody tension and breathless proclamations of love from the first page.

Greta has broken up with her fiancé and moved to the Hudson Valley, living in a dilapidated barn with her dog and the homeowner, Sabine. Setting out on a new chapter, Greta secures a job transcribing sessions for Om, a sex and relationships therapist. Drunk off all the gossip she’s guzzling, Greta becomes fixated on one patient in particular, a married woman whom she’s coined Big Swiss.

Then, one day at the dog park, Greta recognizes Big Swiss’s voice, and soon enough, they become involved. Greta keeps her secret from Big Swiss, knowing that should she find out, it would end them. Greta falls hard for Big Swiss, and things appear to be progressing. That is, until Big Swiss invites her to visit her and her husband at home.

Like a season of In Treatment gone off the rails, Big Swiss is at once comical and heart-wrenching, portraying one woman’s love fest as another’s side piece. Does it get more painful than that? We say no.

What would you do if you were heartbroken, but wrote romance novels for a living? Welp, this is the predicament Florence has landed in. Working as a ghostwriter for one of the top romance authors, Florence is mired in the aftermath of a messy breakup. And though the last thing she wants to do is write about romance, she needs to keep a grip on her career—even if she thinks love is for losers. Making matters worse, her hottie editor won’t extend her deadline on her latest project. But all that stress is overshadowed by the unexpected death of her father.

Back at home, Florence helps prepare for her father’s funeral. Then a ghost interrupts her mourning. (The nerve!) Over time, she realizes that the ghost is, in fact, her editor (some writers have nightmares about this), swinging by from the afterlife to help her complete her project ahead of its looming deadline. As they work together, their chemistry erupts. But what happens if you fall in love with a ghost? Is anything more forbidden than that?

Low-key Casper for adults, avid Ali Hazelwood followers will savor the setup and lovable characters. (Psst: Watch Ghost after this.)

All hail weird girl lit. The reigning high priestess of the subgenre, Ottessa Moshfegh, announced herself with this award-winning, disturbing yet quirky novel. It’s the early '60s, and Eileen works as a secretary at a juvenile detention center. Here, Eileen is immersed in the prison's ongoings, even developing a crush on one of the guards. Her day-to-day is shaken up when a new hire, a counselor named Rebecca, joins the staff. Rebecca is everything Eileen is not: glamorous, flirtatious, and mysterious. And suddenly, Eileen spins off into an entirely new orbit, becoming infatuated with her new colleague.

More accurately, she’s besotted. As she idolizes Rebecca, she pictures a life where she’s more like her coworker and less like, well, herself. As the two spend time together, Eileen begins to mirror Rebecca's appearance and mannerisms. But Rebecca isn’t some flawless angel. In fact, she harbors her own strange obsessions. So, when a prison matter is brought to Rebecca, Eileen becomes ensnared in a misunderstanding that could send her to prison.

A masterful, dizzying tale wound by one of lit fic’s contemporary greats, Moshfegh brings new meaning to letting your freak flag fly.

This one is for all the romantasy girlies. The first of the Angels of Elysium trilogy, Feather introduces Leigh, an angel who’s currently working to earn her feathers and complete her wings. To do so, she must reform a human sinner by having them perform an act of kindness.

Once her wings are fully feathered, she will be allowed to rise to Elysium and have the chance to marry a seraph, a powerful angel. Should Leigh entice him into marriage, she would be able to influence Elysium and bring it into modernity. But first, Leigh must finish her wings. With less than 100 feathers to go, Leigh takes on a Triple, which will garner plenty of feathers to do the trick. But there's a catch: A Triple is the worst type of human sinner, and the one she takes on, Jarod, is the leader of the Paris Mafia.

For those pining for the next book in the A Court of Thorns and Roses series, or deep in their latest rewatch of True Blood, this novel will be a confectionery pleasure.

We do a happy dance anytime we learn Jessica Knoll has a new book coming out. Helpless, the author’s upcoming fourth novel, is an erotic thriller steeped in lusty tension. Faye has left L.A. to return to her alma mater in Upstate New York for her mentor’s funeral. It’s surreal to be back in the leafy enclave that helped shape her into the successful film and TV producer she is today. Though she’s happy to see her friends (and frenemies), there’s one person she’s hoping to avoid: Henry, her college ex. Despite the ages it’s been since they’ve seen each other, she’s still surprised to find him changed. No longer the person whose love was so intense it nearly broke her when she went to L.A. for an internship that would later launch her career. That guy is nowhere to be found. Now, he’s a father and husband.

So, when Henry suggests that they grab a drink, Faye is intrigued—and a little (a lot) turned on—especially because it’s been years since her husband has touched her. (That's not to mention that no one has ever touched her like Henry.) But when Henry reveals he’s the same old guy willing to compromise his marriage, her safety, and her career, Faye wonders if this isn’t what she’s been longing for. Someone who knows how to pleasure her, even if the consequences are deadly.

The 1970s were a pivotal time for a slew of reasons. Chief among them: the sexual revolution. At the opening of Lake Effect, it’s 1977, and Nina is in a stagnant marriage. She senses more is out there, but doesn’t know where to look. Then her friend gives her a copy of The Joy of Sex, and her life irrevocably changes. Instantly, her marital problems are crystallized. That’s where her neighbor comes in. As Nina’s love life heats up, her daughter’s is derailed, impacting them for years to come.

A propulsive read that covers everything from intimacy to family dynamics and trust, Lake Effect is a zip of a book. Read this in tandem with watching Mad Men for juicy vintage vibes on ever-prescient issues.

Fans of Lauren Groff’s Fates and Furies, Sliding Doors, or The Affair need to add this to their cart ASAP. New parents Cora and Sam meet at a baby group. Though both are married—happily so—to other people, their connection is undeniable. So, as they fantasize about the other, neither crosses the line of no return. Or…do they? Told over split timelines, where one features Sam and Cora walking the straight and narrow, and the other in which they indulge their curiosity and attraction, The Ten-Year Affair is a look into longing for someone other than your spouse, what it may cost, and if it’s worth it.

When we talk about forbidden love, Wuthering Heights should be on everyone's mind. Well worth a (re)read (or listen—the audiobook doesn’t disappoint) ahead of watching the newest film adaptation, Emily Brontë’s only novel delves into the tortured love of Catherine and Heathcliff. However, it’s more than love, really; what's between them is more of a cosmic connection.

But that doesn’t keep Catherine from accepting a marriage proposal from Edgar Linton, who lives at an adjacent estate to her family’s. Why would she do that when her feelings for Heathcliff are so deep? Well, for one, money. Linton belongs to the same class as Catherine and can provide a respectable social standing. Heathcliff, meanwhile, was adopted as a child and thus is lower-class than Catherine. He doesn’t stand a chance.

All that changes when, years later, Heathcliff returns newly (and mysteriously) wealthy. Then Heathcliff, riding high on his riches, seduces Linton’s sister to settle the score, infuriating Catherine and reigniting their old flame. Imbued with yearning unlike anything that came before or after, Catherine and Heathcliff put pining on the map. Brimming with toe-curling will-they-won’t-they tension, Wuthering Heights is a top classic.

Feyi, an artist, is emerging from the cloud of grief that’s been hovering over her since her husband tragically died. With her friend Joy by her side, Feyi decides to dip her toe in the dating pool. After a surprise encounter, she also begins reconnecting with her sensual side. Then she meets Nasir—he’s wonderful, and it feels like things are turning around her. Beyond her new boyfriend, her work has been selected for an exhibit at a Caribbean gallery. Needed on the island to put the finishing touches on her work, she and Nasir decide to make a trip of it and stay at his father’s compound near the gallery.

But when she meets someone unexpected on the island, everything she and Nasir have begun to build becomes threatened. Feyi must choose whether she’s willing to cross a line and potentially destroy Nasir and their relationship to explore being with someone who understands her, or play it safe and never act on the feelings churning in her stomach. A love story anchored in grief and forbidden attraction, You Made Death a Fool With Your Beauty is perfect to pack for an upcoming vacation (or to pretend you’re already on one).

"A glossy primer on ambition as endurance sport. The Devil Wears Prada captures the moment when proximity to power feels like success—until you realize you’re paying in sleep, dignity, and your sense of self. A cautionary tale about fame by association and how quickly 'just paying dues' becomes a lifestyle."

"Fame is intoxicating, but it’s also a messy group project. Daisy Jones & The Six explores what happens when raw talent collides with ego, addiction, and gendered double standards in the music industry. Not everyone survives the spotlight intact."

"This novel understands that fame isn’t neutral, it’s political. Walton unpacks how race, gender, and power shape whose art gets celebrated and whose gets erased. The price of ambition here is steep, especially for Black women navigating white-dominated creative spaces where 'genius' often comes with invisible conditions."

"A sharp, uncomfortable look at ambition in the era of 'representation.' Senna skewers the desire for visibility and validation in elite cultural spaces, asking what gets lost when success requires constant self-editing. The novel understands that representation comes with fine print—and that ambition often demands strategic self-erasure."

"Swing Time is about ambition in the shadow of someone else’s spotlight. Smith examines talent, proximity to fame, and the quiet resentments that grow when you orbit greatness but never quite touch it. It’s a study in what happens when ambition doesn’t fail; it just stalls, quietly, while you watch someone else take off."

"Not all ambition is loud. This novel explores the desire for a rich, meaningful life, and the subtle disappointment that can linger even when things go 'right.' Fame isn’t the goal, but success still sends an invoice, especially for women navigating impossible expectations."

"Egan’s nonlinear masterpiece captures ambition across time: before, during, and after the moment passes. Fame is fleeting, relevance is brutal, and the industry always moves on. The book understands that the real cost of ambition isn’t failure, but what happens when success doesn’t last the way you thought it would."

Did you stay up late bingeing Inventing Anna? Well, great news, there’s more to the story. Cover Story is another take on the Anna Delvey case—this time fictionalized, but still giving readers a front row seat to the debauchery unleashed by the notorious scammer.

In the novel, Lora, an NYU student, is struggling. Strapped for cash and time to work on her writing, Lora sees a bright light in Cat Wolff, a contributing editor at the magazine where she’s interning. Cat takes an immediate interest in Lora, urging her to work on side hustles that showcase her talents. When Lora reveals she’s drowning, having lost her scholarship, Cat steps in for the rescue...or so Lora thinks.

While at first enamored by Cat’s lifestyle—lots of parties, a place at the Plaza—she begins to wonder if some things are actually too good to be true. Propulsive and, at times, funny, Cover Story is a fresh take on the outlandish con artist who fooled N.Y.C.'s downtown elite.

Franca is hosting the dinner party from hell. Tasked with cooking for her fiancé, Andrew, an aristocratic tech bro, and his colleagues ahead of an exciting launch, Franca works hard to keep it together, even when the fridge breaks down in the middle of summer. With her main course melting and dessert yet to be made, Franca doesn’t have time to think about her relationship and what happened just before guests started arriving. Instead, Franca is fighting to stay sane, even while a table of tech bros patronizes her. Then, the guest of Andrew’s partner arrives, and a diabolical twist is delivered on a silver platter.

In conversation with Ottessa Moshfegh, Mona Awad, and Han Kang, Viola Van de Sandt's The Dinner Party is an interrogation of class, consent, and gender roles that’ll have you asking for seconds.

Money can’t buy you class, but it can cause burnout. Enter Discontent, perhaps the most accurate portrayal of millennial apathy of recent times. Marisa is a successful creative executive at a marketing agency who frequently pawns off her work onto junior colleagues so she can pop an Ativan and chill in her office. The truth: She hates her job.

Capturing the existential crisis that plagues many a millennial, Marisa is fully aware of the irrelevance of her work. But where does that leave her? There’s only so much dread a girl can handle without needing to blow off some steam. Fortunately, she has her hot AF neighbor for that, but even if this relationship feels hollow and flat. As she prepares for a company retreat, Marisa fears that she’ll blow her cover on how much she’s relied on others for her success, and what may happen to her job if her colleagues find out. Though she’s not entirely sure she’ll care.

A meditation on the millennial experience, Discontent thrusts the reader into Marisa’s perspective, illuminating her meandering motivations and nostalgia for a life that’s never happened. Maybe not a read for anyone prepping for their annual performance reviews, but still a comfort (in a way) to know that, if you’re feeling like garbage going to work every day, you’re so not alone. Fortunately, with a good book in tow, you'll get through it.

Nina is a sophomore at The University, doing everything in her power to put her flop of a freshman year behind her. The best way to do that? Rush The House, the most exclusive sorority on campus. Their alumni boast successful careers, beautiful homes, and more. But getting accepted into The House is anything but simple. So, as Nina slowly moves from one stage of recruitment to the next, she not only begins a secret relationship with one of The House’s most influential sisters but must decide how much she’s willing to put on the line to embody the values of The House.

Meanwhile, Sloane is new(ish) to The University, having foregone her tenure-track job for an adjunct role teaching sociology at the college where her husband has landed a new position. Still in the sweet, exhausted haze of caring for her baby daughter, Sloane juggles an absent partner and an unfulfilling job. But when she's suddenly asked to be the faculty advisor of The House, she becomes surrounded by highly intellectual women and finds her spark again. Still, she can't help but have questions about their annual dinner that allegedly holds the key to the women's success, inspiring her to investigate.

Haunting yet quippy, Girl Dinner serves up a propulsive read that’s both stomach-turning and intoxicating. Read this if you’ve fallen down a #RushTok rabbit hole or if you’re looking for something like Yellowjackets marinated in The Secret History, seasoned with notes of The Valley of the Dolls.

Sophie has some regrets after moving her family from Chicago to small-town Texas. First of all, she’s bored. But what's more is that she's stranded, away from her thriving career and busy city life. Sophie is straining to see the vision she had originally drawn her there: becoming a famous influencer, one of those mom/home/lifestyle gals. But it's not as easy as she imagined.

Plus, it’s more fun to lurk on Margot, a mutual friend who’s at the core of a small group of socialites in town. As Sophie and Margot begin to get to know each other, Margot invites Sophie to join her and the gals for one of their outings, which is very different from a girls’s night in Chicago.

In Texas, these evenings include shooting guns, outdrinking one another, and casually flirting with men who aren’t their husbands. That all comes to a dramatic head, however, when Sophie becomes embroiled in the homicide investigation of a teenage girl discovered where the ladies often meet for their escapades. Suddenly, Sophie begins to wonder if her friendship with Margot wasn’t just a big game—or worse. (And if you're a fan of the Netflix series adaptation, don't worry if you know all the twists and turns: the source material is just as much of a bullseye hit.)

Couldn’t get enough of the Didion & Babitz tell-all? You’re in luck. Ella Berman’s latest, L.A. Women, carries whiffs of the infamous frenemies, but even more intense. (We didn't think it was possible, but here we are!)

It’s 1975 in L.A., and Lane, respected writer and journalist, is stuck. While on paper—husband, adorable twin girls, important friends—seems incredible, she’s in a rut after her latest book was a dud. Meanwhile, her free-spirited friend, Gala, is flitting around with her rockstar boyfriend, being the same unreliable, but deeply inspiring enigma that she’s always been. Which is why, though endlessly irritating, Lane has continued her friendship with Gala: She is Lane’s muse (and pain in the ass). So, with her next book on the horizon, Lane decides to base the novel on Gala, so she can finally understand what makes her so magnetic.

But all is not so simple: Gala has gone missing. Lane works to help find her by revisiting key moments of their friendship, from their whirlwind first meeting to supporting one another’s dreams of being writers. L.A. Women features dual timelines and perspectives in sunny, breezy prose, making it an ideal read for a dreary day stuck inside.

From the author of Crazy Rich Asians, Kevin Kwan’s novel Lies and Weddings is begging to be brought on your next vacation. Henry Tong belongs to a wealthy family in England, where he lives next to Eden, a girl from a less affluent background. But Henry doesn’t mind; in fact, he’s smitten with her down-to-earth values and dedication to her work as a doctor. As Henry nurtures his feelings for Eden, his mother is on his back to marry up and save the family from destitution. (Woof.)

Henry, torn between honoring his family duty and the woman he loves, must decide before he loses everything he holds dear. As the cast of characters hops from one country to another like they’re on a bar crawl, not a plane, Lies and Weddings sings with the charm of Kwan’s other novels, and a shocking ending that will have you buzzing—and checking your airline miles.

This 2025 novel marked bestselling YA author Renée Ahdieh's adult fiction debut. If Succession and Crazy Rich Asians had a baby, it would be Park Avenue. In the novel, Ahdieh digs into ambition, the immigrant experience, corruption, and toxic families. Sounds heavy, we know, but trust: It’s enchanting (in an unhinged kind of way).

Meet Jia, the daughter of Korean immigrants who's determined to become successful, support her aging parents, and buy herself a Birkin (relatable!). A junior partner at a high-powered law firm, Jia is presented with the opportunity to make senior partner. All she has to do is manage a very high-profile, very fraught divorce between Seven and Jenny Park. Yep, those Parks. As in the billionaire Korean beauty magnate, Parks. Jia is asked by the managing director of her firm to investigate the family’s finances to ensure that the inheritance and settlement are fair and accounted for.

Inevitably, Jia finds herself at the center of a swirling (albeit luxurious) dumpster fire. She’s up for it, though, throwing herself into the assignment. But, with a leak in her midst, Jia encounters roadblock after roadblock, making her life anything but easy. The murder of a key family member only complicates her job further. A passport to the world of the ultra-wealthy, Park Avenue delivers a wild romp brimming with scandal and surprises.

Walk into just about any bookstore, and chances are you’ll find this novel (still!) on the Staff Favorites table—and for good reason. This bestseller offers a snapshot into how the 1 percent live. Meet the Stocktons, wealthy New Yorkers who have long held a foothold in the fruit streets of Brooklyn Heights, including the family manse on Pineapple Street, currently occupied by Cord and his new wife, Sasha.

Sasha has her hands full fitting into the family and getting to know her sisters-in-law, Darley and Georgina, who think Sasha is a gold digger. Told in a kaleidoscope of voices, the three women—Sasha, Darley, and Georgina—unspool the minutiae of managing family dysfunction and Big Moments (pregnancy, unemployment, self-harm) against a backdrop of profound advantages.

Significantly character-driven, don’t expect a zombie to jump out from a bodega. Instead, this story steeps you in its glorious, slow-drip drama that’ll have you gasping until the last page.

What would you sacrifice to work with your dream mentor? Well, for Maggie Wang, a struggling writer trying to make it in L.A., the question isn’t hypothetical. It’s real—and turns out, she’d give up a lot.

