25 Books to Gift Everyone on Your List This Year

Billed as The White Lotus meets Agatha Christie, The Unwedding—Reese’s Book Club’s August 2024 pick—opens with a woman, Ellery, heading to a luxurious resort in Big Sur, California, to celebrate her 20th wedding anniversary. The first hitch? She's there alone, following a recent divorce. And not only is her singleness at the front of her mind, there's also a wedding slated to happen at the resort during her trip. I say slated to happen because it never actually does; Ellery finds the groom's body floating in a pool. Soon, another mysterious death occurs, and to add insult to injury, the investigation is thwarted by a violent storm that leaves the guests trapped. Like any good thriller, there are twists and turns, seemingly promising leads that go nowhere and a lot of secrets threatening to be uncovered. 

Subtitled " How Rogues, Geniuses, and Speed Freaks Reengineered F1 into the World's Fastest-Growing Sport," The Formula sees two Wall Street Journal reporters breaking down the riveting saga of how Formula 1 broke through in America to become the world’s fastest growing sport. Featuring fast cars, big money, glamorous locales and beautiful people, The Formula brings unique insight and access to F1’s most storied teams and personalities, offering a portrait of the drivers, corporations, cars and rivalries that have shaped the sport for half a century.

Told in five phases—Single, True Love, Pregnancy, Baby and Ongoing—this collection of essays by comedian, co-creator of Marcel the Shell, and New York Times bestselling author of Little Weirds, Jenny Slate, is about the journey into motherhood. Taking the form of letters to a doctor, dreams of a stork, fantasy therapy sessions, excerpts from an imaginary olden timey play, theories about post-partum hair loss and more, Lifeform documents Slate’s singlehood and eventual motherhood, having a baby during a global pandemic and then being expected to carry on like everything was normal. But, she wonders in these funny, heartfelt essays, had she (or anything) ever been normal?

Finding out that an ex-boyfriend is getting married is enough a bummer. Now, imagine that same ex asks you to be his best man. That’s exactly the situation Meghna, a 20-something teacher, finds herself in in this sweet rom-com. The solution? Pretend to be engaged to Karthik, a handsome but grumpy suitor with no intention of marrying anyone (but whose mother is hellbent on finding a wife). As the fake couple goes through the motions, they find common ground, grow protective of each other and start to fall for the traits they originally thought they hated. But what happens when their expectations and insecurities threaten their initial deal?

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This action-packed reimagining of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn was an instant New York Times bestseller, a National Book Award winner and on the shortlist for the Booker Prize. Translation? It’s really good. When the enslaved Jim overhears he’s about to be sold to a man in New Orleans, he decides to hide on nearby Jackson Island until he can formulate a plan. Meanwhile, Huck Finn has faked his own death to escape his violent father, recently returned to town. While many pieces of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn remain in place (floods and storms, unexpected treasure, scam artists posing as the Duke and Dauphin), Everett writes of Jim’s agency, intelligence and compassion in a radically new light.

The latest from best-selling author Paula Hawkins (The Girl on the Train) is set on an isolated Scottish island that’s only accessible to the mainland twelve hours a day. It’s been 20 years since an infamous artist whose unfaithful husband disappeared after visiting her on the island, and a new discovery intimately connects three people and threatens a carefully concealed secret. For readers of Shirley Jackson and Patricia Highsmith, The Blue Hour asks questions about ambition, power, gender and perception.

You’ve likely heard of (and hopefully read) Ijeoma Oluo’s best-selling 2018 book So You Want to Talk About Race (or 2020’s Mediocre). Her latest spotlights powerful systems—including education, media, housing and policing—and shows what people are doing to create change for intersectional racial equity, and how readers can bring some of this important work to their own lives. Urgent and inspirational, it’s about taking our conversations on race and racism out of a place of pain and trauma, and into a place of loving action.

Billed as a mix of Schitt’s Creek and Sally Rooney, this funny debut centers on the misfortunes of two siblings. A year after getting dumped by his ex-boyfriend, Valdin is doing…fine. He’s living in Auckland with his sister, Greta, and doing well at work. But when his job sends him to Argentina (where his ex now lives), Valdin is forced to confront the feelings he’s been trying to ignore. Meanwhile, 20-something Greta would love to focus on her own floundering love life, but her chaotic family life won’t stop intruding. Funny and relatable, Greta & Valdin is about complicated romances, sibling relationships and the dynamics of an eccentric, Māori-Russian-Catalonian family.  

