The Five Best Books I Read in 2025

I am proud to say that I have reached my goal of reading a hundred books in 2025! Accomplishing this goal in October is the most impressive part for me. But what matters is not the amount of books I read but the amazing books I read over the course of the year.

This article will focus on the five best books I read in 2025. Choosing five from the 101 books I read so far was not easy but there were some that stood out then most. And you will definitely see a theme in the books that I ended up choosing. You can see the full list below!

The Five Best Books I Read in 2025

• One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez
• The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen
• James by Percival Everett
• Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver
• The Women by Kristin Hannah

One Hundred Years of Solitude

Choosing only five books was not easy but there were standout novels that made this process faster than I expected. After you read One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez, you will start to ask yourself how high you would rank this novel on your personal favorite list.

Gabriel García Márquez‘s novel is brilliant and beautifully written and is easily one of the best books I have written. It is a powerful novel and one that everyone should read in my opinion. The fact that is is considered one of the most important works of literature should make this novel the next one on your reading list if you haven’t read it already.

The Sympathizer

The Sympathizer by Viet Thanh Nguyen won the 2016 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and ended up being named of the 30 best books of the year by The New York Times. That should be more than enough to get you to read this amazing novel.

The novel is set in 1975 and the following years and takes place in Vietnam and Los Angeles. The protagonist is unnamed and is a half-Vietnamese, half-French undercover communist agent who was educated in the United States as a kid and has a firm understanding of both American and Vietnamese values. 

Throughout the book, the unnamed protagonist tells us his story and being a double agent, trying to survive in the U.S in the 1970’s. His job requires him to be close to the General and report to his bosses even after the fall of Saigon.

It is a story about identity, love, survival, and what it means to live thousands of miles away from home follows and is a breath of fresh air and was written by Viet Thanh Nguyen, a Vietnamese-American professor. 

James

James by Percival Everett was easy to choose as one of my favorite books of 2025. The novel won numerous awards including the National Book Award for Fiction, and the 2025 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. There was some controversy around it winning the Pulitzer but I am glad that it won because it deserved it. 

Everett gives Jim from The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain the voice that he deserves and it makes for an amazing and tragic story. Jim, or as he calls himself, James, is a slave in Hannibal, Missouri and tries to look out for the other slaves. One day, James finds out that he is being sold and separated from his family. James decides to run away and finds himself tagged alongside Huckleberry Finn who also has run away. 

You don’t have to read Huckleberry Finn to read this novel but it will make you appreciate this novel a lot more. Everett gives James the voice that he deserves and that he has his own story to tell. If you had to read one book written in 2024, then make it this one.

Demon Copperhead

Just like James, Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver is a retelling of David Copperfield by Charles Dickens in the 21^st century. Even if you have read the Dickens novel, this novel has its own story and message that are very important for this day and age.

This novel was the recipient of the 2023 Pulitzer Prize along with Trust by Hernan Diaz and won the Women’s Prize for Fiction. With these two prestigious accolades, I knew I had to read this novel and I am glad that I did.

The story follows Damon Fields, better known as Demon, and his single mother. They live in a trailer home in Lee, County, located in the Appalachian Mountains of Virginia. Demon’s life is difficult takes a turn for the worse when his mom starts dating a guy who abuses Demon. 

Things go from bad to worse and Demon tries to make the best of his situation as he tries to survive and overcome his situation. This is a long novel but every page is incredible and I highly recommend this novel to fans of historical fiction books.

The Women

There is a good chance that you heard about The Women by Kristin Hannah because it was Twas everywhere in 2024. That helped it become the most sold book of 2024 and rightfully so. Hannah is immensely talented and this novel showcases why she has been one of my favorite authors for the past decade.

The Women tells the story about the women who served in Vietnam but their service was neglected and ignored and their trauma was belittled by the public and by men who served in Vietnam. Hannah does a beautiful job of telling this heart-wrenching story and it is one that she has wanted to tell for a long time.

“For years, I wanted to write about the turbulence and chaos and division of the times, but it wasn’t until the pandemic, when I was on lockdown in Seattle, confined to my home essentially, and watching our nurses and doctors serving on the front lines of the pandemic, becoming exhausted amid the political division of the time that it all came together for me,” Hannah said in an interview with LibraryThing. “That’s when I knew I was ready to write about the women who served in the war and were forgotten at home.”

Conclusion

These are the five best books I read in 2025 but I could have kept going. My honorable mention goes to The Emperor of Gladness and when a novel makes you feel every emotion possible, you know you chose the right book to read.

I am lucky that I was able to come across these amazing novels and you may have noticed that all the books on this list were historical fiction books. That wasn’t intentional but this genre has many of my all time favorite novels so I am not surprised. Have you read any of these hovels? Let us know in the comments below!

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