After suffering a humiliating blow from her boyfriend and creative writing teacher, Maggie responds to a job ad to work as an assistant for Ingrid Parker, a famous film producer who seemingly has it all. (If only people knew the lengths she’d taken for her life—and career—to seem so flawless.)

But Maggie and Ingrid embark on possibly the most toxic workplace dynamic ever to be imagined—and not even by entertainment industry standards. After Ingrid learns at a doctor's appointment that she could fall ill in the future, depending on her genes and fate, she puts her trust in a new procedure that could reverse the chances of her cells mutating into something deadly. All she needs is someone willing to part with their youth—and who better than her ambitious assistant?

One part The Substance, another part The Devil Wears Prada, The Take is a juicy, twisty take on aging, success, and race. Told in a sharp and hilarious voice, The Take is sure to be one of the hottest books of spring.

When Lian’s best friend, Wenyu, returns to Beijing after 10 years in California, everything that she’d considered stable (and enviable) goes out the window. While Lian has been nurturing a life based on her parents’s expectations, Wenyu jetted off to the U.S., making a fortune as an influencer called Vivian. Now reunited, Lian begins to view her life from Wenyu’s perspective—and doesn’t love it. The two revisit their stomping grounds as Wenyu prepares for a party celebrating her engagement to an American finance bro. But despite her forthcoming nuptials, Wenyu is harboring a major secret—one that floors even Lian, who's known her forever.

And then there's Song Chen, who throws their lives in sharp relief. He is past the age of wishful dreaming, having accepted the reality of remaining in China, though he’d once hoped to move to the U.S. While Lian and Wenyu cycle through drama, Song Chen low-key steals the show with astounding character development. A perfect read for a long plane ride, this book probes into the validity of viewing success through financial earnings and how relationships can be formed—and destroyed—by wealth.

Same but different, Wanting harkens back to cult classics like Thirteen (or more recently, Euphoria), about two friends who can’t get out of their way, tripping over their relationship on the path to self-actualization.

If you were obsessed with This Is a Robbery, the documentary about the heist at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, we have just the book for you. Claire Roth is an artist living in Boston, reeling from a scandal that nearly ruined her and her career. To get by, Claire paints imitations of famous artworks that are then sold online. Is it ethical? Maybe. Does it pay the bills? Absolutely.

When a well-known gallerist tours Claire’s collection and presents a strange, morally ambiguous arrangement to forge esteemed paintings in exchange for a solo show (and the chance to return to her previous high standing), Claire jumps on it. Nothing is ever easy, though. Is it? As it turns out, the work she's meant to replicate is the Degas painting from the Gardner Museum heist that was never recovered.

Imbued with the struggle of being a working artist, protecting one’s IP, and more, The Art Forger sings with Claire, a protagonist you root for, and a knotty plot that forges ahead with delicious surprises.

The best works of art can make you feel like you’re living inside them, transported to another world courtesy of the artist’s imagination. But what if you could actually step inside them? Skip stones on Matisse’s lily ponds or stretch alongside Degas’s ballerinas? Such is the conundrum Claire, an evening janitor at a museum, finds herself in. Night after night, she studies a face in a Matisse painting, only to learn that she can commune with the subjects themselves—inside the painting.

And so begins one of the captivating star-crossed love affairs of this millennium. Able to travel to various destinations rendered in various paintings (hello, ideal first date!), Claire must wrestle between her everyday life and true love. Perfect for anyone who’s had fantasies of spending the night in a museum, this book will hook you with its lovable characters and unique plot.

Ever wonder what a female Patrick Bateman might be like? Well, you might find out in the Boy Parts protagonist, Irina, an emerging photographer with a taste for subverting gender constructs in her work.

Irina has long pushed the boundaries in her photography. From challenging her professors at the Royal College of Art and Central Saint Martins, people have always had something to say about the fetishized feral depravity depicted in her images. Increasingly desensitized, Irina must continuously level up (down?) the scenes she captures of young men she scouts…well, everywhere. But as it becomes increasingly difficult to separate life in and out of the darkroom, Irina spirals out of control, leaving collateral damage in her wake.

Read this if you’re jonesing for something completely unhinged and a little feral, like Yellowjackets meets American Psycho.

Leave the World Behind author Rumaan Alam's Entitlement pulls back the curtain on the other side of the art world: the wealthy who run it. Brooke is a young Black woman living in N.Y.C. who’s just landed a gig at the Jaffee Foundation, the non-profit arm of billionaire Asher Jaffee’s company. Asher, an aging businessman with no heirs, has decided to part with his fortune in hopes of installing his legacy on the mantle of rich white men (cue the eye roll).

Impressed by Brooke, Asher taps her to help identify promising organizations to receive endowments. Enthralled with Asher’s world of privilege, Brooke begins to confuse her responsibilities with (ascending) value. Tension combusts between Brooke and Asher when she champions a Brooklyn-based art program for Black children. But why?

A close examination of the wealthy who own, trade, and profit from art, as well as grant access to it, Entitlement drags Brooke (and readers) into the shark-infested waters of coldhearted business. By the end, it’s sink or swim.

Well worth a reread, The Goldfinch, Donna Tartt’s doorstopper of a novel, follows Theodore, a 13-year-old who comes into possession of the painting “The Goldfinch” by Carel Fabritius, after surviving an attack at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in N.Y.C. While picking through the wreckage, Theo encounters a dying man who asks him to return a ring to his partner. With the piece of art and ring in tow, Theo embarks on a journey to protect the painting while grappling with the tragic loss of his mother and finding Pippa, a girl he spied at the museum just before his life exploded.

Told in Theo’s hypnotic voice, readers travel from Manhattan to Las Vegas and Amsterdam as the story expands as he matures and his life becomes more and more complicated. A mix of Dickens, Little Women, and the Before Sunrise trilogy, this novel invites readers to examine each chapter as if part of a greater exhibition on art, the people who love it, and who desire it at any cost.

Is it still a heist if you steal an idea from someone's mind? Erika, the main character in this tech/art thriller, definitely would like to know. Erika has been enchanted with her friend, Mathilde, ever since they met in art school. But while Erika struggles with her art, turning her energy toward their friendship, Mathilde focuses on her art. The results are staggering: Mathilde’s star rises, and Erika finds herself left in the dust.

So, when Erika becomes privy to new technology that would enable her to live inside Mathilde’s mind, she's is willing to do just about anything to get her hands on it. Capturing the unique competition between ambitious girlfriends—and the vulnerability it reveals—the novel nails the utter confusion and bewilderment of outgrowing a friendship. Tender, though not without turns of the knife, Immaculate Conception showcases jealousy, admiration, and obsession volleyed between girlfriends.

There’s nothing quite like a Jo Piazza thriller to capture the moment. Her latest, a split-timeline that follows two strong-headed, yet searching women separated by centuries, delves into the ownership and thievery of art (and if they might be the same sometimes).

First up is Emma, an American living in Paris who has just about given up on her dream of becoming an artist. After confronting challenge after challenge, Emma takes a job cleaning houses of the uber-wealthy. Then comes along Stella Swanson, one of those ultra-elite, whose husband was an esteemed art dealer, with plenty of skeletons in their closets.

Meanwhile, van Gogh’s sister-in-law, Jo, comes into possession of his castoff paintings. She takes to heart the importance of protecting her brother-in-law’s work, even if it is only drafts and doodles.

Converging with unexpected twists during a heist of Musée d’Orsay, Emma and Jo demonstrate their defiant devotion to fine art and the people who create it. Read this if you’ve been searching for something to scratch the itch after bingeing the latest Slow Horses season or if Big Little Lies is your comfort show.

Art is political. From what gets exhibited, funded, or covered by the media, the act of creating never happens in a vacuum. Wonderfully, Li turns her heist novel into a vehicle for larger commentary on colonization and the subsequent suppression of marginalized voices. Meet Will, a Harvard art history major who’s on his way to landing a coveted job at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, a feat that would make his family proud. Will loves fine art and the stories enclosed in these images and objects. But he resents them, too. Or rather, resents institutions showing stolen art for profit.

So when a wealthy businessman offers Will and several peers to steal back heritage works for an unfathomable sum, Will and his cohort of unlikely thieves must decide whether to risk it all or play it safe—and embody the colonizer’s idea of a “good immigrant.”

Stuffing the quintessential heist novel with delectable prose and valuable commentary, Li builds characters you’ll root for, even when you’re screaming at them. Ideal for those who enjoyed The Vanishing Half and Harlem Shuffle, Portrait of a Thief demonstrates genre fiction's capacity to investigate a hefty topic.

What if a counterfeiter were almost as famous as the work they forged? Such is the case in Portrait of an Unknown Lady. An anonymous forger has become infamous for their replications of renowned Buenos Aires artist Mariette Lydis's paintings. The unknown identity of the copycat is so legendary that it spurs the unnamed narrator, an esteemed Argentinian art critic, to hunt down the counterfeiter once and for all.

But the narrator has a deeper connection than solving an art-world whodunit. Having worked as an appraiser early in her career, the narrator is tasked with putting together the catalogue of her recently deceased mentor’s collection. Organizing the archive, she finds a trove of Mariette Lydis's work, leading her down a winding path that may lead to calamitous discoveries.

Read this if you’re searching for a mix of The Silent Patient meets Rachel Cusk. Heady, suspenseful and provocative, this novel doesn’t disappoint.

Lu is willing to do just about anything to make it as a photographer. She works three jobs, supports her ailing father, and lives in a dank apartment. But after inadvertently capturing the best photo of her life—a self-portrait with a boy plunging to his death in the background—she’s presented with an unusual and treacherous choice. To bury the photo and sacrifice a chance at the career she’s always dreamed of, or show it and hurt her neighbor, the boy’s mother, a friend...and maybe more.

Showcasing the relentless compromises and brutality of making it in the art world, this novel sticks with you and makes you wonder: What would you do in Lu’s position?

It can be difficult to whittle away at your backlist when there are so many new books to read. But do us a favor: Make time to dig into Surfacing by queen Margaret Atwood.

About an artist ensnared in a manhunt for her father, Surfacing plays with the line between sanity and madness, what we do for those we love, and what creates an artistic mind. The unnamed narrator has returned to Quebec to find her missing father. After she revisits her childhood home for the first time in ages, old memories resurface, and as a result, she slips into a confused delirium. She also becomes convinced her father is alive, no matter what the authorities say or find.

Surfacing places the narrator under a magnifying glass as she spins out of control. Bursting with holy-shit moments and very messy relationships, Surfacing is a novel by one of the living greats worthy of cheating on newbie bestsellers in your TBR stack.

If the classic '90s movies Stepmom and The Birdcage had a book baby, it might be The Guncle. Patrick, a once-famous sitcom actor, is enjoying his hazy solitude in Palm Springs. But when his sister-in-law passes away and his brother fights his demons in rehab, Patrick is stuck with his niece and nephew for the summer.

The kids have always loved spending time with GUP (Gay Uncle Patrick). But those stints were during holidays and long weekends—not a full summer and definitely not unsupervised. As the children mourn the loss of their mother, Patrick processes his own grief, and the unlikely trio learns and heals from one another. If you’ve found yourself rewatching Father of the Bride or The Family Stone as of late, this one’s for you.

Want more GUP? You’re in luck: There’s a sequel, The Guncle Abroad, and it's ideal reading material for spring break with the fam.

You know those books you wish you could live inside of? This is one of them. A follow-up to Catherine Newman's popular novel, Sandwich, it returns to Rocky and her delightfully riotous cohort a few years later. Since we last saw Rocky, her mother has passed away, and her elderly father has moved into her home’s backyard ADU.

Meanwhile, Rocky has discovered a rash that’s not going away. She does what any sane person would do: Googles what it could be, and checks in with her doctor, which opens a can of worms like no other. Saddled with anxiety, Rocky juggles her work as a freelance writer while helping her adult daughter, Willa, navigate her anxiety, as Rocky’s husband tries to fix a fan without slicing his fingers off. Whew! And that’s, like, the first 10 pages—but it only gets better. At the top of the novel, a tragic accident occurs, which Rocky becomes fixated on, perhaps, to take her mind off her rash.

Relatable, laugh-out-loud funny, and as heartwarming as Sandwich, Wreck had this writer looking up if it was possible to be adopted by a fictional family. (Sadly, it’s not.)

If you’ve never stepped foot inside the Kevin Wilson universe, consider us the welcome wagon. It’s just a normal day in Coalfield, Tennessee on Madeline Hill’s farm when a car pulls up and a nervous man steps out with news she’d never anticipate: His name is Reuben, and he is her half-brother. He informs her that there are even more of them—deserted Hill half-siblings scattered across the U.S., none of whom know about the others.

Reuben, bearer of quizzical news, convinces Mad to embark on a cross-country road trip to collect the rest of their half-siblings. Though strangers, they all share the wounds of being abandoned by their father, who ghosted all of them after leaving. The half-siblings drive west, picking up more Hills in pursuit of their father and the answers he never provided.

As the siblings squeeze into Rube’s PT Cruiser, they become closer than they might have ever imagined. Brimming with sibling squabbles and tender vulnerability, Run for the Hills is a wild premise that could only come to life with Wilson at the helm. A magician of dysfunctional families, Wilson wields his storytelling powers over the most unlikely of circumstances. Once you’re finished this read, be sure to check out his other novels, Now Is Not the Time to Panic or Nothing to See Here.

Sometimes, family isn’t what you’re born into, but what you create. So it goes on Angela Flournoy’s sophomore novel, The Wilderness, which follows a group of friends across years, relationships, and cities.

At the start of the novel, Desiree is accompanying her grandfather to Europe for an assisted death by suicide. The decision to join him fractures a rift between her and her sister, Danielle, and pushes Desiree to become even closer to her best friends, January, Nakia, and Monique, who are searching for their own paths. While their view on where to go and what to do with their lives may be murky, they rely on each other for tough love and ongoing support. As time unfolds and decisions are made, the group watches in awe (and sometimes horror) at what their chosen sisters have done with their lives. Though members of the group move from L.A. to New York and back again, one thing remains unwavering: their love and admiration, even when they want to strangle each other.

With an ending that has a full-blown twist you won’t anticipate (but will sob over nonetheless), The Wilderness is a testament to female friendship that’s relatable, heart-wrenching, and completely stunning.

When cracking open a Gary Shteyngart novel, you know you’re in for a good time. His latest, Vera, or Faith, follows suit. In a near-future Manhattan, democracy is on the brink of collapse, cars drive themselves, and 10-year-old Vera is trying to keep her family together. Vera, a Korean-American, lives in real time as roles and civil rights are shifting, while she aches to meet her Korean birth mother. Told from Vera’s perspective, readers will at once become enamored with the girl, while fearing for her well-being. Prescient, comical, and endearing, Shteyngart delivers a dystopian novel, for once, that won’t make you feel too terrible about the future.

The author of Fleishman Is In Trouble, Taffy Brodesser-Akner, returned with a hilarious and chaotic story of a family living in a wealthy enclave of Long Island. Trouble finds the Fletcher family early in the novel when, in 1980, patriarch Carl is kidnapped in front of his house and held for ransom.

And that’s not the most stressful thing that happens. This potboiler picks up almost 40 years later, where the kidnapping has marked each family member—Carl’s wife, Ruth, and their three children, Nathan, Beamer, and Jenny—to a withering degree. With each character commanding passages throughout the novel, Brodesser-Akner creates a heart-pounding, fly-on-the-wall read. As the once famously rich Fletcher cohort learn their fortune has gone bust, the family goes to distressing lengths to get back on track—if they can get out of their own way.

A propulsive read, the audiobook further elevates the knotty plot. You can basically hear the characters's blood pressure spike.

In a near-future Brooklyn, May, the former breadwinner of her family, has lost her job. As a result, her family is sinking into debt. Subsisting on her husband’s income as a glorified Task Rabbit, the family is drifting apart amidst the tension, each preferring the company of their phones rather than each other, spending much of their time in their individual “wombs,” or VR pods on steroids.

So, when May is presented with an opportunity to participate in a trial that'll pay handsomely, she jumps on it. The catch? The procedure renders her face unidentifiable to the cameras lining the streets, stores, everywhere. She goes through with it anyway. With the cash burning a hole in her pocket, she decides to live a little and books the family a stay at the Botanical Gardens, now an exclusive retreat. But, when something goes terribly awry during their stay, May realizes that her effort to save the family may have put it in an even more compromising position.

Begging to be made into a limited TV series, Hum will hook you from the first line. Good luck trying to go to sleep before you finish; it’s that good.

Zadie Smith is not one to shy away from complicated family dynamics. Case in point: Her 2005 novel, On Beauty. The novel proves that, sometimes, it takes another family to illuminate the cracks within one's own. The Belseys and Kipps are at odds on just about everything, which of course means they can’t get out of each other’s way. It’s partially because Howard Belsey and Monty Kipps work: They’re both art historians who specialize in Rembrandt.

Pushed together through fate and academia, the families partake in a tragic pas de deux. First, there’s the case of Jerome, Howard’s child, who’s seemingly been converted by ultra-conservative Monty. Then there’s the burgeoning friendship between Kiki, Howard’s wife, and Carlene, who’s married to Monty. Not to mention some unseemly sharing between the patriarchs that hurts an innocent. And so much more.

If you’ve been searching for a novel that has the capital-D drama of a 19th-century novel with tongue-in-cheek social commentary minus the stuffy prose, On Beauty is for you. Read this after you’ve watched the new Wuthering Heights.

Whether you’re reading Emma Straub’s delicious novel for the first or 40th time, picking it up is always a good idea. Astrid Strick is running errands in town when she witnesses a longtime acquaintance get hit by a bus. Traumatic as hell, the experience cracks something open in Astrid and shortly thereafter comes clean to her three adult children, Porter, Elliott, and Nicky, about a secret she’s been hiding for years.

The news coincides with the arrival of Nicky’s 13-year-old daughter, Cecilia, who’s to live with her grandmother as she recovers from a terrible bullying incident at her Brooklyn school. As the Strick family navigates Astrid’s news, disrupting the image they always had of their mother while flailing through adult life, they spin toward complete upheaval.

Told from multiple Strick perspectives, All Adults Here feels like a Nora Ephron movie in print. It’s a story about acceptance, forgiveness, and the people who have seen you at your worst—and loving them all the more for it.