Laurie Devore’s first novel for adults (after three YA novels) centers on Jac Matthis, a romance novelist who has moved back to her South Carolina hometown after her career goes bust. Desperate for a comeback, Jac decides she’s going to be a contestant on the 1, the world’s most popular reality dating show. On set, Jac quickly establishes herself as a front-runner, but she’s shocked to discover who’s actually pulling the strings: Henry Foster, her last one-night stand who’s also a longtime producer on the 1. Henry is similarly surprised…but they can’t keep their hands off each other. As the show progresses, Jac slowly discovers that she’s getting the villain edit, and as her secret plan begins crumbling around her, she wonders if, in trying to save her career, Jac has ruined her life.

Twenty-five years after the publication of his groundbreaking first book, Malcolm Gladwell’s newest volume reframes the lessons of The Tipping Point. Through a series of stories, he traces the rise of a new and troubling form of social engineering. From rediscovering a forgotten television show from the ‘70s that changed the world to visiting the site of a historic experiment on a tiny cul-de-sac in northern California, Revenge of the Tipping Point is Gladwell’s most personal book yet and a guide to making sense of the contagions of the modern world.

Ina Garten’s best-selling memoir is a total no-brainer for your friends or family who adore entertaining—and learning more about the Hamptons icon. For the first time, Garten presents an intimate, entertaining, and inspiring account of her remarkable journey. From a difficult childhood to meeting the love of her life, Jeffrey, to a boring bureaucratic job in Washington, D.C., and answering an ad for a specialty food store in the Hamptons that changed everything, this candid memoir is encourages readers to do what you love (because if you love it, you’ll be really good at it), swing for the fences and always Be Ready When the Luck Happens.

Bianca Bosker is a journalist whose work has appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and more. In her second book (after 2017’s Cork Dork), Bosker turns her focus to the competitive and elitist art world. Probing everything from cave paintings to Instagram posts, and from the science of sight to the importance of beauty in our culture, economy and hearts, Get the Picture combines juicy art world gossip with higher-level philosophical musings to help us understand why art matters and how we can engage with it more deeply.

Laura Dave (The Last Thing He Told Me) is back with another propulsive thriller—this time with the story of estranged siblings and the secret their father has been keeping for over 50 years. Liam was a self-made hotel magnate fleeing his past; a loving, albeit distant, family man; and, to Nora, a father who loved her from afar—often from a cliffside cottage in California coast from which he fell to his death. The authorities rule the death accidental, but Nora and her estranged brother Sam aren’t convinced. But as Nora and Sam join forces to unravel the mystery, they uncover a family secret that changes everything. Jennifer Garner has already recommended it a couple times, so if your best friend is a fan of the star, I suggest picking up a copy to gift her.

Umami is a penguin who’s sick of cold eating cold fish, but fish is what the penguins eat. (Even on their birthdays too.) To find new exciting foods, Umami travels the world across the seas to discover flavors and spices that are inspiring. But will the other penguins share her love for these different foods? This preschool-age book isn’t just ultra-cute, it’ll also hopefully inspire little ones to think outside the buttered noodles and chicken fingers box.

Bookstores, as history professor Evan Friss writes, are powerful spaces, but they’re also endangered ones. In The Bookshop, Friss describes the stakes—what has been, and what might be lost. Drawing on oral histories, archival collections, municipal records, diaries, interviews with leading booksellers and more, The Bookshop offers a fascinating look at this institution beloved by so many, from Benjamin Franklin’s first bookstore in Philadelphia and takes us to iconic booksellers including the Strand and Chicago’s Marshall Field & Company. It’s a love letter to bookstores that any avid reader will adore.

Brooklyn-based writer Alexandra Tanner, whose work has appeared in The New York Times Book Review, Gawker and more, has crafted a darkly funny story of sisterhood with Worry, which opens in March of 2019. 28-year-old Jules has been living alone in the apartment she once shared with the man she thought she’d marry when her younger sister Poppy—a year and a half out from a suicide attempt only Jules knows about—comes to crash indefinitely. As the year goes on and a new decade looms, a disastrous trip home to Florida forces Jules and Poppy to ask themselves what they want their futures to look like, and whether they’ll spend them together or apart.

