Best books of 2025, across every list

59 year-end lists from 51 publications, 722 books. Ranked by how many lists each made. 122 made 3 or more.

  1. Flashlight by Susan Choi: on 18 lists (Booker shortlist)
  2. The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny by Kiran Desai: on 18 lists (Booker shortlist, Kirkus Prize finalist)
  3. Audition by Katie Kitamura: on 17 lists (Booker shortlist)
  4. A Marriage at Sea by Sophie Elmhirst: on 15 lists (Kirkus Prize finalist)
  5. Heart the Lover by Lily King: on 14 lists
  6. A Guardian and a Thief by Megha Majumdar: on 13 lists (National Book Award finalist, Kirkus Prize finalist)
  7. Flesh by David Szalay: on 12 lists (Booker winner, Kirkus Prize finalist)
  8. One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This by Omar El Akkad: on 12 lists (National Book Award winner)
  9. What We Can Know by Ian McEwan: on 12 lists
  10. Mother Mary Comes to Me by Arundhati Roy: on 11 lists (Kirkus Prize finalist)
  11. The Wilderness by Angela Flournoy: on 11 lists (Kirkus Prize finalist)
  12. Shadow Ticket by Thomas Pynchon: on 10 lists
  13. A Flower Traveled in My Blood by Haley Cohen Gilliland: on 9 lists
  14. Perfection by Vincenzo Latronico: on 9 lists (International Booker shortlist)
  15. The Antidote by Karen Russell: on 9 lists (National Book Award finalist)
  16. The Buffalo Hunter Hunter by Stephen Graham Jones: on 9 lists
  17. Raising Hare by Chloe Dalton: on 8 lists (Women's Prize shortlist)
  18. Stone Yard Devotional by Charlotte Wood: on 8 lists
  19. The Director by Daniel Kehlmann: on 8 lists
  20. We the People by Jill Lepore: on 8 lists
  21. Baldwin by Nicholas Boggs: on 7 lists (Kirkus Prize finalist)
  22. Isola by Allegra Goodman: on 7 lists (Kirkus Prize finalist)
  23. King of Ashes by S.A. Cosby: on 7 lists
  24. Lonely Crowds by Stephanie Wambugu: on 7 lists
  25. Murderland by Caroline Fraser: on 7 lists
  26. Stag Dance by Torrey Peters: on 7 lists
  27. There Is No Place for Us by Brian Goldstone: on 7 lists
  28. Things in Nature Merely Grow by Yiyun Li: on 7 lists (National Book Award finalist)
  29. We Do Not Part by Han Kang: on 7 lists
  30. A Truce That Is Not Peace by Miriam Toews: on 6 lists
  31. Book of Lives by Margaret Atwood: on 6 lists
  32. Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil by V.E. Schwab: on 6 lists
  33. Dark Renaissance by Stephen Greenblatt: on 6 lists
  34. Is a River Alive? by Robert Macfarlane: on 6 lists
  35. Mark Twain by Ron Chernow: on 6 lists
  36. Searches by Vauhini Vara: on 6 lists
  37. Sky Daddy by Kate Folk: on 6 lists
  38. The Book of Records by Madeleine Thien: on 6 lists
  39. The Dream Hotel by Laila Lalami: on 6 lists
  40. The Emperor of Gladness by Ocean Vuong: on 6 lists
  41. Wild Dark Shore by Charlotte McConaghy: on 6 lists
  42. Atmosphere by Taylor Jenkins Reid: on 5 lists
  43. Black in Blues by Imani Perry: on 5 lists (Kirkus Prize finalist)
  44. Buckeye by Patrick Ryan: on 5 lists
  45. Buckley by Sam Tanenhaus: on 5 lists
  46. Careless People by Sarah Wynn-Williams: on 5 lists
  47. Dream Count by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie: on 5 lists
  48. Helm by Sarah Hall: on 5 lists (Goldsmiths Prize shortlist)
  49. Katabasis by R.F. Kuang: on 5 lists
  50. King of Kings by Scott Anderson: on 5 lists (Kirkus Prize winner)
  51. Memorial Days by Geraldine Brooks: on 5 lists
  52. Palaver by Bryan Washington: on 5 lists (National Book Award finalist)
  53. Ruth by Kate Riley: on 5 lists
  54. The Dry Season by Melissa Febos: on 5 lists
  55. The Slip by Lucas Schaefer: on 5 lists (Kirkus Prize winner)
  56. The South by Tash Aw: on 5 lists