Sometimes, when reading a doorstopper of a novel, you wish for it to end. This is not the case with Paul Murray’s The Bee Sting, which was listed for about every prize when it was published in 2023. The Barnes family, a formerly well-off Irish family, is struggling. They’re not alone—it’s 2008 and, like so many of their friends, the Barneses are watching their life’s work circle the drain. But, while others might band together to fight against financial ruin, the Barneses twirl off into their own orbits, driven by resentment, fear, and regret.

Take Imelda Barnes, for example, mother to Cass and PJ, wife to Dickie, who is seething over having to part with her beloved jewelry and designer clothes. Or PJ, who gets so swept up in clearing out an abandoned cabin with his father, he puts everything on the line. As fissures grow within the family, it’s unclear what can save them. With an ending that will have you combing Reddit threads for hot takes, this tome delivers a major payoff.

Could a curse get in the way of finding love? For the Duong women, the answer is absolutely. After an ancestor breaks up her marriage for true love, a curse is placed on her descendants, plaguing all the women in her family to miss out on love. Fast forward to the present day, and Mai and her sisters, Minh Pham and Khuyen Lam, and their children understand the depth of the curse intimately.

But when a clairvoyant aunt sees a major tide change, Mai and her family can only hope to hold on to each other for dear life. Perfect for anyone who’s been in a dating rut or tired of having their family meddle in their personal life, The Fortunate of Jaded Women is a comical romp of missteps and the type of humiliation only a family member can inflict.

"When I’m working on writing fiction, I like to read biographies or scripts. I have a weakness for non-fiction love stories. That’s a funny way of referring to a researched book, but how much can we ever know about the truth within two other people’s relationship?"

"Of course, this is the iconic novel adapted for Bogie and Bacall’s legendary 1946 movie of the same name. Set in gritty 1930s Los Angeles, it’s also Chandler’s first novel and the introduction of detective Philip Marlowe. I read that director Howard Hawks (some say Bogart) found a problem with the plot during filming and Chandler admitted he didn’t have an answer."

"A 1986 collection of speculative fiction writer William Gibson. It includes 'New Rose Hotel,' the short story turned into a film of the same name in 1988. Set in a dystopian future of mega conglomerates, it's a 'new' take on the time-honored mess of two troubled agents and a beautiful woman."

"An experimental writing project by French filmmaker and novelist Marguerite Duras. It isn’t a script or a novel, rather a fresh text that pulls from the author's existing written works—Le navire Night, Césarée, Les Mains Négatives, and Aurélia Steiner, Aurélia Steiner, Aurélia Steiner."

"Filmmaker and novelist Catherine Breillat chose to access the story behind her 2004 movie Anatomy of Hell through novel form rather than a screenplay. It is about a woman who encounters a man at a gay nightclub, and the intimate nights thereafter."

"A massive English-language volume with 129 poems (25 never before published) by the Austrian writer Ingeborg Bachmann. It includes new insights from the translator who is also at work on a biography about the legendary poet and novelist."

"This is one of nearly 75 novels following a French detective named Inspector Maigret. The 17th in the series, it opens in the South of France, and follows Maigret as he tries to figure out what happened to sometime sheep rancher, William Brown."

"I haven’t read this yet, but it is by my bedside. It tells the story of a cold female assassin with nods to various genres. The bleakness and commentary sound eerily similar to Nymph."

If Ghost and Back to the Future had a book sibling, it’d be the romance novel The Seven Year Slip. Clementine is reeling after the death of her beloved aunt. Now, left only with her aunt’s N.Y.C. apartment and her memories, Clementine is grappling with the past to make it through her present.

Though her aunt always assured her that the apartment was magical, she found it hard to believe. That is, until she comes back to the apartment and finds a strange man, Iwan, in the kitchen. Apparently easier than taking the subway during rush hour, Iwan traveled through time to visit Clementine from seven years in the past. As Clementine and Iwan learn more about each other, chemistry fizzes, seasoning the story with just the right level of spice. With an ending that’s sure to produce more than a couple of tears, this rom-com is an ideal comfort read.

Whenever a poet writes a novel, we do a happy dance, knowing that the prose will sing off the page. Such is the case with DéLana R.A. Dameron’s debut novel, Redwood Court, which follows a constellation of characters anchored by Mika Tabor, a young woman living in Columbia, South Carolina. Mika, with the help of some brief appearances from her ancestors, unfurls her family history spanning post-World War II to the ‘90s.

From living in the Jim Crow South to enduring verbal attacks en route to Disney World, the family turns not only to each other for support, but their community, too. Showcasing one fictional family’s journey through generations, Dameron expertly demonstrates how Black families have not only survived but triumphed in the face of incessant racism and other related injustices.

There’s nothing quite like an enemies-to-lovers story to keep you turning the pages. Red, White, and Royal Blue epitomizes this trope—and then some. At the top of the novel, U.S. First Son Alex and U.K. Prince Henry are frenemies at best and full-blown rivals at worst. While this type of petty conflict is just another day on Instagram for some, it begins to take on more weight when the clash could jeopardize important world politics and alliances. Tasked with feigning friendship for the sake of, well, world peace, Alex begins to develop real feelings for Henry. Alex is left wondering if Prince Henry might show up on a white horse, or if he'll be sitting in the bleachers. A delightful romp, have fun reading this after you’ve (re)watched Chasing Liberty.

If you’ve been looking for a sign to venture into the Sally Rooney-verse, here it is. The sophomore novel from the great millennial whisperer (JK), depicts the messy uncertainty of finding love when you’re too young to appreciate it—and what comes after.

Enter Marianne, a wealthy girl living with her distant and cold family, and Connell, a boy brought up by a loving single mother, who happens to work for Marianne’s family as a house cleaner. Crossing paths when Connell meets his mother after school at Marianne’s home, he and Marianne begin a relationship. One snag: Connell is popular, and if he were discovered going out with Marianne, the class outcast, he too might find himself out of the school’s inner circle. While they might be diametrically on opposite ends of the social ladder, their interests collide over philosophy and literature, and, yes, a shared mutual attraction.

But as these things tend to go, Connell brings another girl to a dance, leaving Marianne to suffer through the special heartbreak and humiliation reserved for teenagers. However, Connell and Marianne aren’t through—remaining in each other’s orbit as they progress through school and relationships, showing that some love can weather even the harshest storms.

At long last, Heart the Lover, the newest novel from Lily King, author of books like Writers & Lovers and Euphoria, has arrived. Wonderfully, as with a Swift album, the book features more than a couple of Easter eggs. For one, King revisits the topic of a love triangle: Tangled in the web are college roommates and best friends Sam and Yash, and “Jordan,” who received her nickname from her then-boyfriend Sam. But, as time progresses, it becomes clear that Yash is more curious about Jordan as a person, and soon enough, difficult decisions are made.

Dripping with tension that’ll make you want to speed read and savor simultaneously, Heart the Lover investigates the limits of young relationships, the imprint they leave behind, and the future they inform.

If you continue to be one of the folks unpersuaded to pick up a novel about gamers, let us be the next in line to say: Read it. Childhood friends Sadie and Sam have seen each other at their lowest, pining after the other throughout the years, without ever doing anything about it. And so, together with Sam’s college roommate Max, they channel their passion into designing video games, becoming creative partners during the early tech boom. But working with your best friend can have its drawbacks, and tension inevitably fissures within the triad. With a surprise twist that’s a gut punch to the heart, this novel showcases how close friends can buoy you through even the toughest times.

This way for some healthy female rage. In 1980s New York, Anita de Monte was an artist to watch. But then, her trajectory is cut short, tragically dying well before her time. At first, the art world was left reeling. Grieving the loss of a young and promising talent. And then, as so often is the case, she’s forgotten. Fast forward to the late '90s, and Raquel, the first in her family to attend college, is in her third year of studying art. Often overlooked or othered by those teaching and attending her school, Raquel becomes involved with an older student who helps her notoriety soar.

But when she stumbles across Anita’s story, Racquel is confronted with uncomfortable similarities between their stories. At once a searing condemnation of revisionist history, specifically in the art world, and also race, class, and gender, this novel pulls no punches. Get ready to rage read (in the best way ever).

If laughing instead of crying came in book form, it might be Green Dot. Hera Stephen is a recent(ish) college grad, making her way in Sydney, moderating comments for a newsroom. Torn between believing she’s mapping her own course and resisting stereotypical life benchmarks, and also suffering from major Peter Pan syndrome, Hera finds herself entangled in a love affair way more complicated than fishing out online trolls.

Arthur is everything she isn’t: Older, settled, and married...very married. After learning about his ball and chain, Hera does the unthinkable: She continues with the affair. Crumbling clichés and excising taboos, Gray defeats predictable plotlines, presenting the path less traveled, if no less considered.

For many going through a breakup, there comes a point when the other half of the partnership is unrecognizable. Where was the charming, impressive person from the first date? Out of Love takes this concept and runs with it. Starting at the end of the relationship, an unnamed narrator retraces her time spent with her now ex-boyfriend. As each chapter moves back in time, the narrator revisits cherished and terrible moments alike. If you’ve ever wondered what went wrong in a past ‘ship, this novel might be for you. But give it a couple of weeks if your heartbreak is super fresh.

What do ex-boyfriends, a Magritte painting, and new psych-tech have in common? In Sloane Crosley’s second novel, quite a lot. Lola is an editor, navigating the rocky media landscape with the focus of a boxer. After her former employer, Modern Psychology, folded, she found a job covering arts and culture, swept up in drafting more listicles and roundups than she can count.

But there is a bright spot: her fiancé, Max. Except one night, the thing she cares most about is threatened, coming face to face with an ex. The next night, same place, different ex. The following? Rinse and repeat.

Becoming more predictable than a Lifetime movie, Lola suspects that something is afoot. And sure enough, she discovers that a few former colleagues are joining forces, applying psychology, AI, and other tools to help others find closure. But which relationship will Lola find closure for? And how will this serve her current 'sitch? At times inciting full belly laughs and others total stomach knots, this novel is a nail-biter to the end.

Remember that Anne Hathaway movie, The Idea of You (about a woman involved with a younger pop star )? Imagine that, but with a comedic edge, and you’d get Romantic Comedy.

Sally Milz is a comedy writer for a late-night show. Hardboiled and sardonic, she’s long given up on love, settling for fulfilling work, friends, and family. But when a male colleague starts dating a female mega star, she can’t resist penning a sketch about the absurdity of the situation and how society embraces a dude punching above his weight, but not a woman who did the same. When A-lister Noah Brewster (think, Harry Styles or MGK) shows up to act in the sketch, sparks fly. Tackling gender roles in relationships, comedy, and society, Curtis Sittenfeld proves that she’s an expert social critic who leaves it all on the page.

In the '60s, long before Swift had wheels down at JFK, Patti Smith moved to N.Y.C. to become a poet. In her first memoir, the mother of punk recounts her early days in the city, and crossing paths with a boy who would, ultimately, change her life: artist Robert Mapplethorpe. Instantly hitting it off, the two quickly became friends—sometimes more. Regardless of the state of their relationship, they spurred one another in their creative projects and often collaborated. When the work was done, they’d flit around the hotspots of the time, like Max’s Kansas City and the Chelsea Hotel, where they lived for a stint.

Elegantly capturing the disappointment, elation, and thrill of discovering your found family, the devastation of first heartbreak, and the joy of seeing your dreams realized, Just Kids belongs on everyone's bookshelf.

The aughts may have invaded our closets, but according to Sophie Gilbert’s new book about the time, they invaded our minds, too. A writer for The Atlantic, Gilbert delves into the mass sexualization, degradation, and humiliation of women during the late '90s and early 00s: what caused it, who was impacted, and what effect it continues to have today.

Expertly tying together various sources like internet porn, reality TV, and bro-coms, Gilbert makes the case for how these moments set the stage for the overturning of Roe v. Wade, #MeToo, and more. Chapters like “Show Girl: Overexposure in the New Millennium” and “Gossip Girls: The Degradation of Women and Fame in Twenty-First-Century Media” can be read individually or in one big bite, depending on how much fury you can handle that day.

Once you hop on this wild ride of a novel, you won’t want to get off. Lillian is a 29-year-old who works in marketing. On the surface, she’s like everybody else. She celebrates her birthday (in the office), has a decent (if not soul-crushing) job, and is even in the process of converting her situationship to a full-fledged boyfriend. But then, her could-be BF pulls the plug on their relationship, sending Lillian into a tailspin. (We’ve all been there.) But she takes it one step (okay, several steps) forward. She places a hex on her ex, who winds up dead. Oops!

With tart prose that tastes like sour candy, Kirsten King’s debut is a home run. Commenting on everything from corporate culture to dating and gender roles, this novel had all the ingredients of a must-read.

Nothing like getting embroiled with a married, middle-aged white dude to shake things up a bit. Edie, a young Black woman living and working in N.Y.C., meets Eric randomly. While the sexual tension is front and center, so is Eric’s marriage, which is (allegedly) open.

Edie's relationship with Eric becomes strained as he flip-flops between the women in his life, and when Edie loses her job and her Brooklyn apartment. Where is one to go in such a situation? The married boyfriend's house, obviously. With its sexy undertones, high-key messiness, and poignant racial commentary, this book will make you want to pop a bag of popcorn and grab your cozy clothes because you won’t want to put it down.

Nothing is quite as devastating when the idealized version of a person, a relationship, or a family dissolves. Megan Nolan’s debut peels back the layers of how a romantic fantasy is crafted—and destroyed. At the top of the novel, the anonymous narrator meets an older man, Ciaran, and immediately becomes obsessed with him, even becoming a glorified housekeeper at his place, all to stay near him. But she’s not as doe-eyed as her performance may suggest. She bristles at the vulnerability surfaced by this obsession. And yet, proceeds anyway.

With glinting prose and sharp observations on gender roles, sexism, and sexuality, Acts of Desperation is an unflinching portrayal of unrequited love and the interiority of a young woman as she confronts her life choices.

So you’ve read Good Material by Dolly Alderton, but have you checked out her memoir, Everything I Know About Love? Recounting her graduation from childhood to adulthood, Alderton unspools the relatable missteps she made at the time and how, ultimately, they led to crucial self-discovery. A reporter, Alderton turns the lens onto her past, examining it with a critical, yet loving eye. Funny, cringey, and big-hearted, this is the ideal gift for your besties, work wife, and pretty much anyone in between.

While several songs on folkmore can feel like individual movies wrapped into one, Trust is a nesting doll of an epistolary novel. Featuring a fictional novel and segments of (fictional) memoirs and diaries, this unique tome tells the story of financier Andrew Bevel and his wife, Mildred, who are at the center of controversy after a popular novel is published ostensibly about them, their wealth, and the means by which it was earned. Sections of the book include the novel in question, Bevel’s rebuttal to said novel, and Mildred’s diaries that paint a different picture. Impressively woven, intricate, and captivating, Trust is a triumph.

Set mainly in India and N.Y.C. in the '90s, this doorstopper is the family epic you’ve been waiting for. Unbeknownst to her, Sonia had been presented to Sunny’s grandfather as a prospect for an arranged marriage—and turned down. It’s likely for the best; she’s fallen for an older man while in the U.S. for college. Meanwhile, Sunny is off with his own American girlfriend, whose existence he hides from his very judgmental, very doting mother.

Then, a chance encounter brings Sonia and Sunny together, and chemistry sparks. However, Sunny lives in New York, while Sonia has returned to India. So, when the two have to decide how (and if) to move forward, their once “simple” relationship becomes complicated. Funny, tender, and gripping, this novel also explores themes such as nationalism, race, and gender.

If you’ve ever listened to both sides of a fight, you know how perspectives on the same situation can dramatically vary. Fates and Furies takes it a step further: Depicting a marriage through the lens of both husband and wife. Like The Affair (but better), this novel showcases how communication can become tangled by emotion and history.

Lotto and Mathilde’s marriage seems idyllic on the outside, but within the relationship lurks deception, manipulation, and selective ignorance of what the other is capable of. The novel begins by looking through Lotto’s eyes, his challenging yet comfortable life, his playwriting, and his marriage to the ingenue Mathilde. Soon, his star rises until his untimely death. The second half of the book is dedicated to Mathilde, who reveals that she’s much more than the shrinking violet she often played at dinner parties. Quite the contrary. Spotlighting fissures that can lead to a rupture within a relationship, Fates and Furies persists as one of the best books about modern marriage, sexuality, class, and more.

It’s the year 2000, and the unnamed narrator, a recent Columbia grad, has become increasingly disaffected. Or, perhaps she’s not disaffected—maybe she’s depressed. And so, she goes in search of a psychiatrist, finding one who’s willing to bend the rules and try unique forms of treatment. Namely, overmedicating the narrator until she’s so blitzed out she loses her job. But she’s not concerned about money. She has an inheritance and now unemployment to live off of.

With little responsibility and few friends, the narrator decides to use the medication to sleep for an entire year to process her trauma and wake up feeling renewed. What could go wrong? Well, a lot. She hadn’t accounted for the fact that she might sleepwalk. And so much worse. A blistering story about misogyny, girlhood, and grief, My Year of Rest and Relaxation is darkly funny yet haunting.

This way for a phenomenal piece of feral girl literature! The novel was a hit on #BookTok when it was released in 2022 and is still widely discussed years later. And for good reason.

Meet Joan, a young woman who’s encountered more than her share of tragedy in her life. Having survived a horrific event as a child, Joan has decided to never be a victim again and has lived her life according to a zero fucks mantra. That has served her until tragedy comes knocking on her door again, forcing her to leave her home in N.Y.C. and drive to L.A. in search of the one girl who might be able to help her make sense of everything that’s happened in her short life. But when she finds herself ensnared in yet another problematic scenario, Joan decides to take matters into her own hands, risking it all—and then some.

Read this book if you’re looking for a spooky-lite novel, or if you loved Yellowjackets, Gone Girl, or often find yourself humming “Anti-Hero” in the shower.

Delivered in spare, unfettered scenes, Aysegül Savas’s novel, The Anthropologists, is deceptively simple. Asya and Manu, a young married couple, are house hunting, searching for a place to call their own in a city where neither comes from. As they tour houses between everyday tasks and work, the topics of home, place, and belonging emerge in striking clarity. Assisted by Savas’s restraint, this thin novel investigates what constitutes a happy, good life, and how to know when one’s accomplished it.

Shortlisted for the 2025 International Booker prize, Perfection follows a young couple, Anna and Tom, who live in Berlin, where they work as “creatives.” If you glanced at their social media, you’d think they’d built a swoon-worthy existence. On the inside, though, something is rotten—only they can’t decipher what, exactly, it is. Perhaps if they zoomed in on their Instagram, they could figure it out. In the meantime, their disenchantment festers.