New Yorker staff writer Vinson Cunningham draws on his work for Barack Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign in his debut novel about an idealistic campaign worker. When protagonist David first hears the Senator from Illinois speak, he’s intrigued by the rhetoric and by the compromises it will take to become the United States’ first Black president. And during his18 months working for the Senator's presidential campaign, David meets people who raise questions—about history, art, race, religion and fatherhood—that force him to look at his own life and what it means to really bring about change.

The first part of almost EGOT winner—she's won an Emmy, Grammy and Oscar—Cher’s two-part memoir follows her extraordinary beginnings through childhood to meeting and marrying Sonny Bono. In candid, fascinating detail, she reveals the highly complicated relationship that made them world-famous—and eventually drove them apart. It's a must-read for diehard fans and casual enjoyers alike. An L.A. Times review reads, "Cher: The Memoir, Part One is a fun read, a candid and well-written book that will justifiably make her legion of fans excited for the release of the second volume. Like Barbra Streisand, who recently penned a 970-page memoir, Cher is one of the handful of artists whose extraordinary life merits the extra ink."

Yes…that Kate McKinnon. The SNL star has a New York Times bestseller that’s perfect for the middle grade reader, about three sisters, a ravenous worm and a mysterious mad scientist. Gertrude, Eugenia and Dee-Dee Porch do not belong. After getting kicked out of the last etiquette school that would take them, they receive a mysterious invitation to new school, and are suddenly under the tutelage of the infamous Millicent Quibb—a mad scientist with worms in her hair and oysters in her bathtub. Dangerous? Yes! More fun than they’ve ever had? Absolutely! But when the sisters are asked to save their town from evil scientists, they must learn to embrace what has always made them stand out.

Love the cult-favorite mockumentary Best in Show? Read this. While watching a dog show on TV, reporter Tommy Tomlinson, whose work has appeared in Esquire, Sports Illustrated, Forbes and more, wondered: Are those dogs happy? Are pet dogs happy? His questions led him to explore the dog-show world, in order to better understand the relationship between dogs and humans. He spent three years on the road, going behind the scenes at more than 100 competitions across the country while following one champion show dog—a Samoyed named Striker—along with his handler and entourage of breeders and owners, as he competes in the 2022 Westminster Dog Show. His charming account also includes interviews with experts on how dogs and humans formed their bond—and how that bond has changed over the centuries.

It’s an early morning in August 1975, and a camp counselor discovers an empty bunk. Its occupant, Barbara Van Laar, the daughter of the family that owns the camp, has gone missing. And this isn’t the first time a Van Laar child has disappeared—Barbara’s older brother similarly vanished more than a decade ago, never to be found. In Moore’s (Long Bright River) latest, the search for the missing girl uncovers the layered secrets and sends shockwaves through an opulent summer estate, the camp that operates in its shadow and the blue-collar community that serves them both.

A teen girl is thrust into pop superstardom in the late ‘90s in this coming-of-age novel that Emma Straub calls a “sexy swagger of a debut.” It’s 1997, and Amber Young has received a life-changing call: the opportunity to join a girl group in Los Angeles and escape her small town. But as Amber embarks on a solo career and her fame intensifies, she finds herself surrounded by people who claim to love her but only wish to exploit her. Honey will make you rethink what you know about some of the most famous pop icons of the ’90s and 2000s and reimagines the superstars we idolized, oversexualized and underestimated.

Named a best cookbook of 2024 by NPR and Food & Wine (and a New York Times bestseller), Justine Cooks is chock-full of approachable, inventive recipes with unexpected flavor and ingredient pairings. Expect delicious, plant-forward dishes like Baked Kale Salad with Chili Quinoa, Breaded Beans with Nutty Skhug, Crispy Rice in Sungold-Miso Broth, Butternut Squash Cake with Cinnamon Whipped Cream and more, plus tips, techniques and general kitchen wisdom.

After years of racing up the corporate ladder, writer and podcaster Jennifer Romolini reached the kind of success one strives for on a vision board: a C-suite dream job, a well-received book and a gig traveling around the country giving speeches on ‘making it.’ At home, she had a husband and a precocious child. But beneath the surface, she was struggling with unresolved trauma and chronic overwork. In her new memoir, Romolini explores workaholism and the addictive nature of achievement, the lingering effect of childhood trauma and more. As it deconstructs the American Dream, Ambition Monster is perfect for people pleasers, overachievers and anyone whose trauma has driven them to push for success no matter the cost.