{"id":2209175,"date":"2025-12-22T22:33:15","date_gmt":"2025-12-22T22:33:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2209175"},"modified":"2025-12-22T22:33:15","modified_gmt":"2025-12-22T22:33:15","slug":"the-best-books-we-read-in-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/the-best-books-we-read-in-2025\/","title":{"rendered":"The best books we read in 2025"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

\n
\n

These days when you want to engage with some media, you can choose from podcasts, videos, games, live performances \u2014 or books, one of the oldest and most popular ways to learn something new or escape (at least temporarily) from today\u2019s troubled world.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

We polled the staff of The Verge<\/em> to find out what books they read over the past year that really struck a chord \u2014 because the books were enlightening, educational, or just enjoyable. Here are some of the answers we got. (And please let us know what your favorite reads were in 2025 in the comments.)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

Brandt Ranj, commerce writer<\/h4>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\n

Screwing up is one of the inevitabilities of life, but dwelling on your own mistakes can get toxic \u2014 fast. In SNAFU: The Definitive Guide to History\u2019s Greatest Screwups<\/em><\/strong><\/a>, <\/em>Ed Helms breaks down dozens of blunders from the past 70 or so years. Sometimes a river gets so polluted that it catches fire (multiple times), or the US government conducts human experiments involving copious amounts of psychedelic drugs. Or it turns out that a pair of the 20th century\u2019s greatest spies were also swingers. These things happen.
While many of the events in the book are absolute tragedies, Helms infuses each chapter with a little bit of humor, mostly in pointing out how stupid the perpetrators are. It\u2019s a relatively breezy book that\u2019ll make you feel better about the time you accidentally overcooked microwave popcorn and smoked out your apartment.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
<\/a>\"Cover<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n

Victoria Song, senior reviewer<\/h4>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\n

I\u2019ve been on a memoir kick this year, and this one knocked my socks off. Things in Nature Merely Grow<\/a><\/em> explores Yiyun Li\u2019s experience with grief after losing both of her teenage sons to suicide. This isn\u2019t a light read by any means. The writing is honest, beautiful, sometimes aloof, and oftentimes devastating. But as someone who lost both parents relatively young, I felt strangely comforted by Li\u2019s take on \u201cthe abyss\u201d and \u201cradical acceptance.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

\u201cSome consolations are strictly and purely for the consolers themselves. Please hold on to your silver linings, as I must decline.\u201d Some might say this book is unnecessarily harsh in its unflinching look at loss, but that line stuck with me as the truest reflection of how I felt for the longest time. I recommend it to anyone struggling with isolation after loss. (Some honorable mentions for memoirs: Educated <\/em>by Tara Westover<\/a>, I\u2019m Glad My Mom Died<\/em> by \u200b\u200bJennette McCurdy<\/a>, <\/em>and Maybe You Should Talk to Someone<\/em> by Lori Gottlieb<\/a>.)<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\"Cover<\/a>\"Cover<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n

Dominic Preston, news editor<\/h4>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\n

I\u2019d somehow never read any<\/em> Le Guin until this year, and while I\u2019ve been told that The Dispossessed<\/a><\/em> is an odd place to start, it\u2019s the book I had around, having borrowed it from a friend who knows how long ago. I would feel bad for having hung onto it so long, but the erosion of private property rights is surprisingly on-brand for the book. Its exploration of a moon with a (mostly) functional anarchist society, and the arch-capitalist planet its community sprung off from, holds a pretty unflinching mirror up against our world, and although over 50 years old, it\u2019s about as relevant as ever.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

Don\u2019t go in expecting a rollercoaster plot, but if you like the sound of capitalist critique interspersed with an exploration of how academic bureaucracy works under anarchism, boy do I have the book for you.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\"The<\/a>\"The<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n