Aiming at millennials who have sacrificed art in the name of content, Vincenzo Latronico is unsparing yet moving all the same. At times reading like a Sofia Coppola film, folks who enjoyed The Virgin Suicides or other coming-of-age films, like Igby Goes Down and Boyhood, will likely appreciate the book.

Nila is 19, growing up in contemporary Berlin. Once a devoted, quiet daughter to her Afghan parents who immigrated to Germany, Nila breaks ties with her former self, finding a flock of friends (along with a toxic boyfriend) in the famous Berlin club scene.

Shaking off her past persona as a “good girl,” Nila ignores red flags and spirals out of control, partying and cavorting with people who definitely don’t have her best interest in mind. Stocked to the brim with prose that will make you gasp and scenes that will leave you squealing, Good Girl is a debut you’ll find yourself returning to, time and again.

Published nearly 20 years ago, this novel remains a barn burner. Jacob is a veterinary student at Cornell who, due to a family tragedy, must leave the university before completing his studies. Hastily departing the campus, Jacob discovers he inadvertently boarded a circus train, full of performers and, yes, animals. He stays on board.

Brought on by the resident circus vet, Jacob joins a distorted, new family. He learns who to avoid (August) and who to consider a friend (Camel). But when he falls in love with a married stage performer, Jacob risks derailing his new life, even if it means standing up for who and what he cares about. This book vibrates off the page, rich with well-drawn characters, high stakes, and surprises at every turn—almost like a day at the circus.

If you binged The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel or mark every holiday season by seeing the Rockettes perform, this epistolary novel is for you. Vivian is reflecting on her youth living in N.Y.C. in the 1940s. A college dropout, Vivian became swept up in the exciting scene of theater showgirls. This book beams with old-world glamor, quippy dialogue, and so much atmosphere, you’ll look up from the page, shocked to find that you aren’t in a smoky theater bar.

As WWII encroaches and Vivian becomes embroiled in tense circumstances, she evolves from a bratty teenager to a woman. Penned by Elizabeth Gilbert (yes, that Elizabeth Gilbert), the prose doesn’t disappoint. This is a book to get lost in.

There were few actresses more captivating than enigma Evelyn Hugo. She reeked of old Hollywood, fiery relationships, and talent that spouted from her fingertips. That’s why, as she approaches her autumn years, she’s decided to have an official biography written about her. And no one is more shocked than Monique Grant herself that she was hired for the job.

Unfolding over seven parts, each dedicated to a husband, Evelyn Hugo finally reveals the true story behind the marriages, what spurred them, what broke them, and how they affected Evelyn.

Taylor Jenkins Reid is a master at crafting exceptional female characters who break barriers and challenge stereotypes. Here, she set her sights on the entertainment industry, celebrity gossip, and sexuality. A novel you’ll absolutely tear through, be sure to pack some tissues for the final pages.

"If I’m sad or in a bad place, I read Marie Dermansky and I feel better. Bad Marie is very bad. Or is she? You’ll have to read to find out. This book is such a delight, even as it is quite dark at times. And it’s funny as hell."

"'The Little Mermaid' and 'The Red Shoes' are two of my favorite fairy tales. I love how powerfully Andersen captures being bewitched, and the longing for another kind of life. Often this longing leads to serious consequences for the heroes of his stories, but there is a great deal of compassion and empathy, too. And of course, magic, both dark and light."

"Written as a dialogue between a woman in grave danger and a young mysterious boy named David, this book hooked me and didn’t let go until the last page. It’s an absolutely terrifying story, but it’s dazzling too, and some of the images and scenes Samanta Schweblin has written here will stay with me always."

"I’m blown away by this collection. It’s not easy to contemporize the fairy tale in ways that truly make the form feel truly fresh and subversive. But Daniel M. Lavery has done this in these stories. Dark, playful, funny, and terrifying at times, these stories are a true testament to the fairy tale’s power to both enchant and reveal us."

"A classic I’ll never forget and that I revisit often. This is a story about the power of beauty to enchant us and the power of art to reveal who we truly are. I love how much this book celebrates beauty but also shows us its shadow side, and shows us, too, how our desire to possess it will undo us."

"Probably one of my favorite contemporary novels, I love the narration in this book. It’s told from the perspective of a young man, Piranesi, who lives in a labyrinth and has no memory. Though he himself adores the labyrinth, the reader becomes increasingly aware that he is in grave danger."

"I love Bret Easton Ellis’s novels, but there’s something truly singular about The Shards. This is the story about a young man in his senior year of high school in L.A. in 1981, and his obsession with a strange and charismatic new schoolmate. Brilliant, labyrinthine, and scary as hell."

If the rumors are true, creative writing MFA programs can be a total nightmare. At least that’s the case for Sam, a creative writing student at esteemed Warren University, who’s become ostracized from the rest of her small class. She has nothing in common with them. For one, her classmates are gussied-up girly girls who call themselves, and each other, Bunny.

But then, with a new semester underway, the Bunnies invite Sam to one of their “Smut Salons.” There, she learns the Bunnies are revising a lot more than their latest assignments. Soon, Sam falls down the rabbit hole, abandoning her close friends, her work, and potentially her future, all to fit in with the Bunnies.

Straddling magical realism and horror, Bunny is at once a surreal satire of elite MFA programs and the people who attend them, while confronting the terror of pursuing a life in the arts. But Sam’s story doesn’t end there. We Love You, Bunny, Mona Awad’s newest release, returns to the Bunny-verse, which catches up with Sam and hops into the Bunnies’s origin stories.

Extra credit if you knew this iconic film could also be enjoyed in book form. Based on the movie’s screenplay, Dead Poets Society recounts the story of groundbreaking Professor Keating, who encourages his students at an all-boys’s school to question convention and the forces that wish them to conform. Influenced by their teacher, a handful of students begin the Dead Poets Society, a club for pledges to evade the pressures of masculinity and find refuge in the words of groundbreaking poets.

At a time of peak toxic masculinity, Dead Poets Society serves as a reminder of the strength in vulnerability and the calamities that can follow if neglected. Read this to relive this stunning story all over again.

In this novel, the monster isn’t hiding under the bed. He’s leading the boys’s choir. Fee, a Korean-American boy in Maine, has recently joined the local chorus thanks to his stunning voice. Then, he's silenced. Abused by Big Eric, the choir director, as many of the boys have been, Fee remains quiet until a peer comes forward, unveiling the extent of the choir director’s malevolence.

Though Eric is arrested, the impact of his abuse is pervasive, haunting Fee and his friends, causing several of them to die by suicide. With so much trauma, Fee flings himself into unhealthy coping skills. Over time, Fee grows up and distances himself from his vices.

He even accepts a teaching job at a boarding school. There, he meets a boy who has a striking resemblance to one of his dead friends. As Fee gets to know this student, he realizes they’re more connected than he thought, and Fee is presented with an opportunity to heal from his past while helping his student.

A moving, heart-wrenching story, Edinburgh is a master class in how beautiful prose can be wielded to describe brutality. Given the subject matter, this book may not be right for everyone, though with his impressive characters, churning plot, and breadcrumbed surprises, Edinburgh is one you’ll return to time after time. Check this out if your copy of A Little Life is falling apart and you need something else to pick up.

Many have tried to write a podcast novel, but few have succeeded. One of the rare authors to accomplish the task is Rebecca Makkai with I Have Some Questions For You, which skewers the very topic that drives the story forward. Bodie Kane, a respected podcaster and film professor, has come a long way from her years at the Granby School, the exclusive New England boarding school from which she graduated.

Back on campus to teach a course on podcasting, Bodie tasks her students to come up with a podcast idea. So, when one of her students resurfaces a crime that occurred at Granby, to Bodie’s roommate no less, Bodie is thrown by the possibility that a man has been sitting in jail for a crime he didn’t commit. And so, Bodie embarks on uncovering the truth, once and for all.

With a subject that’s all too prescient, from culture’s appetite for consuming tragedy for entertainment to systemic racism, I Have Some Questions For You bellows with suspense without feeling heavy-handed.

R.F. Kuang is no stranger to putting a twist on dark academia. After achieving major success with Babel, the author is headed back to school with her latest release, Katabasis. Meet Alice Law, a star student of Magick at Cambridge University. Motivated doesn’t even begin to describe Alice, who has put everything on the line to study under esteemed Professor Grimes. Then she, low-key, kinda kills him, sending him to Hell, instantly becoming the opposite of a teacher’s pet.

To stop the train wreck she set in motion, and to get her hands on a coveted recommendation letter from Grimes, Alice must use all the skills she’s learned to rescue him. But it's not quite that easy. With an academic foe determined to keep her from acquiring the rec and the unpredictability of dealing with, literally, Hell, Alice has to wield magic unlike any time before. She can only hope it’s enough.

Can’t wait for more episodes of Wednesday? Pick up this creepy dark academia read while you pass the time. Tucked away in the Catskills Mountains is the Dalloway School, which is no stranger to tragedy. Just ask Felicity Morrow, who’s finally back at school after the horrific death of her girlfriend.

The school has seen its share of devastating events. It was the site of the Dalloway Five, after all, in which five girls (maybe witches) died under strange circumstances at Godwin dorm, the same dorm that Felicity calls home. Inevitably, rumors swirl.

Like the one that suggests magic is Dalloway’s legacy. Felicity wants to ignore the gossip, keeping her eye on graduation. So, when a new student is keen to investigate the Dalloway Five, Felicity finds herself torn between helping solve the mystery and burying her head until the end of term. That is, until a crisis forces her to make a choice she won’t be able to come back from.

A secret society named after Persephone, the Greek goddess of death? That’s just the tip of the iceberg in this novel by Alex Michaelides, author behind the #BookTok-favorite, The Silent Patient. Set at Cambridge University, The Maidens is a private club of young women who idolize not only Greek mythology, but also one of their professors, Edward Fosca. But something about this group, and the man at the center of it, doesn’t sit right with Mariana Andros, a therapist who’s returned to her old stomping grounds to support her niece, who’s grieving after her best friend is killed.

Then, another young woman winds up dead, causing Mariana to investigate the ongoings of The Maidens, convinced that Edward is behind the tragedy. But, with her own demons troubling her, Mariana has a herculean feat set out for her if she’s going to solve the mystery.

If you prefer your dark academia with a dose of dystopia, allow Never Let Me Go to be your next read. At Hailsham, a British boarding school, Kathy H. and her friends are like any other group of kids: They play soccer, make art, and experience their first crushes. However, unlike other boarding school students, Kathy and her classmates can’t leave; instead, they rely on their teachers to help them understand the outside world. And their purpose: to make donations. As the group graduates from Hailsham, their duties become clearer, as do the ramifications of such jobs. So, as Kathy and her closest friends begin their assignments, they become obsessed with searching for alternative paths outside of what’s been set for them.

Fully engrossing and unlike anything else, Never Let Me Go will leave you thinking about its message and the characters, long after you’ve finished (and reread it, which you’ll undoubtedly do countless times).

Nothing says dark academia like a secret society. Enter Yale University’s Lethe House, the ninth secret society responsible for overseeing the dark magic practiced at the other eight societies, or houses. Recently, Lethe House welcomed a new addition, Alex Stern, an unlikely recruit lifted from a difficult past and planted in the upper echelon of academia.

As Alex finds her footing at Yale, she also must settle into her role as Lethe’s newest Dante, or supervisor tasked with keeping the other societies in check. Guided by Darlington, her Virgil (like a student version of Giles in Buffy the Vampire Slayer), Alex not only has to keep an eye on a bunch of spoiled students wielding their power, but also juggle unruly ghosts before anyone gets hurt. Or disappears. Like Darlington has.

To retrieve him, Alex gets swept up in solving not one, but two murders (O.K., overachiever, we see you!), while righting wrongs everywhere she turns. But as she gets closer to solving the puzzles, she finds herself confronted with danger by human and supernatural forces alike.

Whether you’re an avid fantasy fan or looking to switch things up, Ninth House is an immersive story that will have you gasping and guessing with every page. Once you’re finished, pick up Hell Bent, the sequel, to find out what comes of Lethe House and its members.

A cursory TikTok search for “dark academia” will surface more than a few homages to Donna Tartt’s debut novel, The Secret History. Arguably one of the pillars of the genre, Tartt fittingly completed the book before she graduated from college.

The novel centers on a group of classics majors at an elite (read: isolated) New England college. Think snowy landscapes, Greek mythology, and murder. Unspooled in what would become Tartt’s trademark Dickensian prose, The Secret History is at once a campus novel and a twisty thriller delivered by one of fiction’s finest.

Need a study break? Listen to the podcast, "Once Upon a Time…at Bennington College" by Lili Anolik (also author of Didion & Babitz). In the pod, Anolik delves into the legendary Bennington class, which included not just Donna Tartt, but also Bret Easton Ellis and Jonathan Lethem. Was something in the water that year? Or did the three burgeoning literary icons spur each other to succeed? This investigation surfaces the truth behind the gossip.

This novel is like a mix of Yellowjackets, Lost, and Station Eleven. The isolation was one of the drawbacks of the Raxter School for Girls in Rory Power's futuristic novel, but it's now probably the thing that’s spared them from "the Tox." Despite its remote location, the illness has invaded the school, claiming the lives of everyone but three friends who are left waiting on a cure, but are terrified to leave the safety of the school.

When one of the trio goes missing, everything is turned upside down. In their search, the girls find so much more than their friend. With a thrumming plot and endearing characters, this is an ideal book club pick. You’ll be dying to dish on the surprises that you won’t see coming.

Searching for a hot and horny novel? We got you. Imagined by Spanish writer Eva Baltasar (and translated from its original Spanish by Julia Sanches), Boulder follows a restless cook on a merchant ship. One day, when docked at port, the cook meets a geologist, Samsa, who gives the narrator her nickname, Boulder. Nothing stokes the flames of romance like being out at sea, and so Boulder pines for Samsa in a way that is at once delicious and maybe low-key destructive.

But when Samsa receives a job offer in Reykjavik, Boulder jumps ship and joins her girlfriend to live in a type of domestic bliss that leaves the narrator unmoored and listless. Then Samsa decides that she wants to have a child, which pushes Boulder further onto the edges of their relationship. At once an examination of motherhood, queer love, and the sacrifice of oneself for the sake of another, Boulder is a lusty exploration of contemporary relationships.

Robert Seethaler’s feel-good novel, translated by Katy Derbyshire, will deliver all the cozy vibes you could want. It’s 1966 in Vienna, and Simon is leaving his job working at the local market to revitalize a shuttered corner café. With the space spruced up and the doors open, Simon welcomes folks from all walks of life into his establishment. A testament to found family and the importance of community, The Café With No Name is a narrative about people often overlooked or neglected, banding together to support one another while swapping a story or two.

Diehards of Amor Towles's bestselling A Gentleman in Moscow will relish this novel’s gentle, timeless prose that challenges the belief that all stories must be doom and gloom to be relevant or captivating. With characters who will long stay with you after you’ve finished, The Café With No Name is a must for everyone’s TBR.

If every season is spooky season for you, don’t sleep on The Dangers of Smoking in Bed. This short story collection by Argentine author Mariana Enriquez delves into all sorts of twisty terror, often blurring folklore with other forms of the macabre. Take, for example, one story that features the haunting by a baby, relentless in its torment of the narrator. Or the title story, which is thick with foreboding after a woman hears that an apartment next door has been burned down, so, to calm her nerves, she lights a cigarette...under her bed covers. In all of Enriquez’s stories (translated by Megan McDowell), reality and fiction bend at disturbing angles, producing divinely chilling results.

Want more? If you’re looking to sink your teeth into something a little longer, consider Our Share of the Night, Enriquez’s family saga that follows a cult worshipping a form of dark witchcraft.

Janina is an older woman who’s found refuge in a quiet countryside village in Poland. While the town bustles with activity during the summer months, it becomes all but a ghost town once the temperatures plummet. With only her neighbors Big Foot and Oddball around, Janina relishes the surrounding natural beauty, passing the time by translating William Blake. But then Big Foot is found dead, and Janina’s curiosity is piqued. After several other local hunters go missing—and resurface dead—Janina, a devoted vegetarian, concocts a theory over what’s happened to the men: The animals are waging revenge.

With a humdinger of a reveal that got #BookTok talking, Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead crackles with propulsive suspense. Perfect for fans of mysteries like True Detective and Fargo, this novel won’t disappoint.

What would you do if your family earned its wealth by investing in the arms industry? Such is the premise for Kracht’s 2024 novel, Eurotrash, which dares to ask poignant and unflinching questions. Christian, the fictional narrator of the novel, has been called to Zurich by his elderly mother, who refuses everything from the internet (“too complicated”) to cell phones (“buttons are too small”).

Much to Christian’s chagrin, his mother, newly free from a psychiatric hospital, is as confounding and frustrating as ever, especially as they embark on a road trip through Germany and Switzerland. While on the road, Christian attempts to pay reparations for his family’s past misdeeds to varying degrees of success. Eurotrash is a raucous story with a thrumming undercurrent about legacy, personal responsibility, and family ties that’ll keep you turning pages well after your bedtime.

Fresh off its win of the 2025 International Booker Prize, Heart Lamp, a collection of stories by journalist and author Banu Mushtaq, showcases Muslim women and girls living in Southern India. Equally tender and hilarious, the stories in Heart Lamp touch on topics from breaking with the convention of gender roles and the language that goes along with it. Elsewhere in the story collection, regular women navigate family dynamics and question their faith. Deeply moving and relatable, Heart Lamp is the perfect gift for your friend who’s read everything.

Isabel Allende fled her home in Chile for Venezuela in the 1970s after a political coup brought threats to her door. Since then, Allende has dug into her country’s past in her numerous novels (and launched a non-profit supporting women’s rights).

With over 20 novels to her name, it can be daunting to decide where to start with Allende's body of work. For us, beginning with her debut, The House of the Spirits, is a no-brainer. This sprawling epic follows the Trueba family as generations live through uprisings and tragedy. Anchoring the novel are Esteban and Clara Trueba, the latter possessing an uncanny ability to predict the future through premonitions. As the couple starts a family, their offspring bob and weave through ongoing political and personal turmoil.

Fully engrossing, this novel serves not only as a crash course in Chilean history but also as a dance through dreamlike scenes that somehow manage to root the characters in their real-life circumstances. If you’re itching for something with a whiff of the Yellowstone universe joined by a dash of magical realism, congrats, you just found your next read.