  57. The Wayfinder by Adam Johnson: on 5 lists
  58. 1929 by Andrew Ross Sorkin: on 4 lists
  59. An Oral History of Atlantis by Ed Park: on 4 lists
  60. Claire McCardell by Elizabeth Evitts Dickinson: on 4 lists
  61. Dead and Alive by Zadie Smith: on 4 lists
  62. Death of the Author by Nnedi Okorafor: on 4 lists
  63. Endling by Maria Reva: on 4 lists
  64. Girl on Girl by Sophie Gilbert: on 4 lists
  65. Herculine by Grace Byron: on 4 lists
  66. John & Paul by Ian Leslie: on 4 lists
  67. Minor Black Figures by Brandon Taylor: on 4 lists
  68. Paper Girl by Beth Macy: on 4 lists
  69. Playworld by Adam Ross: on 4 lists
  70. Startlement by Ada Limón: on 4 lists
  71. Storyteller by Leo Damrosch: on 4 lists
  72. Strangers in the Land by Michael Luo: on 4 lists
  73. Sunrise on the Reaping by Suzanne Collins: on 4 lists
  74. Terrestrial History by Joe Mungo Reed: on 4 lists
  75. The Correspondent by Virginia Evans: on 4 lists
  76. The Gods of New York by Jonathan Mahler: on 4 lists
  77. The Hounding by Xenobe Purvis: on 4 lists
  78. The True True Story of Raja the Gullible (and His Mother) by Rabih Alameddine: on 4 lists (National Book Award winner)
  79. Vera, or Faith by Gary Shteyngart: on 4 lists
  80. Woodworking by Emily St. James: on 4 lists
  81. All Consuming by Ruby Tandoh: on 3 lists
  82. Bat Eater and Other Names for Cora Zeng by Kylie Lee Baker: on 3 lists
  83. Black Moses by Caleb Gayle: on 3 lists
  84. Bread of Angels by Patti Smith: on 3 lists
  85. Bug Hollow by Michelle Huneven: on 3 lists
  86. Clam Down by Anelise Chen: on 3 lists
  87. Crumb by Dan Nadel: on 3 lists
  88. Cursed Daughters by Oyinkan Braithwaite: on 3 lists
  89. Dream State by Eric Puchner: on 3 lists
  90. Electric Spark by Frances Wilson: on 3 lists
  91. Gertrude Stein by Francesca Wade: on 3 lists
  92. Good Dirt by Charmaine Wilkerson: on 3 lists
  93. Good Girl by Aria Aber: on 3 lists (Women's Prize shortlist)
  94. Great Black Hope by Rob Franklin: on 3 lists
  95. Heartwood by Amity Gaige: on 3 lists
  96. Hot Girls with Balls by Benedict Nguyễn: on 3 lists
  97. How to End a Story by Helen Garner: on 3 lists
  98. I Regret Almost Everything by Keith McNally: on 3 lists
  99. Joyride by Susan Orlean: on 3 lists
  100. Maggie; or, A Man and a Woman Walk Into a Bar by Katie Yee: on 3 lists
  101. Moderation by Elaine Castillo: on 3 lists
  102. Motherland by Julia Ioffe: on 3 lists (National Book Award finalist)
  103. Mothers and Sons by Adam Haslett: on 3 lists
  104. Mỹ Documents by Kevin Nguyen: on 3 lists
  105. North Sun by Ethan Rutherford: on 3 lists (National Book Award finalist)
  106. On the Calculation of Volume (Book III) by Solvej Balle: on 3 lists
  107. Pan by Michael Clune: on 3 lists
  108. Replaceable You by Mary Roach: on 3 lists
  109. Sleep by Honor Jones: on 3 lists
  110. The Eleventh Hour by Salman Rushdie: on 3 lists
  111. The Fate of the Day by Rick Atkinson: on 3 lists
  112. The Hollow Half by Sarah Aziza: on 3 lists
  113. The Names by Florence Knapp: on 3 lists
  114. The Pretender by Jo Harkin: on 3 lists
  115. The Sisters by Jonas Hassen Khemiri: on 3 lists
  116. The Ten Year Affair by Erin Somers: on 3 lists
  117. The Zorg by Siddharth Kara: on 3 lists
  118. Theft by Abdulrazak Gurnah: on 3 lists
  119. These Summer Storms by Sarah MacLean: on 3 lists
  120. To the Moon and Back by Eliana Ramage: on 3 lists
  121. Uncanny Valley Girls by Zefyr Lisowski: on 3 lists
  122. Will There Ever Be Another You by Patricia Lockwood: on 3 lists

The lists

Titles and authors only; read the critics on their own sites. Spot a mistake, or want your list left out? Tell us.