It’s that time of year again! Tis the season where we celebrate our favorite reads from the past 12 months. BookSparks CEO, Crystal Patriarche, has shared her absolute favorites every month this year and now she’s rounding up the ones you don’t want to miss and will definitely want to pick up as gifts. Check your TBR twice for the best books of 2025.
Best Books of the Year
Every year leaves with you stories that make a mark, and this year, a few stood out not only for Crystal’s best books, but on some of the top celeb book clubs as well. We’ll also break down re-reads she loved, the books she can’t forget and the surprising novels that swept her away in 2025.
Wild Dark Shore by Charlotte McConaghy
Dominic Salt and his three children are caretakers for a seed bank on a remote island off the coast of Antarctica. After a terrible storm, a woman named Rowan washes up on shore and the family nurses her back to health. However, another storm is brewing that could threaten the seed bank, and tensions are rising between Dominic and Rowan as her secrets and their feelings towards one another threaten to come out.
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Buckeye by Patrick Ryan
The lives of Cal and Margaret change forever after a chance encounter in the aftermath of World War II. The two continue to intertwine across the course of American history until the end of the Vietnam War. This incredibly moving novel grapples with themes of love, loss, and family as the characters change alongside their country.
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Before I Forget by Tory Henwood Hoen
Despite a job at a posh wellness company, Cricket Campbell finds herself a bit adrift when she gets news that her father’s Alzheimer’s diagnosis has advanced to the point where he needs to be put in full-time care. Instead of allowing this, she returns to her childhood lake home to be his caregiver. But an extraordinary thing happens. As her father loses his memory, he appears to gain insight into the future. Cricket must cope with this new ability while reconciling her past.
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Best Quick Read
Heart the Lover by Lily King
A senior in college meets two English geniuses, Sam and Yash, in her 17th century literature class who take an instant liking to her, nicknaming her Jordan, and inviting her into a world of academia, revelry and intellectual ambition. However, their academic passion goes awry and soon the trio gets complicated when a love triangle forms. After graduation, and some life-altering decisions, Jordan thinks the past is behind her. That is, until decades later, when she gets a surprise visitor. Suddenly, Jordan’s past comes crashing back and she must face the decisions of her younger self.
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Best Book Club Book for Conversation
Culpability by Bruce Holsinger
A car crash leaves a family under intense scrutiny because one of the vehicles was operated by artificial intelligence and two people are dead. Not to mention the fact that everyone in the family has a secret. Lorelei is a prominent voice in AI with insidious connections to another more controversial mogul and her husband Noah is getting suspicious. Their son Charlie has fallen in love with a competitor’s daughter, and twin girls Alice and Izzy are sitting on information that could blow up the entire story.
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Best Re-Read
The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
Published in 2003, this beloved novel is about a friendship between a wealthy boy and the son of his servant. Set in Afghanistan during a tense moment of change, this bestselling novel explores betrayal, the power of reading, familial love and redemption.
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Best Romance
It’s a Love Story by Annabel Monaghan
Jane is a Hollywood executive trying to move on from her embarrassing past on a sitcom. Desperate to impress, she oversells her childhood relationship to the singer Jack Quinlan and makes a blind promise that he can write a song for their new movie. Her only in, however, is Dan—the arrogant cinematographer she has a tense relationship with—whose hometown is where Jack’s next concert will be. The two stay together in close quarters on the journey to fulfill Jane’s promise, but while Jane keeps her white lie hidden, she might accidentally reveal the feelings she has for Dan.
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Best Family Drama
The Irish Goodbye by Heather Aimee O’Neill
The three Ryan sisters are finally getting a family reunion at Thanksgiving, two years after a fatal boat accident changed their lives forever. Each sister is carrying her own secrets—about her role in the accident, about her sexuality, and about her career. Tensions rise and secrets spill out with the arrival of an unexpected guest.
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Fun for the Whole Family by Jennifer E. Smith
The four Endicott siblings, Jude, Roddy, Gemma, and Connor, are summoned for an unexpected reunion by a cryptic message from Jude after they used to be inseparable. Each of the siblings are in a turbulent part of their lives: Gemma is questioning the sacrifices she made to have a family, Connor is a novelist suffering from writer’s block after his divorce, and Roddy is on the verge of losing his husband while negotiating a contract for his professional soccer career. Only Jude, the famous actress, seems to have everything under control until she reveals she has three secrets of her own that could change everything.