No one knows you quite like your childhood best friend. This is especially the case for Elena, the narrator of the first installment in the four-part Neapolitan series by Elena Ferrante. At the top of the novel, 60-year-old Elena finds out that her longtime friend, Lila, has gone missing. Encouraging Lila’s worried son to let her friend be, Elena reflects on their friendship, writing down what she can recall of their complicated yet loving bond.

So begins the tale of Lila and Elena. Meeting in the 1950s in Naples, Elena and Lila find a match in each other, oftentimes competing, especially in their studies. But as they approach middle school, their paths diverge: Elena goes on to school while Lila is forced to work in her father’s shoe shop, no matter her intelligence. Jealousy ensues.

Unfurled in a hypnotizing, simple prose (translated by Ann Goldstein), My Brilliant Friend (and the rest of the Neapolitan series), will hook you from the first chapter, welcoming you to historic Naples.

It’s not every day that a debut short story collection is longlisted for the International Booker Prize, but that’s exactly the case for Reservoir Bitches by Dahlia de la Cerda (translated by Julia Sanches and Heather Cleary, respectively). Across 13 stories, de la Cerda illuminates the spectrum of experiences of Mexican women. From a protagonist hunting down unconventional abortion methods to the daughter of a Cartel figurehead making her way through the world, de la Cerda’s prose is unflinching, scathing, and, yes, funny. With a flair for dark comedy and a voice that feels like you’re chilling with your girlfriends, Reservoir Bitches is the ideal companion for when you can’t decide if you should be laughing or crying over life.

Fans of Fleabag, Veep, or Fundamentally by Nussaibah Younis (another dark comedy must-read) will especially want to pick up Reservoir Bitches; de la Cerda manages to make even the most outlandish situations convincing, given her incisive characters and sheared-back style.

“I didn’t know what to do, so I went swimming,” writes Colombe Schneck in her auto-fiction novel. Thanks to its varying points of view and frank perspectives, this book will keep you in an absolute chokehold as Schneck returns to critical moments throughout her (thinly fictionalized) life. From easily accessing an abortion as a teenager in Paris to navigating the terminal illness of a friend to losing a lover (while gaining a hobby: swimming), Swimming in Paris suggests that, if one is capable of holding their breath while moving through whatever life flings their way, a good story, at the very least, is sure to be gained.

Don’t be fooled that this slim novel is penned for young adults. Trees for Absentees, by Ahlam Bsharat (translated from its original Arabic by Ruth Ahmedzai-Kemp and Sue Copeland), will shake you to your core. This coming-of-age story is set in occupied Palestine and follows university student Philistia, who's reeling from her grandmother’s death. What’s worse, her father is being held in an Israeli prison. Alone for the first time in her life, Philistia resorts to the skills and traditions imbued in her by her grandmother: cleaning the bodies of local women at the hammam, or Turkish baths. As she goes about her tasks, Philistia finds herself in a dreamland, waltzing between fantasy and reality.

Trees for the Absentees is more prescient than ever. Published in 2019, before the current conflict between Israel and Palestine erupted, this novella puts a face to the many impacted by the current humanitarian crisis in Gaza and wider Palestine.

The latest novel from Han Kang, the first Korean to be awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature, We Do Not Part is a heady story steeped in magical realism. As a result, the novel is impactful and heartrending as Kang grapples with generational trauma from a frequently overlooked moment in Korean history: the Jeju Uprising and the subsequent violence it spurred.

In the novel, Kyungha is a writer living in Seoul. Plagued by nightmares after completing a book about an unnamed massacre in Korea, Kyungha is reminded of the rampage everywhere she turns. Meanwhile, her friend Inseon, a documentary filmmaker who has returned from Jeju Island, is in the hospital without a way to return to the island to feed her beloved bird. In one of the biggest shows of friendship ever, Kyungha sets off to Jeju Island while a blizzard is brewing, all to spare the bird from missing its daily macros.

Once at Inseon’s home, Kyungha is confronted with the past of her friend’s family. And, as the snow piles outside the windows, so too does the tension thrillingly build within the house. A gripping story of the history that haunts us, Kang highlights an important time in Korean history while illuminating the ongoing damage it caused.

“This sexy, sweet story revolves around Michelle and Gabe, childhood best friends whose close relationship fractured when Gabe moved away, leaving Michelle heartbroken. Now, as adults, their paths cross again when Michelle is hired to help with the N.Y.C. expansion of Gabe's gym. Both characters carry past hurts and unresolved feelings from their previous relationship, which they must confront as they work together closely. Sparks fly, tensions rise, and hearts pound. It's a steamy read that also pulls at the heartstrings.”

“Listen, whenever Kennedy Ryan releases a new book, I am sat! This is a moving tale of love, loss, and resilience, whilst also managing to be grown and sexy and warm. It explores the journey of exes (married with children!) Yasmen and Josiah, rebuilding themselves after heartbreak.

I love this book because it's a truly grounded love story whilst being achingly romantic. Josiah and Yas discover themselves again and heal, and allow each other grace through true tragedy. Have I mentioned it's sexy? Because it is sexy. It celebrates second chances that are embraced with wisdom and learning, family bonds, and healing. This is about a gritty, sexy, sturdy love that grows and transforms through life's seasons.”

“Emily Henry's Happy Place gives us a double whammy rom-com treat. It's a second-chance romance, forced proximity, and fake-dating rom-com. As somebody who once wrote a fake-dating/friends-to-lovers rom-com (cough, Honey and Spice!) I am a big fan of the hybrid rom-com. Happy Place is a warm tale of exes pretending to still be together at a friends’s getaway. There's a quirky, funny gang you want to be part of, alcohol-fuelled confessions, and buckets of romantic tension. It's a love story about friendship and re-discovery and tells us that love always needs honesty at its heart.”

“This is one of my favorite novels of all time, and though it isn't technically thought of as a second-chance romance, I believe it is in the best way possible. We follow Dex and Emma in a 20-year will-they-won’t-they saga that mixes heartbreak with hilarity, their friendship blossoming from an awkward (but somehow lovely) non-one-night stand. From messy student days to adult mishaps, they orbit each other, their connection pulling them to collide and confront truths about themselves and their relationship. It's about growing up, growing up with someone, love revealing itself in increments till it's undeniable. Whether it has a happy ending is up for debate, but in my mind, the happiness is that the love existed and that they experienced it—that their love happened.”

“Perhaps one of the earliest second-chance romances! A formative text, by my all-time rom-com fave, my girl Jane Austen. Anne Elliot, a quietly brilliant heroine, allows herself to be convinced to let her taciturn but dashing sailor, Captain Wentworth, go. Eight years later, he’s back—richer, maybe a little grumpier, and still dreamy. Throw in meddling relatives, awkward reunions, and strategic letter-writing, and you’ve got Austen proving love can survive bad advice and worse parties.

It's sweet, and I love how strong Anne's conviction grows with her love; love empowers her! This is a second-chance story about forgiveness, grace, and being brave enough to listen to your heart.”

“Love Island fans, assemble here! Londoners Temi and Wale seem to have a perfect relationship, then disaster ensues. They break up, and Wale does what anyone would surely do after a devastating split: go on a reality TV show called Love Villa. Temi, a writer, tries to heal herself by working on a novel, but this seems to be going disastrously, so she takes up a celeb autobiography ghostwriting job to pay her bills…only she finds out too late that the celeb in question is her ex. A fun second-chance romance that homes in on the importance of emotional honesty.”

“My literary soul-sister, Tia Williams! This book swept me up! The novel follows Eva Mercy, a successful author, who reconnects with her teenage sweetheart, Shane Hall, also a writer, after a chance encounter at a literary event. Their reunion is set against the backdrop of a steamy Brooklyn Summer, and within it, they confront the hurt and trauma that came from their separation, whilst getting to know each other again. Eva is a sparky heroine, a single mother with a troubled past and a strong heart, and Shane proves worthy of her, committed to growth, smart, warm, and kind.

I love how it's clear that though these characters are strangers as adults; they know each other's cores fundamentally, they understand what matters. What's hotter than being known? I loved this sexy N.Y.C. romance. This book is so sensual, so emotionally taut, full of love and healing, so funny. and shows how love can evolve and take a new, brighter form as we do, too.”

Taylor Jenkins Reid’s latest novel has arrived just in time to cure you of your summer blues. If you’ve been on the hunt for a juicy (and romantic) story with strong female characters and page-turning prose, look no further.

It’s the 1980s, and Joan Goodwin has landed the gig of a lifetime: joining NASA’s space shuttle program. Not only will she venture where so few people have gone, she’ll work alongside some of the brightest astronauts to ever walk, well, multiple planets. But while life is looking up, Joan is a victim of her times, suffering from breathtaking loneliness brought on by concealing her queerness.

Isolation can feel like you’re living on another planet, and Jenkins Reid captures this paradigm wonderfully, highlighting the beauty of chosen family, bravery to live as oneself, and the rocketing triumph of love. A major tearjerker (those last pages!), Jenkins Reid will have you so deep in your feelings that you’ll forget what brought you down in the first place, and leave you walking away with a refreshed hope in humanity.

It’s the early ‘90s in Corsica, and Séverine can’t wait until her high school graduation. She figures it will mark the beginning of what she’s sure to be an exciting, fresh chapter, full of dreamy days and flirting with boys, making the most out of the privilege she was born into, considering her father is an influential politician.

But when a militant group kidnaps her, Séverine must confront the implications of her father’s work. As negotiations for her release go sideways, Séverine wields her charm in hopes of figuring out how to escape. Feigning friendship, she gets to know her captors and begins reconsidering all that she once believed, ultimately becoming a spokesperson for the very group that got her into this ordeal. With an unexpected love interest and fame that she’s always wanted, Séverine will have to choose between going home and leaving this new life behind, or abandoning the privilege she so dearly loved.

If you’ve read Ann Patchett’s Bel Canto more times than you can count or have nursed a healthy obsession over the Patty Hearst trial, this book is begging to be added to your TBR.

If you’ve ever stayed up past your bedtime scrolling TikToks about Appalachian folklore and have a soft spot for literary thrillers, this might be your new favorite book.

Valerie, a seasoned hiker, has gone missing deep on the Appalachian Trail in Maine, igniting a search. Waiting for rescue and to pass the time, she pens letters to her mother, revealing her deteriorating state of mind—and the potential threat lurking in the woods. To save her, Lieutenant Bev and amateur detective Lena, a retired scientist, work to find Valerie before her mental health reaches a breaking point. To do so, the three women must cut themselves free from the thorny roots holding them back. Covering themes like motherhood and the thicket that loneliness can grow, this novel will have you hooked until the last page.

In this new release, a master sommelier and his partner have decided to welcome four wine experts to their vineyard to taste a rare fine wine. This alone could be a recipe for disaster (who hasn’t overindulged when with a group of strangers?), but further muddying the waters—err…wine—is that the sommelier’s guests are industry outcasts, each nursing damaged egos, disappointments and other professional disasters, which whet their appetite for self-destruction. So, when two of the guests discover the master sommelier is harboring a secret, the drama reaches a combustion point, leaving the rest of the group to pick up the pieces.

Reading like an afternoon spent nursing a hangover under the mercy of a beach umbrella, fans of Saltburn and The Dreamers will delight in prose that drips with boozy tension. Not a wine pro? Don’t stress, this book is heavy on drama, but light on the shop talk.

When Queen of the Beach Read, Elin Hilderbrand recommends a book to check out, you don’t ask questions, you just head to the closest bookstore. Such is the case for Mansion Beach, which the retired(ish) author recently touted in her podcast. A surprise to no one: She was right.

A modernized retelling of The Great Gatsby, this potboiler follows Nicola, who’s currently embarking on a fresh start, having left her career as a lawyer and all the trappings that went along with it, including her apartment and now ex-boyfriend. Courtesy of her cousin, who married into the Buchanan family, Nicola has holed up in a cottage on Block Island. She’d been looking forward to relaxing and unburdening herself of her past in her temporary home. Keeping her from the peaceful summer she’d fantasized about, however, is a noisy neighbor who can’t stop hosting wild parties. And so begins Nicola’s education of Juliana George, a successful tech entrepreneur whose closet is stuffed with as many skeletons as designer clothes.

Unfurled in a quippy voice rinsed in humor, Mansion Beach is a must-read for folks who enjoyed Emma Cline’s The Guest, Hildebrand’s The Perfect Couple, and, of course, the Gatsby OG.

Celebrating its centennial anniversary, Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway is still as prescient as it was when it was first published. A demonstration of Woolf’s command of language and rotating narration, Mrs. Dalloway is an exploration into memory, mental health, and queerness.

A refresher: A kaleidoscopic story spanning a day, the novel follows Clarissa Dalloway as she prepares for a party at her London home that evening. As Clarissa bustles about, she’s confronted by a couple of her exes (they always come out of the woodwork at the busiest time, don’t they?), as her husband languishes in the periphery. Meanwhile, one of her guests, Sir William Bradshaw, is busy treating Septimus Warren Smith, a WWI veteran suffering from PTSD, who’s haunted by the death of one of his friends. As Septimus learns of his involuntary commitment to a hospital and Clarissa becomes caught in the net of girlhood memories, the story culminates in a heart-wrenching turn.

A tip: Once you’ve revisited the original, pick up a copy of Michael Cunningham’s The Hours, which inspired the feature film of the same title.

Fiction has long examined how the wealthy live. Everett continues the tradition with her upstairs-downstairs-oh-no novel. Meet Anna, an American who recently arrived in London for grad school. To make ends meet, Anna has tried just about every odd job on the planet—from bartending to tutoring high school students. Through the latter, Anna becomes friendly with the Wilders, a wealthy family of one of her students, Pippa. As she and Pippa connect, Anna is thrust into the opulent world of the Wilders. Soon, she finds herself globetrotting with the family as she helps Pippa prepare for the SATS, allegedly.

As Anna becomes increasingly besotted with the family and their lifestyle, she begins burying her blue-collar roots and ghosting her old friends (and life) to fit in. But not all that glitters is gold. And, when Anna’s job becomes threatened, she must decide what—and who—she sees in her future, and how much it’ll cost her to achieve it.

Some books draw you in from the first line. The Most by Jessica Anthony is one of them. When Kathleen Beckett, mother and housewife, wakes up on Sunday morning, she doesn't feel like going to church. This is a big deal: It’s the first Sunday she’ll have missed church since she and her family moved to Delaware less than a year ago. Even though their apartment is smaller than their former home and has all the latest luxuries the modern 1950s can offer, it is still a lot to maintain. Kathleen also needs a break. So, with her husband and two sons out of the house, she decides to make the most of the strangely warm weather and take a dip in her apartment complex’s swimming pool. Only one thing: She refuses to get out.

Reading like an alternate version of John Cheever’s legendary short story, The Swimmer, The Most is a taut novel that illuminates gender roles and imbalances in family and society. With timeless prose that could have been written in the sixties as much as today, The Most will keep you thinking about it long after you’ve read the last page.

If you’re someone who likes to decamp to museums on miserably muggy days, this might be for you. Managing to explore the complexity and wonder of friendship without feeling cringey, My Friends is one part art mystery and another part homage to the relationships that can emerge when you’re a teenager.

On the surface, this novel could appear like any old story about best friends spending a summer together—but that would be shortsighted. Told in dual timelines, readers will meet a variety of friends at different stages of their lives. Take, for example, Joar, Ted, Ali, and the unnamed artist, who support one another through rough home lives, bonding as a means of survival and defiance.

Then there’s Louisa, a teenager coming to terms with the death of her best friend, who’s on the hunt for a mysterious painting, born out of the friend group in the other timeline. Full of surprises, this novel is full of twists that will not only have you deeply invested in the characters, but itching to discover who’s behind the painting, and what inspired it in the first place.

Recently crowned the winner of the 2025 Women’s Prize for Fiction, The Safekeep is a claustrophobic novel that sinks under your skin. With only her maid for company, Isabel is a recluse who keeps busy maintaining her mother’s country house in the Netherlands. Isabel’s days are predictable, falling into a steady rhythm of cleaning and repair. All around, progress is happening. Finally, nearly 20 years after WWII, the wounds from the war are healing.

But when her brother unexpectedly drops off his new girlfriend, Eva, to stay with Isabel, her domestic calm is derailed. Isabel can’t stand Eva, from the way she noses into everything to her loud demeanor. But over time, Isabel’s dismay transforms into infatuation, thickening the tension to a breakable degree. Harkening back to the heady tone of Rebecca, readers will hold their breath as the stuffy drama unravels in surprising directions.

Right this way for fans of White Lotus and Big Little Lies. 30 years ago, Sarah Lingate was found dead at the bottom of her wealthy family’s estate in Capri. Though declared as an accident, there’s mounting evidence to the contrary. As a result, fractures have crackled throughout the family, even though no one was ever charged.

Now, with the return of a family heirloom, Sarah’s daughter Helen becomes obsessed with solving her mother’s case, even if no one in her family will help. Fortunately, Lorna, her family’s assistant, is happy to pitch in. When Lorna disappears, the mystery’s complexity doubles. To get to the bottom of Lorna’s vanishing, Helen must solve her mother’s cold case, once and for all.

In my puzzle-box mystery, a young woman travels to a remote tropical island, seeking answers about her fiancée’s death there a few months earlier. She meets a magnetic group of expats who welcome her into the fold…but just when she thinks she’s made peace with the unexpected death, she wakes to a text from one of her new friends: “You deserve to know the truth about your fiancée. Meet me at the cafe at 9 a.m.” When he doesn’t show—in fact, he’s disappeared from the island—she begins to uncover a web of secrets and lies suggesting her girlfriend’s “accidental” death was anything but. If you’re in the mood for sapphic suspense that feels like a trip to Mexico, look no further.

Weird question: Ever wondered what goes on at a gay bathhouse? In this propulsive and provocative thriller, a recovering addict who’s finally found a stable, loving relationship makes the questionable decision to secretly visit one. What’s supposed to be an illicit encounter goes from ill-advised to terrifying, setting off a rollercoaster ride of secrets, betrayals, and danger.

This slow-burn literary suspense, about a woman returning to her hometown where a friend disappeared long ago, features something I’m always happy to see: a main character who happens to be bisexual. (Not every story with a queer protagonist needs to be about homophobia and/or their coming-out). With gorgeous prose and richly drawn characters, The Good Ones is a powerful debut whose LGBTQ+ rep is the cherry on top.