After watching 3 Body Problem<\/em> on Netflix<\/a>, I couldn\u2019t stop thinking about it. So naturally, I just had to delve into the book series to see what details the adaptation left out \u2014 and it doesn\u2019t disappoint. Cixin Liu\u2019s The Three-Body Problem<\/a><\/em> details the origins of Ye Wenjie, an astrophysicist who\u2019s forced to work on a secretive military project during China\u2019s Cultural Revolution in the late \u201860s. While stationed at the secluded Red Coast Base, Wenjie makes a decision that changes the fate of humanity forever, culminating in a series of unsettling events years later that lead some scientists to question everything they know about the laws of physics. In the present day, Wang Miao, a level-headed nanotechnologist, attempts to brush off strange hallucinations until he\u2019s drawn to a virtual reality game that he discovers is linked to a larger conspiracy tied to Wenjie.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\"Cover<\/a>\"Cover<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n

Barbara Krasnoff, reviews editor<\/h4>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\n

After I finished the first story in Theodora Goss\u2019 weird fiction collection, Letters from an Imaginary Country<\/a><\/em>, I was hooked. Titled \u201cThe Mad Scientist\u2019s Daughter,\u201d it is the first-person account of a group of 19th century female \u201cmonsters\u201d from well-known horror literature such as Frankenstein, The Island of Dr. Moreau<\/em>, and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde<\/em>, among others. The women, who are distinctly other than the perceived norm \u2014 either because of their abilities or their appearance, or both \u2014 must support each other while navigating the narrow mores of Victorian society. Most of the stories in this collection seem to center on people who are somehow different, outside of their societies, and trying to cope (sometimes successfully, sometimes not) with those differences. I sped through the first story, and while I haven\u2019t finished the book quite yet, I\u2019m certainly looking forward to it.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\"Cover<\/a>\"Cover<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n

Alexia LaFata, senior SEO manager<\/h4>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\n

As a published author myself, I\u2019m always looking for novels that combine a propulsive plot, richly drawn characters, and thought-provoking social commentary to inspire my own craft. What Kind of Paradise<\/a><\/em> by Janelle Brown fits that bill completely. It\u2019s an exhilarating novel set in the \u201990s about a teenage girl named Jane who escapes her rural life in Montana, where she lives in isolation with her father. Motivated by his fears of technology and progress, her father keeps the two of them living off the grid, banning Jane from using the internet and homeschooling her with old books. But as Jane gets older, she becomes increasingly curious about the outside world and about her father\u2019s mysterious past in San Francisco. She also becomes an accidental accomplice in one of his crimes, and it\u2019s this horrific realization that sends her to the Bay Area to find out why he is the way he is.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

What Kind of Paradise<\/em> is a brilliantly drawn examination of the impact of technology, how deeply your family can influence your identity, and the kinds of doomsday fears that drive people to madness. It\u2019s part coming-of-age tale, part thriller, part family drama \u2014 you can\u2019t quite classify it, but its ingenious genre-bending is one of my favorite things about it. If you\u2019re looking to really sink your teeth into a story, this is the one. I promise you will devour it whole.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\"Cover<\/a>\"Cover<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n

Elizabeth Lopatto, senior reporter<\/h4>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\n

People will tell you Moby-Dick<\/em> is Melville\u2019s masterpiece. This is wrong, but understandable \u2014 it flatters Americans to think that we bear some resemblance to the insane Ahab, speaking in Shakespearean blank verse as we speed toward our doom.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

Melville\u2019s actual masterpiece is his last book, The Confidence-Man<\/a><\/em>, one of the meanest and truest things ever written about this country. It takes place on April Fools\u2019 Day, on a riverboat full of scammers and other assorted riffraff; one of them may or may not be literally Satan. Among the scams being perpetrated on the ship: selling stock of a struggling company, bringing \u201cthe Wall Street spirit\u201d to charity, hawking supplements, finessing a free haircut, and forming a cult. There are nasty caricatures of Nathaniel Hawthorne, Edgar Allen Poe, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Henry David Thoreau, all funny. The book is by turns bizarre, bitter, hopeful, and oddly credulous. Read it \u2014 you will recognize several of its characters immediately, as their current incarnations have been barely updated in 2025. Sure, The Confidence-Man <\/em>isn\u2019t as pretty as Moby-Dick<\/em>, but then, the truth rarely is.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\"Cover<\/a>\"Cover<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n

