The Best Books We Read This Year

Another year of reading, in the books. Before launching headlong into our 2026 TBRs, we’re taking a beat to reflect on our top reads from the past 12 months.

From memoir to fantasy, new releases to contemporary classics, these books run the gamut. And yet, they all share something in common: They’ve stayed with us long after we turned the final page.

Below, editors at Bustle — and Bustle’s sister sites Inverse and Elite Daily — reveal their favorite books of 2025.

Woodworking by Emily St. James

The renowned television critic’s debut novel upends everything you’d expect from a trans-in-a-small-town story through the unlikely friendship at its center: There’s Abigail, the only out trans girl in her high school and a quick-witted rebel worthy of a classic teen movie, and her English teacher, Erica, who’s still coming to terms with her identity when she seeks out Abigail for guidance — a role Abigail is not exactly thrilled to play. As St. James alternates between their perspectives, she plays with narration in ways that made me genuinely gasp — as did the book’s third act. — Nolan Feeney, features director, Bustle

Gwyneth by Amy Odell

I may be biased because she’s a friend, but I couldn't put down Odell’s juicy biography of Gwyneth Paltrow, which promptly spawned headlines when it was released over the summer. And mining new territory when it came to the Oscar winner was no easy feat: The Goop founder and high priestess of woo-woo wellness didn’t participate in the book, yet Odell persisted, rigorously researching and reading everything there was to know about Paltrow and conducting more than 200 interviews with friends, colleagues, and Hollywood insiders. The result? A dishy, intimate look at a woman whose acting career, romantic relationships, and second act as a businesswoman has been the subject of public fascination for more than 30 years. — Christina Amoroso, editorial director, Bustle

The Creep by Michael LaPointe

My surprising reading highlight of the year was a literary thriller that came out in 2015 and is set in 2001. During the anxious intermediary stage between 9/11 and the Iraq War, Whitney Chase, a hungry young journalist at an exciting new magazine, falls into reporting what could be a career-making story. Far away from the centers of power, in the most neglected neighborhoods in Colorado and Florida, Whitney works on a profile of the female founder of a medical startup that readers in 2025 will quickly clock as Theranos-like. Things get weirder, and Whitney falls into her tendencies toward fabulation — “the creep” for which the book is named. The Creep raises all kinds of questions about truth, morality, sacrifice, personality disorders, and so on. But for me, the one left on the table is “Why hasn’t everyone read this?” — Greta Rainbow, research editor, Bustle

The Second Coming: Sex and the Next Generation’s Fight Over Its Future by Carter Sherman

If you’ve ever read one of the countless Internet think pieces on the Gen Z sex recession and thought “I wish someone would talk to Gen Z about what they really think,” look no further than this deeply researched nonfiction book. Reproductive health and justice reporter Carter Sherman spoke to more than 100 young people about how their sex lives have been shaped by the Internet, politics, and pop culture. The result is a nuanced look into the reality of learning how to have sex — and who to have it with — in a post-#MeToo, post-Roe era. — Sarah Ellis, contributing editor, Elite Daily

Be Ready When the Luck Happens by Ina Garten

I’ve always found so much comfort in Ina Garten’s Barefoot Contessa: Her warm, unflappable demeanor and unpretentious air (“Store-bought is fine!”), as well as the truly enviable DINK lifestyle she shares with her husband, Jeffrey Garten, is inspiring. So I was pleased to find that Garten’s memoir, Be Ready When the Luck Happens, is an equally heartening balm. In her familiar, ever-so-cheeky tone, the beloved chef tells her story — from her difficult childhood, to life with Jeffrey, to the bold moves that built her culinary empire — with the candor of a cherished aunt who wants you to have a beautiful life, too. — Grace Wehniainen, staff writer, Bustle

The Unworthy by Agustina Bazterrica, trans. Sarah Moses

I read a lot of books I loved this year: Patricia Lockwood’s Will There Ever Be Another You gave me new language with which to discuss my own illness; I was delighted to find that Benjamín Labatut’s much-vaunted When We Cease to Understand the World was not overhyped; Nona Fernández’s The Twilight Zone, about life in Chile under Pinochet, still turns in my mind. But The Unworthy by Agustina Bazterrica, translated by Sarah Moses, takes the crown. This novel, about a strange, post-apocalyptic religious community occupying a former monastery, captured my imagination from the first page and never let go. — Chloe Joe, features editor, Bustle

Katabasis by R.F. Kuang

If there’s one book I got lost in this year, it’s R.F. Kuang’s Katabasis. The literary, dark-academia-inflected novel follows two grad students, Alice and Peter, who travel into hell to save their professor. They begin as rivals, but over the course of their journey, they inevitably become closer. Their enemies-to-lovers tension is just as gripping as Kuang’s atmospheric worldbuilding, intellectual prose, and twisty, satisfying plot. — Gabrielle Bondi, entertainment editor, Bustle

Circe by Madeline Miller

With Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey promising to blow up box offices in 2026 and Percy Jackson taking Disney by storm, Greek mythology is in the air. But, as ever, the men (and boys) are telling the tale. That pushed me this year to revisit Circe, Madeline Miller’s 2018 reimagining of the story of the daughter of Helios and Perce. A footnote in The Odyssey, Circe was a goddess who threatened Odysseus and his men (turning them to pigs and back) and who then spent a year with the hero. His verdict at the end of his journeys: She “tried to hold me back.” Needless to say, Circe probably doesn’t hold the same perspective. As I read Miller’s telling of her life surrounded by hapless gods and brash men, I can’t help but hold out hope that Christoper Nolan and Charlize Theron, who will play Circe in the upcoming movie, are reading along. To capture the goddess who has for centuries represented the fear of femininity, you can’t do much better than Circe. — Tyghe Trimble, editor-in-chief, Inverse

Hollywood Wives by Jackie Collins

I genuinely have no idea what inspired me, at my big age of 32, to pick up my first Jackie Collins novel. (Maybe it was a Substack recommendation? Or another platform where the algorithm knows me better than I know myself?) Regardless, I went in expecting some pretty camp-y chick lit. What I discovered was such biting, satirical, and raunchy prose that, at times, I found myself blushing while reading it over a glass of wine in the West Village this summer. Pair it with the 1988 Vanity Fair story “Queens of the Road,” in which Dominick Dunne profiles Jackie and her sister, actor Joan Collins, amid a bout of sibling rivalry. Both are heaven on earth. — Samantha Leach, associate director, special projects, Bustle