The year is 2044, and wildfires are engulfing California, violent right-wing militias are proliferating, and authoritarianism is dismantling American society piece by piece. (Sound familiar?) Uber-wealthy gay couple Mason and Yunho are protected from it all, though, and so confident in their safety that they barrel ahead with an over-the-top baby shower even as an apocalyptic event hits their hometown. As you’ve probably guessed, the party…does not go as planned. I can’t wait to read this timely climate thriller (from the author of the unforgettable Yes, Daddy), which just hit shelves on June 3.

This spooky Gothic thriller is about a young father trying to protect his queer son from a TV preacher's disturbed (and disturbing!) family. When the family's patriarch is found murdered on the roof of the house—and the roads flood, trapping everyone inside—things go from bad to, yes, Biblically awful. The whodunit plot slowly unravels around a mounting supernatural danger, making this genre-bending horror/thriller both unpredictable and unputdownable.

Fans of beautifully written, character-driven mysteries à la Jane Harper and Tana French, take note: Real Easy just might become your new favorite. This gorgeously written, suspenseful whodunit is about a strip club in the ‘90s where dancers begin to disappear, and beneath the drum-tight plot is a thoughtful examination of safety, femininity, and the roles women play—with a poignant F/F storyline about two dancers falling in love.

The haunted house in this Gothic YA mystery isn’t your typical creaky-old-Victorian-on-a-hill; it’s the French colonial in Vietnam that closeted teenager Jade Nguyen has to live in for five weeks while her estranged father fixes it up. If she can just play the part of a straight, “normal” girl, she’ll get the college money her dad promised—her ticket out of there. But spooky happenings are keeping Jade from lying low as planned. Eerie and atmospheric, this suspenseful debut was an instant New York Times bestseller.

A just-dumped woman whose long-term plans include a husband and 2.5 kids moves in with an old friend and her husband to hunker down during the COVID lockdown...and finds herself falling for both her enchanting hosts. But then she discovers they’ve done this whole throuple thing before—and their last partner is missing. I wrote this domestic suspense novel while I myself was falling in love with a woman and coming to terms with my own bisexuality.

In one of the darkest campus thrillers of our time, university professor Scarlett Clark fancies herself a vigilante killer, clearing the campus of sexual predators—until she takes it too far and finds herself in a dangerous game of cat-and-mouse with a detective investigating the growing body count. Fiercely feminist and thoroughly effed-up, this twisted tale packs bisexual rep and thought-provoking commentary into a whip-smart page-turner.

This wicked, tightly plotted, and seriously twisted thriller, which just so happens to have been written by my brilliant sister, is about a young woman who travels to a writing retreat at her favorite author’s estate—but when the dream opportunity descends into a nightmare, she’ll have to fight (and write!) her heart out to make it out of there alive. This page-turning debut is also a queer coming-of-age story, exploring power, identity, sexuality, and where they all collide.

Known in Spanish as La Monja Alférez, de Erouso was forced into a nunnery as a 4-year-old girl in 1589 but made her escape as a teenager. For the rest of her life, she traveled Europe in masculine guise, having thrilling adventures that included multiple imprisonments, romantic dalliances with women, military stints, and one alleged meeting with the Pope.

Born in 1397, the mystic Margery Kempe was already married and a mother when she began having visions of demons, devils, God, Jesus, Mary, and other biblical characters. She was known for preaching in public while violently sobbing and convulsing, for which she was frequently imprisoned and charged with heresy. Touted as the first autobiography written in the English language, her book describes her struggles for chastity and her many pilgrimages, including to meet the famous anchoress, Julian of Norwich.

In this experimental and erotic masterpiece, Glück creates a mash-up of his own obsessive love affair with a younger man and Margery Kempe’s obsessive love for Jesus. Along the way, he integrates some of his trademark New Narrative techniques, like borrowing lines solicited from his writer friends. A weird, moving, beautiful, extremely explicit romp like no other.

A mesmerizing and gorgeously written novelization of the life of 12th-century poet and abbess Marie de France. If you are hoping for transcendent depictions of divine visions, hot sex between nuns, an engrossing portrait of a community of women triumphing against all odds, and immaculate prose—this book is for you.

Dunant is a master of historical suspense, and in this much-beloved novel, she transports us to 16th-century Italy, where we follow young Serafina, who is sent to a convent by her father when he cannot afford her dowry. What follows is a propulsive 400 pages rich with political intrigue, Catholic Church drama, erotic longing, and conspiracy among nuns.

Brown’s exploration of the life of 17th-century Italian nun Benedetta Carlini not only covers the accusations against her of lesbianism and her subsequent trial, but also the fascinating historical context of Renaissance Italy. When I took my wife to see Paul Verhoeven’s adaptation, Benedetta, she left the theater at one point because the sex portrayed was so blasphemous—and she is an atheist. Need I say more?

The narrator of Wood’s Booker-finalist novel, driven by despair over her Sisyphean work in species conservation, abandons her marriage and life in Sydney to stay at a convent in New South Wales. There she finds the quiet industry of its nuns, a resurfaced childhood figure, and lots of mice. No narrative fireworks, but Wood’s prose makes the quiet reflection of her narrator truly riveting.

This self-help book by two scholarly BFFs is full of wisdom gleaned from the lives of 16^th and 17^th-century nuns like Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz and Saint Teresa that is applicable to your most modern quandaries. The cheeky and insightful volume is also brimming with fascinating historical details, like the penchants of some nuns for side hustles and eating spiders.

“As a boy, I never knew where my mother was from—where she was born, who her parents were,” writes acclaimed author James McBride in his memoir. For years, he hounded his mother about her background, to which she’d reply, “I’m light-skinned.” Finally, after 14 years of nagging, she acquiesced, shocking McBride with the story of her upbringing. Born to Orthodox Jewish parents in Poland, McBride’s mother and family moved to the Jim Crow South in the 1920s. Years later, his mother fled to Brooklyn after marrying a Black man, seeking a life of acceptance and freedom. When her husband died, she was left to raise 12 children on her own.

Weaving together his mother’s accounts and his own memories, McBride’s memoir reconsiders his experiences in light of learning about her background. This book serves as a crucial reminder that sometimes your mother’s choices may have been informed by a life lived long before you were born.

Michelle Zauner’s memoir, Crying in H Mart, revisits her relationship with her mother, not only as the person who raised her, but as one of the key tethers to her Korean-American identity. Throughout the book, Zauner recalls memories of her mother, their fights, their meals, and, most harrowing, her mother’s terminal illness. The book, at times, is heart-wrenching.

Zauner’s memoir is a deep study of grief and lost connection without becoming a trauma dump. There’s no grandstanding or overly sentimental proclamations. Rather, Zauner showcases the reality of confronting one of life’s most common inevitabilities: the loss of a parent. Crying in H Mart is a grounded reflection about finding your way back to yourself and reclaiming your roots, even after the person who planted the seeds is gone.

While cleaning out her mother’s things after her death, archivist Danielle Geller found a suitcase full of artifacts from her mother’s youth spent in the Navajo Nation, from photos and notebooks to her personal letters. The discovery inspired Geller to embark on a journey to understand her mother, whose presence in her life was spotty and unstable, disrupted by bouts of addiction.

In pursuit of learning more of her mother’s history and meeting her estranged family, Geller returns to the Navajo Nation in Arizona, painting a sharp relief of how her mother’s challenges fit into the lexicon of hardship, colonialism, injustice, and survival of her people. This book hums with mounting energy that leaps from the page, spurred by Geller’s search for answers.

Perhaps no one listens to a mother’s stories like a daughter. So after Lisa Marie Presley died from surgery complications in 2023, it fell to her daughter Riley Keough to finish the manuscript she had been working on. Delivered in dual voices of Presley and Keough, the memoir explores Presley’s life with compassion and unflinching honesty.

When Keough chimes in, she inserts additional anecdotes or corrections as Presley recounts the highs and lows of her privileged life, from the struggles of growing up in the limelight and her relationship with her father to her marriage to Michael Jackson and starting her own family. At times, reading the memoir can feel like sitting at the kitchen table, having a marathon conversation with the two women, which is to say that it is every bit heartful, layered, and mournful.

Sometimes, you need a little kick in the butt to remember to make the most of your time with your mom. Consider this book a love letter to doing just that.

After Hollywood legend Diane Ladd experienced a potentially life-threatening illness that compromised her lungs, her doctor recommended that she take walks to rebuild her strength. Her daughter, actress Laura Dern, joined her on those walks around L.A., thinking they might be their final moments together. The two turned the conversations—where no topics were off the table—into this memoir.

While many will think of The Joy Luck Club when they think about Amy Tan’s fiction exploring family, her second novel, The Kitchen God’s Wife, zeroes in on the knotty relationship that can occur between mothers and daughters. In this case, it’s protagonist Pearl and her mother, Winnie, whose relationship has been strained since Pearl’s father died. Further complicating matters is the life-altering diagnosis that Pearl is keeping from her mother. Never finding the right time to share the news, she knows Winnie will be angry at her for hiding the information for so long. But Pearl might simply be following in her mother’s footsteps, as Winnie is keeping secrets of her own.

Set in California in the ‘90s and China during WWII, Tan delivers a story wrought with struggle and triumph, loosely pulled from her mother’s life. The Kitchen God’s Wife reminds us of the sacrifices mothers make to give their children opportunities that were perhaps unavailable to them. This book will appeal to fans of Rachel Khong, Elizabeth Strout, and Ann Napolitano for its rich storytelling and lovably imperfect characters.

Full disclosure: This memoir is a tearjerker that’ll have you squeezing your mom extra tight. Natasha Trethewey was 19 when her stepfather murdered her mother. In this devastating memoir, Trethewey, a poet, reveals the brutality of losing her mother, especially while on the brink of adulthood herself. She also illuminates circumstances that surround domestic violence and how the lack of early intervention can result in such tragedies.

The material may be heavy, but it isn’t dense. It is subtly defiant. By refusing to let her mother’s memory end with violence, she honors her strength and resilience.

After leaving her husband, Miriam North brings her daughters back to her ancestral home in Memphis, Tennessee, where her sister August lives. Their home is steeped in history and pain but also joy and perseverance. Told over three timelines, this big-hearted novel follows the various generations of North women as they confront systemic injustices and cultivate resilience through their love for one another. A necessary novel, Memphis showcases the big and small ways Black joy is expressed, even through hardships. With quick chapters and characters you’ll come to love, it’s a wonderful book to read with your mom or book club (or book club with your mom).

While many of us may consider Maya Angelou as our literary mother, she herself is a daughter. Ideal for anyone who’s had challenges with their mother, Angelou’s memoir, Mom & Me & Mom can serve as a blueprint for acceptance and timeworn love. In the book, Angelou recounts being raised by her mother, Vivian Baxter, and her grandparents, who looked after Angelou and her older brother for 10 years when they were children. Like all of Angelou’s work, this is a profound emotional excavation. Throughout the book, Angelou explains how her mother’s early abandonment impacted and molded her, partially, into who she was as an adult.

But this is Maya Angelou we’re talking about. Compassion is on every page as she retells how her mother’s life influenced how she treated her children and how she and Baxter rebuilt a bridge back to one another.

Though many have heaps to say about motherhood, it’s less common to hear from mothers themselves on hot-button topics, persisting myths, and taboos. Fortunately, Sarah Hoover’s new memoir eviscerates stereotypes about how mothers should act, think, and feel. A N.Y.C.-based gallerist, Hoover endured postpartum depression after giving birth to her son but put on a happy face so no one would know she was struggling in secret.

Throughout the thoughtful chapters, Hoover pulls back the curtain on the condition: how it festered and fanned the flames of anxiety over her child’s safety while simultaneously making her feel detached from him. But this is ultimately a hopeful compilation, as Hoover tracks her path to finding help and cultivating a comprehensive support network—making The Motherload an important conversation-starter about how best to support mothers during their entire pregnancy, even after giving birth.

This heartwarming, well-drawn novel depicts a family in motion. For 20 years, Rocky and her family have spent their week-long vacation at the same beach cottage in Cape Cod. Time has trundled by, and now, Rocky finds herself in a confounding life chapter: the sandwich years. No longer the parent of young children and not quite yet the full-time caretaker of elderly parents, Rocky must negotiate her responsibilities that seem to shift by the hour. There’s her marriage (her husband “understands between 20 and 65 percent of everything she says”), her children, her parents, and menopause. Rocky straddles these roles with ferocious vulnerability and the acute awareness that this time is temporary, like the gasp before the wave tumbles over.

Newman’s absolute skill in building atmosphere makes this a must-read for any summer vacation. Her prose will remind you of summer mornings on the beach spent with the people you love most in the world.

Lara Nelson is weathering the COVID-19 pandemic with her husband and three adult daughters at their cherry orchard in northern Michigan. There’s plenty to do: The berries require harvesting, the farm needs tending, and the family must remain safe. But, as Lara and her daughters pick cherries and unwind after long days, Lara regales them with stories of her adolescence and her somewhat accidental foray into becoming an actress. Now that her daughters are grown, Lara unspools details from her life that she once withheld—like meeting her ex-boyfriend, now a movie star, and her time performing the play Our Town. Ultimately, in sharing more about who she was before they were born, she tells them the story of their family.

This quiet novel leaves a big impression, urging readers to ask their mothers about who she was before motherhood. In true Ann Patchett fashion, everything from the characters to the setting is intricately developed, so much so that you’ll swear you can smell a cherry pie baking in the oven.

In 2017, Michele Filgate wrote a viral essay. She’d set out to discuss the abuse she suffered from at the hands of her stepfather but wound up writing about her mother instead. Encouraged by the success of her piece, Filgate decided to dig deeper, asking 15 writers to provide their own essays about a similar topic—the things they don’t discuss with their mothers and what prevents them from broaching the conversation—which became this compilation.

With contributions from authors like Melissa Febos, Brandon Taylor, Bernice McFadden, and Alexander Chee, the stories vibrate off the page as they explore everything from going “no contact” to having a mom who can’t stop oversharing. It should be considered an auto-buy for anyone looking for fresh perspectives on an age-old subject.

"Everyone talks about Gone Girl, but my favorite book from the queen of the unreliable narrator is Dark Places. I recently got to meet my writing idol, and she said this one was her favorite, too. It’s a must-read if you’re a true fan of mysteries."

"I fell in love with this book and was shocked to learn after I read it that the author lives in Indianapolis, Indiana, just like me! I’m a stickler about basing my books in reality. What would the cop really say? How could the protagonist actually obtain those records? I thought Don’t Forget The Girl was one of the truest representations of what it’s like for those left behind after a tragedy, woven in a really thought-provoking mystery."

"Prepare to be rocked. This isn’t your traditional whodunit, but it explores a dark topic from the perspective of a victim, who, for most of her life, doesn’t even realize she is one. It’s complicated and beautiful, and everyone I have recommended this book to has said it stayed with them long after reading the final page."

"This is one of my all-time favorite books, and it might come as a surprise to listeners because it is not a straight down the middle mystery/thriller. But if you like 'Crime Junkie' with a touch of 'Full Body Chills' podcast in October, this is right up your alley. It’s about the daughter of an infamous film director who dies, and one journalist's quest to find out if what happened to her is rooted in her father’s cursed work."

"Usually, I gravitate away from books where a podcaster is one of the main characters. I tend to pick it apart technically, which is not the point. But this one I loved! It’s got a main character with questionable motives and next-level twists, all in the setting of making a podcast. What more could someone want?"

"Fair warning: This is not an intro to true crime book. This book is for seasoned Crime Junkies who like untangling complicated webs of lies and conspiracies. The story takes the cake. It’s about a credit union in Nebraska whose president was committing financial crimes and allegedly running a child trafficking ring for the country’s rich and powerful. This is one of those stories I’m shocked more people don’t know about. But that might be because there is a concerted effort to make sure people don’t know about it."

"I’ve recommended this book a number of times on my podcast, and it’s one I read every couple of years. Interwoven with stories from his time as a security consultant to celebrities, Gavin de Becker gives you real-world tips and tricks about staying safe and trusting your gut. This is required reading for all Crime Junkies!"

"I got a chance to interview Barbara, and her story is amazing. She’s a badass medicolegal death investigator, and she’ll teach you exactly what that means in this book in a super engaging way."

All the Water in the World continues in the tradition of Station Eleven and The Road, fostering conversations about what we cling to in the face of danger. Unspooled in lyrical, elliptical prose, All the Water in the World is narrated by Nonie, a 13-year-old girl with a special skill for feeling into water, predicting storms, and sensing their depths. It’s a useful talent: Floods and storms have inundated N.Y.C., forcing Nonie and her family to live on the roof of the American Museum of Natural History. They serve as the museum's stewards, cataloguing surviving artifacts and exhibits. But when a superstorm pounds on their doorstep, the family must evacuate to higher ground, leaving the relics behind.

Through their journey to reunite with her mother’s relatives, Nonie begins to understand life before water upended everything, while simultaneously dodging perilous illnesses, encountering the Lost, those without anywhere to live and resorting to unthinkable acts to survive, and other manmade dangers.

The first installment of Jeff VanderMeer’s Southern Reach trilogy, Annihilation, follows a group of female scientists visiting Area X, a cordoned-off natural sanctuary in what was formerly Florida. The research unit—a psychologist leading the mission, an anthropologist, a surveyor, and the narrator, a biologist—accounts for the 12^th expedition to investigate the zone.

It’s a daunting feat: Members of past expeditions have fallen to mass suicide, cancer, and other confounding psychological effects. Tasked with learning what may have caused these responses, the 12th expedition follows its predecessors, quickly going sideways. Harboring a secret, the biologist insists on pushing the group to explore further, despite their demise. This novel drips with tension you don’t even realize you’re swimming in until you’re gasping for air.

Reading like an A24 action movie melted into book form, this novel follows a group of New Zealand climate activists, known as Birnam Wood, who demonstrate their resistance through acts of rebellious gardening. Yep, you read that right.

When a main artery to the town of Thorndike becomes blocked, Birnam Wood members see an opportunity to creep onto a farm, which they believe is abandoned. But soon they realize that the farm is, in fact, very much inhabited by Robert Lemoine, a tech billionaire who’s conducting nefarious activity on the land himself. Birnam Wood’s leader, Mira, and her best friend, Shelley, attempt to negotiate with Lemoine, which may be akin to sleeping in a snake pit. Holding the other’s secrets, a tragedy brings both sides together, producing a swell of drama so large you could float a raft on it.

What if AI could predict the end of the world? Such is the premise for Naomi Alderman’s novel, The Future, which accordingly, presents a near future where the climate can be manipulated, and the apocalypse can be planned for. Lenk Sketlish, Zimri Nommick, and Ellen Bywater are the three most powerful billionaires in the world, running companies responsible for social media, shipping, and tech devices, respectively. Together, they’ve devised technology that can forecast the end of the world, enabling them to create secret escape plans to weather the storm, literally.

