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Let’s take a look at some buzzy new book club reads for 2025!
It’s that time again to start planning your reading year in 2025! Each year, I like to put together a list of novels that all sound promising for book clubs. It’s fun to read new titles together, and also know what’s on the horizon (check out my 2024 list here and my 2023 list here).
This list features 10 new novels publishing in 2025 that all sound like great selections for book clubs. I plan to read each of these, so keep checking back to the site and this page for my review and book club questions.
Also, each month, I will put together a list of three new titles, and two older titles, to help with book club selections too. After all, there are SO many books publishing that one list is not enough. So keep an eye out for that as well!
This list features a lot of engaging titles from returning authors such as Charmaine Wilkerson, Taylor Jenkins Reid, Fredrick Backman and many more. And there’s so intriguing books by debut authors as well.
Let’s get to the most anticipated 2025 book club list! These are listed in order of pub dates.
Homeseeking by Karissa Chen (January 7)
Start off your reading year with one of the most promising debuts of the year: Homeseeking by Karissa Chen.
According to the publisher, award-winning author Karissa Chen’s meticulously researched and deeply personal literary debut illuminates the grand scope of the Chinese diaspora through the intimate story of Haiwen and Suchi, childhood best friends turned star-crossed soulmates, and their sixty-year journey back to each other.
With expertly crafted dual timelines, Chen carries the reader through the Sino-Japanese war and the Chinese civil war, crisscrossing Shanghai, Hong Kong, Taiwan, New York City, and Los Angeles, all while navigating the themes of love, migration, and the immigrant experience.
I absolutely can’t wait for this one so check back soon for my review and book club questions.
Good Dirt by Charmaine Wilkerson (January 28)
I loved Black Cake by Charmaine Wilkerson. I highly recommend you read it if you haven’t yet! It was such a vivd, compelling and heartfelt story. So I’m so eager to read her latest, Good Dirt.
The story follows the daughter of an affluent Black family who pieces together the connection between a childhood tragedy and a beloved heirloom in this moving novel. The publisher states that in this sweeping, evocative novel, Charmaine Wilkerson brings to life a multi-generational epic that examines how the past informs our present.
Check back soon for my review and book club questions.
Harlem Rhapsody by Victoria Christopher Murray (February 4)
There’s a ton of anticipation for Harlem Rhapsody by Victoria Christopher Murray who is the bestselling coauthor of The Personal Librarian. Her latest is based on the extraordinary story of the woman who ignited the Harlem Renaissance.
Tayari Jones, New York Times bestselling author of An American Marriage calls this book a “page turner and history lesson at once.” I love historical fiction novels where I learn about a historical figure—it always influences me to read more about them as well.
Looking forward to it! Check back soon for my review and book club questions.
We All Live Here by Jojo Moyes (February 11)
You most likely are familiar with Jojo Moyes (Me Before You, The Giver of Stars, etc). I quite like her books, it’s often heartfelt, have humor, but also cover serious topics as well.
Her latest novel features a contemporary story about a woman and a blended family.
Jodi Picoult says that story and Jojo’s writing “…reminds us that we matter, even when the world tries to make us invisible. It takes a master of the craft to catalog the messy vicissitudes of life in a way that both haunts and validates the reader’s own experiences, and her latest novel proves that there is no time like the present to rewrite one’s own story.”
Check back soon for my review and book club questions.
Wild Dark Shore by Charlotte McConaghy (March 4)
Charlotte McConaghy is such a talented author. I read Migrations years ago and I’m still thinking about it. So I’m quite looking forward to her latest, Wild Dark Shore.
Her stories fall under the literary supense arena, one of my favorite genres of late. This one is about a family on a remote island and everything changes when a mysterious woman is washed ashore. The publisher says this is a novel of breathtaking twists, dizzying beauty, and ferocious love, Wild Dark Shore is about the impossible choices we make to protect the people we love, even as the world around us disappears.
Check back soon for my review and book club questions.
Broken Country by Clare Leslie Hall (March 4)
I first heard about Broken Country back in September 2024, making this one of the most buzzed about novels publishing in 2025.
The publisher says it was one of the hottest books at the London Book Fair, selling in over 30 territories. The film rights were immediately optioned by Sony 3000 Pictures with Hello Sunshine (the same team behind Where the Crawdads Sing) attached to produce, and early blurbs have arrived from authors like Mary Beth Keane (Ask Again, Yes), Miranda Cowley Heller (Paper Palace), and Delia Owens herself.
Broken Country is part love triangle, part courtroom drama and part thriller. But while this book is about a murder trial, at its core it is a love story.
Lots and lots of attention on this one! Very curious about it. Check back soon for review and book club questions.
Saltwater by Katy Hays (March 25)
This thriller is about an opulent family retreat to Italy that’s shattered by the resurfacing of a decades-old crime.The publisher says the novel is Succession meets The White Lotus by way of Lucy Foley’s The Guest List. Rich people behaving badly, family secrets, the sunshine of Capri….
Sounds like it will be an engaging, page-turner! Check back soon for my review and book club questions.
Great Big Beautiful Life by Emily Henry (April 22)
Emily Henry books are everywhere! And for good reason, they’re fun, romantic, feature plenty of comedy, but also depth as well. I loved her book in 2024, Funny Story.
So I can’t wait for Great Big Beautiful Life! This story is about two writers who compete for the chance to tell the larger-than-life story of a woman with more than a couple of plot twists up her sleeve in this dazzling and sweeping new novel.
So excited for it! Check back soon for review and book club questions.
My Friends by Fredrick Backman (May 20)
Fredrick Backman stories are funny, charming and so heartfelt. In his latest novel, My Friends, the story follows four teenagers whose friendship creates a bond so powerful that it changes a complete stranger’s life twenty-five years later.
Excited to see what he has in store! Check back soon for my review and book club questions.
Atmosphere by Taylor Jenkins Reid (June 3)
Taylor Jenkins Reid likes covering famous (typically fiction but inspired by real-life) figures and this time it centers around an astronaut. Atmosphere is an epic new novel set against the backdrop of the 1980s Space Shuttle program about the extraordinary lengths we go to live and love beyond our limits.
Can’t wait for this one! Check back soon for review and book club questions.
Happy reading!