Elissa Welle, AI reporting fellow<\/h4>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\n

It\u2019s rare for a book about a company\u2019s successful founding to be a page-turner. Usually, corporate drama centers on the company\u2019s fall, its unraveling, or the criminal activity of its leaders. Not so in Empire of AI<\/a><\/em> by Karen Hao. This is a book about OpenAI\u2019s founding and growth, and it\u2019s truly a riveting read. (It also helps that Hao is a lovely writer.) She tracks the personality quirks of visionary leaders over time. She monitors the changing corporate mission. And yes, she dives into The Drama, when Sam Altman was temporarily ousted from OpenAI by the board. But she doesn\u2019t just stay in Silicon Valley. You travel with her to countries in Africa and South America to see how AI is impacting societies there.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

I\u2019ve heard complaints that Hao\u2019s personal views on AI, and the technology\u2019s societal repercussions come off a little heavy-handed. She does include opinions, often tucked away at the end of chapters, and it feels all okay to me. Her expertise in the field gained through years of covering OpenAI is a useful perspective for those of us trying to make sense of a rapidly growing industry. You can read the facts presented in her book and come to different conclusions.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\"Cover<\/a>\"Cover<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n

Kate Cox, senior producer, Decoder<\/h4>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\n

Honestly, the less you know going in, the better this book might be. The Everlasting<\/a><\/em> by Alix E. Harrow is a love story about a lady knight. It\u2019s also a masterful deconstruction of Arthuriana, the way mythology works, and the very idea of nationalism itself. A brilliant, bittersweet puzzle box that solves itself incredibly satisfyingly at the end. I only wish I could read it for the first time again.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\"Cover<\/a>\"Cover<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n

Terrence O\u2019Brien, weekend editor<\/h4>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\n

Agustina Bazterrica\u2019s last novel, Tender is the Flesh<\/a><\/em>, is unflinchingly bleak. And The Unworthy<\/a><\/em> isn\u2019t exactly an uplifting tale. It\u2019s a postapocalyptic story set in the convent of a cult that \u201crewards\u201d its Enlightened members with physical mutilation. But, where Flesh<\/em> reveled in its gore, The Unworthy <\/em>offers moments of genuine beauty and hope.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

There are still plenty of passages that showcase Bazterrica\u2019s skills at making your skin crawl, but perhaps the most impressive thing about the book is how much world-building this epistolary novel manages to do in a mere 177 pages \u2014 you could easily blow through this in a day. If you\u2019re a fan of The Handmaid\u2019s Tale<\/a><\/em> by Margaret Atwood or I Who Have Never Known Men<\/a><\/em> by Jacqueline Harpman, I don\u2019t think you\u2019ll want to miss out on this excellent piece of Argentinian feminist horror.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\"Cover<\/a>\"Cover<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n

Josh Dzieza, investigations editor<\/h4>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\n

I read Chris Hayes\u2019 book about attention, The Sirens\u2019 Call<\/a><\/em>, early in the year and found myself returning to it regularly. Two insights were particularly useful. The first is from the computer scientist Herbert Simon: that as the quantity of information increases, attention becomes the scarcest and therefore most valuable resource \u2014 information can be infinite, but we have only so many hours in the day to spend consuming it.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

The second is that it is easier to capture attention than to hold it. In Hayes\u2019 example, it\u2019s an easier challenge to get everyone\u2019s attention in a room by, say, screaming or tearing off your clothes, than to keep the room rapt for an hour with a monologue. It follows that if you move public discourse, politics, or culture onto platforms where everyone can say anything at all times, and where the platforms are financially incentivized to keep everyone there transfixed as long as possible and therefore reward their best attention-getters, an arms race occurs that ends in a rapid-fire media environment that is impossible to look away from but also fractured, incoherent, and generally bad for everyone\u2019s brains.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n
\n
\"Cover<\/a>\"Cover<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Follow topics and authors<\/strong> from this story to see more like this in your personalized homepage feed and to receive email updates.<\/span><\/p>\n