However, a counter group led by some of the billionaires’s most trusted confidantes is working to upend their greed. So, when a threat to humanity is identified, it’s unclear who will win out: the one-percenters or something, perhaps, more powerful: empathy. Told from a chorus of characters and message board posts, The Future thrums with action from the start, posing questions about the true essence of human nature.

Come hell or high water, Mason will make the baby shower for his firstborn child one to remember. He’s coordinated the Weathermod for a rain shower to clear the smoke from the ongoing L.A. wildfires. He’s booked the synchronized swimmers. He’s even got a 10-piece orchestra ready. Gucci gas mask in hand, he thinks he’s considered everything. That is, until he and his baby’s surrogate encounter a new hurdle: A pink fog that, if ingested, awakens zombie-like tendencies. For many novels, this would be enough drama to last the entirety of the book. But for author Jonathan Parks-Ramage, these hilariously creepy antics transpire within the first 100 pages. The hijinks only rack up from there.

It’s Not the End of the World reads like the best yap sesh you have with your friends after splitting a pitcher of mimosas at brunch. A rollicking novel that imagines a world where biodomes can sustain a full community and robotic guard dogs helmed by extremists, It’s Not the End of the World distorts humanity just to the point of recognition, delivering a sharp-tongued satire indicting the current political landscape as well as human greed and apathy.

At the opening of C Pam Zhang’s sophomore novel, Land of Milk and Honey, industrial-agricultural experiments in the U.S. have gone awry, unfurling a great smog, which has killed off produce and decimated livestock. This is nearly a career killer for the unnamed protagonist, considering she's now a chef with no ingredients. When she's presented with an opportunity to become the cook for an elite community on a private mountaintop in the Italian Alps, she jumps at it, packing up her cat and meager belongings. But things on the mountain aren’t as clear as its fresh air might suggest: The peak houses some of the leading minds on sustainability research, and much more.

As the narrator becomes entangled with the daughter of the research center’s benefactor, she learns of the wider vision for the research and how it might impact the surrounding communities buried beneath the hazardous smog. This novel sparks a conversation around class, climate, and ethical farming, among other topics. Zhang’s spare, lyrical prose will sweep you into the book’s quiet inertia that will have you thinking about it for weeks after you’re finished.

If you watched updates on the terrible wildfires that swept L.A., you may have heard one name repeatedly come up: Octavia Butler, a sci-fi writer ahead of her time. First published in 1993, Parable of the Sower starts in 2024 L.A. The city has been ravaged by fires and social inequity, displacing thousands who, in the absence of government protection, have unraveled. Despite harrowing poverty and nonexistent resources, many are simply trying to get by, wandering the landscape for money and food. Meanwhile, others have resorted to violence, pillaging gated communities like the one where Lauren lives with her family.

Several years later, Lauren’s community is attacked, forcing her to journey north, seeking land where she and the small group that’s formed around her can begin to rebuild. Despite her conviction, she’s far from immune to the devastation around her; Lauren possesses the gift of hyper empathy, which causes her to feel the sensations of others around her, especially pain, physical or emotional. But from this pain comes a seedling of a new faith, requiring protection as much as nurturing.

The first installment of what was meant to be a trilogy, Butler reimagines the hero’s journey, setting her young heroine in a dystopian landscape that breeds hope, despite its apocalyptic surroundings.

As a last-ditch effort to save his writing career, Patrick leaves New York for L.A., where he’s been enlisted to supervise a film adaptation of one of his novels, which in L.A. speak translates to working as a glorified production assistant. But the city he encounters is a far cry from La La Land: It's succumbed to drought, creating the market for WAT-R, a synthetic fluid meant to replicate the hydrating qualities of water. But WAT-R may have unexpected side effects, wiping the minds of those who consume it.

Patrick isn’t worried—he’s only in town for a short stint—and sips his WAT-R while shepherding Cassidy, the leading lady in the adaptation, across town. Cassidy, a former child star, isn't some hopeless has-been. She’s a sharp-witted actress who senses something isn’t right with WAT-R. She refuses to drink the stuff, shelling out cash for “the real thing.” But as Patrick begins to display symptoms of WAT-R exposure, he and Cassidy must attempt to untangle the mystery behind what’s causing people to fall ill after consuming the drink. Taking aim at climate change and our modern thirst to optimize everything, Something New Under the Sun proposes a future so real, you can taste it.

In Tilt, a long-rumored earthquake finally erupts along the Cascadia Subduction Zone fault line from California to the Pacific Northwest. It rips apart the land and leaves behind so much destruction that Annie becomes stranded in Ikea—at nine-months pregnant, no less. Without a way to get in touch with her husband, Annie attempts to find her way home across Portland, Oregon.

The walk gives her time to reflect on her life: her failed playwriting career, her marriage, her future as a mom, while keeping her baby, “Bean,” safe from unknown dangers. But this novel isn’t a heady character study in which not much happens. (Hello, it starts with an Earth-shattering natural disaster!). Rather, Tilt presents a well-rendered interrogation of compassion, generosity, and, yes, selfishness. You’ll hold your breath each time Annie encounters someone new, waiting to see what’s to come of her and Bean.

Look no further if you’re searching for a thriller that reads like top-class literary fiction. Written in sparse, haunting prose, Wild Dark Shore features characters so clearly drawn, you’ll feel as if you’re stuck on fictional Shearwater Island with them.

Shearwater once housed a bustling research facility. It's abandoned now, but Dominic Salt and his three children still look after the island, considering it harbors one of the last remaining seed banks, compiled for humans to harvest should a climate event wipe out all agriculture.

The Salt clan has their caretaking down to a science. They ration food, mind the angry and unpredictable sea, and vigorously look after the seeds. But when Rowan blows up on shore during a horrific storm, their equilibrium is immediately disturbed, further fissuring fractures within the family that existed before Rowan’s arrival. It wasn’t an accident that the mysterious woman wound up on their shores; she's swept to their coast on a current of curiosity and her need for answers. But, as she uncovers more about what brought her to the island, a storm threatens to dismantle all she’s come to care for. The only question is: What will she do to protect it?

Recovering girl bosses will delight in Gabrielle Korn’s debut novel that smashes outdated ideals of corporate feminism. If you’ve ever wondered what a cocktail of capitalism, feminism, survival, and climate change tastes like, pick up this book.

Climate change is taking a toll on Ava’s relationship. It’s 2050, you would think that people would be better at navigating the sweltering temperatures and the toxic air, but that's not the case. When she scores the chance to leave her home in Brooklyn for a coveted spot within The Inside Project, the Manhattan bubble created by visionary Jacqueline Millender, Ava jumps on it, irrevocably altering her future.

She joins a league of followers, like Shelby and Olympia, who also can’t believe they get to call the glorified biodome home. But, as the initial excitement wears off, Ava and her newfound friends start to detect that not everyone is as “empowered” as Jacqueline wants her followers to believe. Soon, it becomes unclear what’s more of a threat: Jacqueline’s wrath or the climate change outside the Inside.

Before a young Leonardo DiCaprio ever traipsed across our screens in baggy board shorts, The Beach was a novel that instilled a special type of fear in backpackers and ex-pats alike. While traveling in Thailand, Richard, a young Brit, befriends a group of fellow travelers. Under suspicious (and bloody) circumstances, one of his new friends gives Richard a map of a remote island with the most beautiful beach in the world. With some luck, Richard finds the island, only to learn he’s not alone, encountering an off-the-grid community. At first, everything is idyllic, but Richard’s mental state slowly deteriorates as the harmony of the community slides into violent chaos.

This thriller is so taut with tension that you could play it like a guitar string. A visceral exploration of man versus (his) nature, The Beach continues to resonate with its increasingly prescient themes.

Before heading to college, best friends Bess, Joni, and Evangeline head to Greece to spend one last summer together. But as they soak up the sun and cook delicious meals, their vacation quickly goes sideways, becoming pockmarked with tension perhaps only felt by teenage girls (IYKYK). Then, Evangeline tragically dies, and Bess and Joni become embroiled in an international scandal that tears apart their friendship, causing them to spin off into their orbits.

Now, years after being cleared of any wrongdoing, Joni is thriving, having become a successful wellness guru. Meanwhile, Bess has slipped into obscurity, hiding from life. So, Bess is suspicious when Joni reappears in her life, needing a favor—and, as she finds out, she's right to be.

This mystery is smooth like a well-blended piña colada. While paying homage to female friendship (really!), Before We Were Innocent skewers stereotypes and misguided biases of girls on the brink of womanhood.

Release date: June 17, 2025

Do you know who really knew how to tell a yarn? The Greeks. Fortunately for readers, plenty of modernized versions of Greek tragedies have been published. But there’s always room for one more, like this reimagining of The Bacchae by Euripides.

In Ivy Pochoda's retelling, Lena is a middle-aged mother traveling to the Greek island of Naxos for the opening of The Agape, a luxury resort that her son, Drew has been nurturing as a side hustle. With her husband and Drew's father recently dead, her son has seamlessly stepped into the role of her protector—or warden. While putting the finishing touches on the resort, he also keeps her under close watch.

While cooped up again, Lena yearns for her past as a free-spirited party girl. So when she encounters a group of women who appear liberated and maybe a little feral, she's reminded of what it was like to live rather than merely survive. Something awakens in Lena and she must figure out what she’s willing to sacrifice to feel that way again.

With biting prose that leaves a mark, Ecstasy will spirit you down the rabbit hole of pleasure, autonomy, and self-actualization. Be sure to pre-order this one.

It’s the summer of 1975 and Camp Emerson has just opened for the season. Nestled at the foot of the Adirondacks, most campers arrive by car, train, and plane to enjoy the camp’s surrounding beauty and fun activities. Only one, Barbara, can shuffle out her front door and head down the hill to find her cabin, considering the camp is run by her family, the Van Laars, pillars of the local community. Despite her family’s stewardship of the camp, her mother isn’t thrilled to see her go, unable to shake the underlying fear that something could go wrong. That’s because, 14 years earlier, something did go wrong: Barbara’s older brother went missing from the camp and was never found. So, when Barbara herself goes missing, painful wounds are reopened.

Full of exquisite details that'll have you reaching for the bug spray, God of the Woods reshapes the camp thriller into a literary mystery, complete with multiple narrators, deliciously drawn-out suspense, and a surprise ending you won't see coming.

Plus, if you're going on a long road trip, the audiobook will especially transport you to a bunk at Camp Emerson, even while stuck in gridlock traffic.

No one likes to get dumped. But for 22-year-old Alex, a former sex worker with only burned bridges for company, getting dumped by her wealthy older boyfriend, Simon, is catastrophic. Not only will she miss his killer house in the Hamptons and lavish gifts, but she'll also miss their relationship's security. And so, Alex becomes obsessed with setting the record straight because she's convinced that if she can clear the air, he'll take her back. With his epic Labor Day party coming up, she can't think of a better time to confront him.

There is only one problem: the party is days away and she has nowhere to stay beforehand. Because of a misunderstanding with her roommates back in Manhattan, Alex pulls out all the stops to crash out East. Inevitably, she embarks on a grift fueled by drugs and desperation, mooching off unsuspecting marks with a mix of nonchalance and persistence that’s deeply alarming (and riveting).

Throughout the novel, Alex is an unlikely tour guide to the tony vacation town, pulling back the curtains and slipping behind the gates of opulent estates, ransacking the loneliness often housed within their walls. With tension that’ll have you galloping to the last page, you’ll probably want to pack a second book since you won’t be able to put this one down.

If reading about a bunch of grisly murders while you're on vacation doesn’t do it for you, pick up a copy of The Life Impossible. Grace Winters, a retired math teacher, has been bequeathed a startling gift from Christina, a woman she barely knew: a house in Ibiza. Surrounded at home by reminders of a family tragedy, Grace travels to the island to escape her past and learn about what happened to her long-lost friend. However, as Grace untangles the mystery of Christina’s death, she gains access to powers that will forever impact her outlook on life.

The Life Impossible is one of those books that gets under your skin in the best way possible. Fans of The Midnight Library, Haig’s previous fantasy novel, may recall the author’s knack for showcasing the full humanity of his characters: their wants, fears, dreams, and darknesses. The Life Impossible is no different, putting forth a heartwarming story steeped in magical realism that accentuates the main character’s relatability, even as things heat up.

Unlike the main characters of the other novels on this list, The Maid follows a protagonist who works at a luxury hotel, rather than stays at one. Molly is a maid at The Regency Grand Hotel, one of the most prestigious hotels in her town. She loves her job: the tidiness, the detail, and even some guests, like Giselle Black, the wife of a successful businessman who frequents the hotel when he’s in town.

One day during a typical morning shift, Molly uncovers something terrible: Mr. Black’s dead body. And so, Molly finds herself swept up in a homicide investigation. While some unsavory characters aim to take advantage of her neurodivergence, Molly's unique way of moving through the world makes her an asset to collaring the culprit—even if she doesn’t know it yet. The Maid is a modern whodunnit that encourages readers to embrace each other's differences because, you never know, they might help solve a murder.

The Midnight Feast takes place at the grand opening party of The Manor, a coastal estate in Dorset, England that's been converted into a resort. Held during the summer solstice, the festivities are to culminate into a midnight dinner—but with various forces at play, it’ll be a miracle if the festivities go smoothly. Take, for one, the presence of The Mystery Guest, who doesn’t quite fit in with the other wealthy patrons. There’s also The Husband, who becomes squirrely when asked how he met his wife, the resort’s proprietress, Francesca. And then there’s Francesca herself, who opened the resort despite local legends warning against such a thing. So, when the party is underway and a history of horrendous crimes resurfaces, the only question is: Who will make it to dessert?

Author Lucy Foley is a master at knotty plots that make for propulsive reading. Told in a kaleidoscope of perspectives spanning three timelines, The Midnight Feast blends vacation thriller vibes with classic folklore creepiness, creating a unique spine-tingler you won't want to put down.

Belonging to the same constellation of deserted island thrillers like The Beach, Reckless Girls is a deliciously dark romp set in a tropical oasis. It’s not every day you’re asked to sail a couple of besties to a deserted island, but that’s what happens when Lux, along with her boyfriend Nico, are offered a tidy sum to bring Brittany and Amma to Meroe Island, a tropical haven that’s caused shipwrecks—and served as safe harbor for unsavory secrets.

Upon arrival, the foursome is dismayed to find another boat when they dock on Meroe’s shores. They seem nice enough and the entire group falls into a pleasant rhythm—but their rendezvous is quickly interrupted by another unknown stranger and later a dead body.

Hawkins deftly froths up tension between the group as they fight to get off the island alive, making the book read like a beloved summer blockbuster. With short chapters and approachable prose, this book is perfect for a day spent poolside.

You’ve seen the movies and TV shows, but have you read the book that started it all? First published in 1955, The Talented Mr. Ripley is a psychological thriller that’s rightfully earned its place in the classic mystery lexicon.

Tom Ripley is an outsider, scamming his way across N.Y.C. when he crosses paths with Herbert Greenleaf, the father of Tom’s friend from school, Dickie. Playing up their closeness, Tom is asked by Herbert to retrieve Dickie from Italy, since he refuses to leave (who wouldn’t?). So Tom heads to Italy, needling his way into Dickie’s life, much to the chagrin of Dickie's sometimes-girlfriend, Marge. But as Tom and Dickie forge a bond, Tom becomes besotted with his new friend—so much so that he wants to be him. Epitomizing the meaning of "cute but psycho," Tom pulls out all the stops to embody Dickie’s quirks, gestures, and demeanors, no matter the consequences.

Whether this is your first or 50th read of this banger, The Talented Mr. Ripley is soaked with briny prose ringing with the heat of the Italian coast. If you need more Ripley in your life—who doesn't—consider checking out the entire series, which will equally delight you.

If you were part of the #Booktok contingent that championed Mona Awad’s dark academia darling, Bunny, this one’s for you. Awad’s sophomore novel, All’s Well, feels like a spooky mix of Eileen by Ottessa Moshfegh and, well, Shakespeare—just don’t tell the main character, Miranda, we said that.

Once a promising actress, Miranda had a bad fall while performing in a Shakespearean play. Since the tumble, her life has been upended. Suffering from chronic pain, Miranda is gaslit by doctors and in competition with students she directs in a college theater troupe. Oh, her marriage has crumbled, too. It’s as if the fall plummeted her to an all-time low.

When presented with an offer to dispel her pain, Miranda doesn’t ask questions. What happens next is a blissed-out retribution sequence that will have any underdog rooting from the sidelines. But Miranda will learn there are consequences, especially for revenge. In usual Awad fashion, the plot is carried by a creeping darkness threatening to shroud the characters if they’re not careful.

Release date: March 18

In this upcoming sexy novel, Rachel is about a week into her life as a newly divorced mom when COVID-19 storms N.Y.C. where she lives, raises her children, and works as a UX designer. Now stuck at home and incredibly horny, Rachel immerses herself in the world of online dating, pushing her vibrator to its limits. After careful safety screenings, Rachel takes the sexting to the sheets, hooking up with random men for the first time in her life.

Though the wild nights are delicious, Rachel can’t shake a convo she had with her best friend about her ideal person. What attributes would she program into them? She has the chops to design those very characteristics into a chatbot—but will she?

Leaving Chicago and her husband behind, Lois arrives at the Golden Yarrow, a divorce ranch in ‘50s Reno. What’s a divorce ranch, you may ask? In the ‘50s, divorce ranches served as loopholes to restrictive laws that made it difficult for women to meet divorce requirements. In Nevada, however, women simply needed to live in the state for six weeks to meet the criteria for divorce. While staying at The Golden Yarrow, future divorcées drink their weight in gin, flirt with local cowboys, and prepare for their freedom.

Lois, a somewhat meek former housewife, is a good girl. She listens to her father’s instructions on how to behave at the ranch and keeps to herself. But when a new resident checks into the ranch, Lois receives an education on her untapped potential.

There are two sides to every story. And, boy, does Fates and Furies deliver on that premise. When Lotto and Mathilde get together in college, everyone is confused. Lotto is the man about campus, gregarious, and driven to shake his family name and make it big on his own as an actor. Meanwhile, Mathilde is an enigma who’s quiet and contained.

It’s a case of opposites attract that the pair only leans further into, even when Lotto’s wealthy family cuts him off. Though they’re full of promise when they graduate college, marry, and move to New York together, it’s up to Mathilde to support them when Lotto’s career goes nowhere. That is until Lotto writes a play based on his family, and it’s a hit.