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Best Historical Fiction
Hamnet by Maggie O’Farrell
Told from the point of view of Agnes—Shakespeare’s wife—the story kicks off in 1580 in the throes of the Black Death. Agnes is a talented healer and an eccentric woman who lights a fire under her young, poor husband. Inspiring him as he begins to ascend in his career, the two endure a horrendous loss that is believed to inspire the infamous Hamlet. Academy Award-winner Chloé Zhao brought this gorgeous story to the screen this year making it the perfect time to revisit the novel.
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Best Always Wanted to Read and Finally Did
Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry
Retired Texas ranchers Augustus McCrae and Woodrow Call go on a perilous adventure across Montana while herding their cattle. This classic Western novel takes the beloved ranchers on an unforgettable journey where they face danger, love, and a wild cast of unique characters along the way.
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Best Classic I Read
East of Eden by John Steinbeck
This classic novel set in California between the Civil War and World War I follows the intertwining destinies of two families—the Trasks and the Hamiltons. Over the course of Steinbeck’s genius novel, the families reenact the fall of Adam and Eve and the rivalry between Cain and Abel.
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Most Beautiful
The River is Waiting by Wally Lamb
New father Corby Ledbetter has lost everything. His job, his wife, and now his freedom. After addiction causes him to lose it all, he winds up in prison, witnessing the unchecked brutality of the system. Though the world on the inside is harsh, there are small pockets of refuge in the kindness of a prison librarian and a good-hearted cellmate. Forging a new identity away from the mistakes he made, Corby dreams of being reunited with his family and proving his change for the better.
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Most Surprising
The Correspondent by Virginia Evans
Sybil writes letters she will never send to people that matter in her life, whether that be a friend, a lover, a favorite author, or a hated professor. As she writes these letters over the course of her very full life she comes to understand herself better—especially when an unexpected letter gets sent back to her and she must face some of the darkest parts of herself.
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Most Interesting Concept
The Names by Florence Knapp
Mother of two, Cora, sets off to register the birth of her new son on one condition—she must name the child Gordon after her husband. However, after a marriage of abuse and misery, Cora hesitates to fulfill his demands. From this decision comes three alternative timelines spanning 35 years of the mother and son’s lives. Three names, three different lives in a story that begs the question, what’s in a name?
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Best Celeb Book Club Pick
Broken Country by Clare Leslie Hall
In this Reese’s Book Club pick, Frank and Beth’s marriage depends on their ability to hide the past. But, after her brother-in-law shoots her ex-boyfriend’s dog going after their sheep, the past comes clawing back for her. Her ex, Gabriel, can’t help but remind her of their once beautiful and heartbreaking love, and his young son Leo reminds her all too much of her son, whom she lost in a tragic accident. As dangerous jealousy and secrets arise in the small village, Beth must face the woman she was, and the woman she must become.
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Still Thinking About
Dream State by Eric Puchner
Cece cannot wait to start her life with her true love and soon-to-be husband Charlie, who insists his best friend from college, Garrett, officiate the wedding. Cece struggles with this, as she cannot think of a worse person for the job. Garrett is haunted by his past with Charlie and refuses to let anyone in. That is, until he spends more time with Cece, who now must choose between the life she had planned for herself and the one she would never have imagined.
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Wish They Would Write Even Faster
These romance novelists have characters you can’t help falling in love with and are masters of the tropes you already adore. Heartwarming and sexy, these authors write novels that have something for everybody and despite their beloved backlist, we still want more—and soon!
Emily Henry
A New York Times bestselling author, Henry is the current voice for all romance lovers. Her six most recent works flip through tropes like enemies-to-lovers, fake dating, opposites attract in daring, can’t-miss books. After getting Great Big Beautiful Life this year—a slight departure from her usual—it looks like we may have to wait a bit for her next novel. A 2026 book has not been announced, but we do get to look forward to the adaptation of People We Meet on Vacation coming to Netflix in January!
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Abby Jimenez
An award-winning novelist, Jimenez has written a slew of sweet, cinnamon roll-laden romance novels and we want even more! Her sexy characters and cute tropes make her novels an easy page-turner and this year’s hit, Say You’ll Remember Me landed her the #1 spot on the New York Times bestseller list. Fortunately, we are getting a follow up to that beloved book in March with The Night We Met.
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