The novel follows the couple as Lotto’s success continues to rise, thanks to the sacrifices of his wife. And then Mathilde gets to tell her side of the story. The novel, which features echoes of Greek mythology, reveals the inconsistencies and biases that can make up a marriage. If you were a fan of the Showtime series, The Affair, chances are, you’ll probably love this book.

Toby Fleishman is a father of two who recently separated from Rachel, his wife of 15 years. And though difficult, Toby thought he was managing his new life pretty well—until Rachel abandoned him with their children. The novel, adapted to screen as a Hulu series, sings with tension as Toby struggles to balance his new single life, caring for his children, hunting down Rachel, and holding onto his job. Above all, he can’t shake the bewilderment over what would cause Rachel, his formerly driven, insanely successful wife, to do such a thing. Fortunately for readers, she’ll fill you in…eventually.

Andy, a flailing, London-based comedian, has gone off the deep end. After being dumped by his longtime partner, Jen, Andy becomes consumed with what went wrong in the relationship—and how he can get her back (or, at least, make her jealous). This novel is all sorts of relatable. Take, for example, the extremes Andy swings from after the breakup. One second, he’s working on his “revenge body,” the next he’s reminiscing about their life together, the following moment he’s moving into a houseboat.

Dolly Alderton expertly explores the special Hell that is post-breakup life—often raw with emotion, insecurity, and misunderstanding. Told in quippy prose fit for a comedy show, Alderton saves up for a surprise ending that will leave you crying into your pillow in the best way possible. And if you’re on the go (good for you, post-breakup activities are a must!), the audiobook delivers.

Before You’ve Got Mail and When Harry Met Sally, there was Heartburn. In the ‘80s, Nora Ephron, the Queen of Romantic Comedies and dreamy movie sets, wrote a banger of a breakup novel that ultimately launched her career. In the novel, which inspired a feature film of the same title, cookbook author Rachel is married to Mark, a political journalist based in Washington, D.C. Seven months pregnant with their second child, Rachel stumbles across evidence that Mark is cheating on her. Rachel then does what any sensible woman would do: She goes to New York. Imbued with humor, the story tracks Rachel’s steps to recover from the shock, plan for her next chapter, and seek laughter, even through tears. Come for this classic’s high jinx, and stay for the must-try recipes and snackable prose.

Raise your hand if you’ve buried parts of yourself to make a relationship work. Such is the case for Jane, a writer married to filmmaker, John. At the beginning of their relationship, Jane is convinced that she and John want the same things: to cultivate a loving marriage, build a family, achieve their artistic dreams, and become unapologetically successful. But as John’s star begins to rise, Jane is expected to shoulder the brunt of, well, everything else. A scathing look at gender roles and working as a female artist, this book is for anyone who’s ever felt unappreciated or overlooked in their relationships. (If you find yourself a fan of this one, check out The Wife by Meg Wolitzer.)

Part punk manifesto, part breakup book, the LGBTQ+ novel Nevada is a cult classic for a reason. Meet Maria, a trans woman working and living in N.Y.C. While she’s an online expert on trans life, Maria struggles to maintain relationships offline. When she’s not tending to her blog about transgender rights, she’s avoiding her girlfriend, Steph. And so, after losing her job and splitting up with Steph, Maria embarks on the age-old quest west, seeking answers and self-reflection.

Instead, she meets James, who she’s convinced is trans but has yet to come out. In a near-pitch-perfect arc, Maria is transported from the role of needing care to giving it. This novel exposes the messiness that follows a breakup while illuminating the complexities and beauty of trans life. With biting prose that hums along like your favorite Sex Pistols song, this novel is unflinching in its complicated warmth.

There’s a reason that Sally Rooney has been coined the “first great millennial novelist.” It’s because of books like Normal People, her second novel, which was so popular it was adapted into a Hulu series.

For newcomers to her work, Normal People is arguably the best of her novels to read first. The novel follows the classic enemies-to-lovers(ish) romance book trope, featuring Connell, the classically popular boy in school, and Marianne, the quiet outsider. But, after a fateful meeting, their lives become inexplicably intertwined. The book examines their relationship over several years, mapping their misunderstandings and missed connections that are so believable you’ll forget that you’re reading fiction.

So, you’re newly single and feel like the world is over. Now what? Read this book. Because, if you’re looking for a relatable novel about a woman struggling to make sense of the flaming trainwreck that is her life, you’ve come to the right place.

Maggie is pushing 30, newly divorced, and can’t get offline. This debut, penned by Monica Heisey who used to be a writer on the hit comedy Schitt’s Creek, teems with full belly laugh moments as Maggie relearns how to function as a single woman. Readers will delight in her missteps as she pieces her life back together, leans into her group chat (been there), and returns to the world of random hookups and 4 a.m. hamburgers.

If it’s your turn to rec a title for your book club, consider this one; it’ll have everyone in your group cackling and cringing in equal measure.

Whether it’s martial arts, language, or relationships, Katie Kitamura applies surgical precision to every topic she explores in her novels. In A Separation, Kitamura turns her keen eye to grief and absence. The novel begins when the unnamed narrator learns her husband, Christopher, whom she’s been separated from for six months, has gone MIA while on a work trip in Greece. The catch: She and Christopher have kept their separation a secret. Traveling to Greece to aid in the search, the narrator maintains the charade that she and Christopher are still together, contributing to oozing tension.

If in the hands of a lesser author, the plot has the potential to become overbearing and heavy-handed. But, fortunately for us, Kitamura unfurls her typical, bone-clean prose that illuminates plenty in their white space. Lines like, “Our marriage was formed by the things Christopher knew and the things I did not,” will have you silently nodding along, especially as the story heats up.

An excellent depiction of the impact of mental health on relationships, Sorrow and Bliss blends comedy with heart-wrenching scenes about mental illness that will stick with you long after you’ve finished the novel. Martha, once a writer with a bright future, has come up short in life. Though if you asked her, she couldn’t begin to tell you when or how everything went sideways. On paper, she has (or had) it all. For one, there’s her husband Patrick, who she’s loved since she was a girl, a loyal sister, and an aunt who fiercely supports her. Somehow, she’s ruined everything.

It may be due to the random mood swings that can override everything else, causing her to push away everyone she loves, cannibalize her career, and mirror the chaos she experienced in childhood. To understand her outbursts, Martha revisits key moments of her upbringing to understand and address her behavior, hopefully before it’s too late. This book has a host of trigger warnings, from alcohol abuse to mental health issues, so be sure to give it a quick skim before diving in if you’re unsure if it’s right for you.

With a ship crew made up of her besties and a demon for an ex-husband, Amina al-Sirafi may be unhinged, at least by contemporary standards. But in the medieval fantasy realm where she operates, her badassery is basically a calling card for folks who need her services, like finding lost treasure, whatever (or whoever) it may be. A pirate, Amina al-Sirafi’s impressive reputation reaches a woman searching for her missing grandchild, Dunya. Embarking on a harrowing adventure, Amina discovers that she and Dunya share a unique connection, and without the other, each will suffer. This is a new take on the classic hero’s journey trope, upending the classic conventions to produce a story that’s edge-of-your-seat good.

Each year, six of the most talented magicians are invited to compete for a place in the Alexandrian Society, an elite group that manages and sequesters knowledge from civilizations of antiquity. If accepted into the secret society, they will enjoy a life of influence and power. Told in a kaleidoscope of voices, The Atlas Six follows the class of competitors as they go blow to blow against each other—and unforeseen enemies.

Right this way, dark academia fans. It’s the early 19^th century and orphan Robin Swift is a student at Oxford University’s Royal Institute of Translation, or Babel. Robin immerses himself in his studies: Latin, Greek, Chinese, and, well, magic. Babel has helped the British Empire assert reign over the world, thanks to the school’s silver workings which manifest translations of lost languages. Robin relishes his time at school, developing friendships with his classmates and being engrossed with his classes. But when Robin learns the university’s plan to help foster a war against those he cherishes, he must decide to fall in rank with his beloved college or join a secret society fighting the empire’s colonialism and therefore eschew his academic dreams.

The first novel in The Dark Star trilogy unfurls an epic story of friendship, adventure, and plenty of danger. Tracker, a man with an uncanny sense of smell, has been employed to find a missing boy, the sole survivor of a massacre. To find the boy and his monster captors, Tracker must resist his lone-wolf nature and work with a crew of supernatural beings to recover the child. But, when they encounter a hefty amount of resistance in their pursuit, Tracker and his squad begin to wonder if there’s a bigger game at play.

Collum, a talented knight, is very late. Arriving at Camelot hoping to secure his place at the Round Table, Collum discovers that King Arthur and his knights are dead. And so, it’s up to Collum and a gaggle of misfit knights to rebuild the Round Table while protecting Britain from faeries and other magical powers. To do so, they’ll have to learn why King Arthur was felled—and avoid making the same mistake.

A retelling of the Greek myth, Circe follows the goddess of the same name through rounds of disappointment and struggle. Exiled to the island of Aiaia, Circe strengthens her witchcraft and encounters mystical beings. But she’s not alone—not when Hermes, an Olympian god visits her, or when Jason and Medea seek refuge on the island after committing a crime. During her time on the island, Circe endures betrayals and loss, while sharpening her survival instincts, which she unleashes to find solace after an eternity of hardship.

After slaying a mystical wolf in the woods behind her house, Feyre must venture into the dangerous adjacent fairy territory to protect her family from imminent danger. But as she learns more about her captor and the truth behind his mysterious mask, she realizes she might be the link to breaking a decades-long curse. This series has topped the lists for good reason: They’re delectable stories that read like an indulgent snack, and will surely have you hoping for a second serving.

We won’t hold it against you if you’ve watched the movie before reading the book (guilty). But reading Dune can majorly help decipher all the family trees, unique powers and talents of certain characters, and the general world where the story in the Timothée Chalamet-starring blockbuster occurs. Frank Herbert’s iconic sci-fi/fantasy novel is set on the planet Arrakis, where young royal Paul Atreides and his family are sent to oversee the mining of a special spice used for space travel and therefore in high demand across the universe. But, when conflict erupts on the planet between the Atreides clan and the former Arrakis overlords, the Harkonnens, Paul and his mother must flee to safety in the surrounding desert riddled with danger…and opportunity.

What would you do if you could live forever, but were remembered by no one? After making a deal with the devil, Addie LaRue roams the world for 300 years, destined to remain invisible to everyone she encounters. Until one day, countless minutes and days and years after she made the deal that changed everything, she meets Henry. They see each other again—and he remembers her. This heartbreaker of a novel spans multiple timelines and will leave you so shook you’ll probably need a hot bath or chocolate or a Housewives marathon to snap out of it.

This one is a buckle-up type of novel. After her suburban neighborhood is destroyed, Carolyn and several other orphans are taken in by a man who goes by Adam or Father. Each orphan has been relegated to a different section of his magical library, tasked with learning as much as possible about their assigned topic, ranging from healing to animal communication and even murder. Carolyn is assigned to languages of all types, including supernatural ones. Years later, Father has gone missing, and Carolyn and her adoptive siblings want to find him. But as drama unfolds within the group, she must tap into unlikely allies to help retrieve Father. Sweltering with surprises, this fantasy book is a fever dream that flirts with speculative fiction—and it doesn’t disappoint.

The third installment of Rebecca Yarros’s Empyrean series, Onyx Storm arrives later this month, meaning we can all finally relax. At least, until we race through this one like the others before it. After proving herself as the dragon rider she was destined to become, it’s time for Violet Sorrengail to fly free and leave Basgiath War College and the Aretian wards behind. And while Violet has dodged plenty of threats in her time training as a dragon rider at Basgiath, she’ll have to use all of her skills and talents—and more—to hunt for magic that can protect against the enemy threats in and outside the college’s walls. Violet must find the truth she’s searching for before it’s too late. Like Fourth Wing and Iron Flame, Onyx Storm brims with can’t-put-downable tension until the last page.

File T.J. Klune’s series about a mystical orphanage in your cozy fantasy folder. The sequel to Klune’s list-topping The House in the Cerulean Sea, the newest installment follows Arthur Parnassus as he runs the Marsyas Orphanage, caring for magical children he hopes to adopt. A lot has changed since he was an orphan there. For one, the children are protected from government agencies that discriminate against people with unique abilities. And so, when Arthur and his partner Linus leave the island where the orphanage is located, he must navigate an unexpected turn that threatens the future of the orphanage and the children who live in it. Reach for this book if you need a major pick-me-up (who doesn’t?) that, while cozy, isn’t cloyingly sweet.

Book, stage production, or movie? Why not all three? In case you’re pining away for something to fill the Elphaba-sized hole in your heart—at least until Wicked: For Good comes out later in 2025—the original novel will more than satisfy. Wicked, an inspired prequel from the 1900 classic children’s book The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum, gives the Wicked Witch of the West her roses. With its delightful take on the iconic story, you’ll fall in love with the characters—all of them.

Word to the wise: Not unlike Game of Thrones or even Harry Potter, Wicked is decidedly more mature than its screen and stage counterparts, and probably best reserved for a more grown-up audience. But, if you have a child-size, Elphaba fan on your hands and you’re eyeing the book for a potential bedtime story, just do a pre-read before tucking anyone in (consider this permission to double-down on defying gravity, we won’t tell).

This novella has it all: a blustery country estate, boarding schools, an unsolved murder, and a surprise ending juicier than your mom’s holiday roast. Ashley Smith, an American art student in London, is staying with a university pal, Emma Chapman, and her family for Christmas. The Chapman’s Cotswolds manor brims with holiday opulence and festivities. That is until Ashley learns that Adam, her crush and Emma’s brother, is under investigation for a recent murder. Then, it gets weirder.

This little novel packs a lot in for its brief length, making it—or its excellent audiobook—a strong contender for holiday travel.

This is a favorite among fans of Ruth Ware, the contemporary mystery-thriller queen. Hal works as a tarot reader at a seaside boardwalk, leading an isolated, yet burdened life. Then, she receives a letter that changes everything. In the note, Hal learns she’s to receive a significant inheritance from Mrs. Westaway—whom she’s never heard of. Hal untangles a series of mysteries to receive the inheritance, but her investigation turns out to be more dangerous and surprising than she could have ever imagined.

This nail-biter will likely appeal to lovers of Clue (the game or the ‘80s movie—a classic in its own right). Friends and family are cozied up for Christmas at Warbeck Hall, a country manor. But when a blizzard knocks down the phone lines, someone turns up dead, and the hosts, guests, and staff are shocked to discover they’re both suspects and detectives.

Right this way, fans of The Great British Baking Show. You’ll devour Jessa Maxwell’s charming novel about the fictional cooking show Bake Week. In the book, the biannual show follows England’s most promising home bakers through a competition at the childhood home of the show’s super host. This is a cozy mystery, though—so if you were wondering what could go wrong, well, everything. Sugar is swapped for salt, knives are sharp, and the competition is mean. When a body turns up, bakers will have to look for proof in the pudding to discover who’s behind the murder.

What would you do if a fortune teller told you that, in the future, you’re going to be murdered? Such is the case for Frances Adams, who collects dirt on just about everyone in her village after hearing the news. But, when the fortune teller’s prediction finally comes true, it’s Frances’s great-niece, Annie, who will have to piece together the clues to figure out who was behind the murder based on the clues she left behind.

Twins Mercy and Lizzie have inherited their grandfather’s bookshop in Shamrock Cove, Ireland. But when Mercy happens upon a dying neighbor, she inadvertently becomes embroiled in a homicide investigation. Mercy and her sister must race against the clock to clear her name—and stay alive.

Crime books don’t come much cozier than this nesting doll of a novel. Susan Ryeland finds herself in a mystery, much like one of the detective novels she edits for well-known author Alan Conway. Susan must turn to one of Conway’s recent manuscripts to uncover clues to help her solve her real-life case. Readers searching for a modern Sherlock Holmes story will delight in Horowitz’s twisty, tweedy novel with no shortage of red herrings, local color, and tea-splattered dialogue.

This list wouldn’t be complete without at least one title by the OG herself, Agatha Christie. While the author almost single-handedly put cozy mysteries on the map—and has penned several holiday procedurals—The Murder at the Vicarage marks the first installment of the iconic Miss Marple series. Miss Marple, an unlikely gumshoe, comes across the murder of a detested business owner in her village, St. Mary Mead, a sleepy English country town. Weeding through unassuming suspects and local gossip, Mrs. Marple uses all her resources to collar the culprit.

Reach for this thriller if you want a book like Only Murders in the Building. Jess is down and out when her half-brother, Ben, invites her to stay with him at his epic Paris apartment. Only when Jess shows up, it turns out that he’s MIA. As time passes, Jess wonders if his neighbors had anything to do with his disappearance. The problem? No one is saying a word.

In a different sort of detective novel, the father-and-daughter duo Nagare and Koishi run a diner in Kyoto with a special focus: recreating dishes for their clients. Nagare and Koishi hunt down secret ingredients and culinary tricks all to achieve the perfect bite. By sleuthing and creating culinary delights, Nagare and Koishi help their clients answer larger questions. Succinct and heartwarming, these stories are ideal for reading before bed.

Getting snowed in at a luxury resort in the Swiss Alps sounds pretty great, right? Well, not if you’re Detective Elin Warner. Currently off duty, Elin joins her brother and his fiancée on vacation at a former sanatorium converted into a five-star hotel. But when Laure, Pearce’s future sister-in-law, goes missing in the middle of a blizzard, the detective must use all her sleuthing skills to locate her before it’s too late.

Claire Keegan’s novella bursts with inner conflict. It’s just before the holidays in Ireland, and Bill Furlong, a coal and timber merchant, is helping out his staff by pitching in to do some deliveries. While dropping off coal at a local convent, Bill encounters a girl in dire need of help. As the church works to conceal the issue, he must confront his own misgivings to follow his moral compass. There’s no body count here, so if you’re not a fan of murder but searching for a tension-filled plot, this one’s for you. (More reason to read: It was adapted into one of 2024's must-watch dramas, with Cillian Murphy leading the cast.)

From Holmes and Watson to Mulder and Scully and yes, even Buffy and Angel, detective duos make for some of the most entertaining watches and reads. Steve and Amy Wheeler, the main characters in Richard Osman’s 2024 mystery, are no exception. A heart-thumping thriller, Steve exits retirement to help Amy pin down a murderer. Hijinks and holy shits ensue, making this a cozy mystery you won’t want to put down.