Lists on Lists of the Best Nonfiction Books of the Year

Publishers Weekly takes a different strategy. Instead of just including different lists based on genre, they include their top ten picks overall. The top ten includes a few nonfiction titles, including When It All Burns: Fighting Fire in a Transformed World by Jordan Thomas, Capitalism and Its Critics: A History, from the Industrial Revolution to AI by John Cassidy, Searches: Selfhood in the Digital Age by Vauhini Vara, and Water Mirror Echo: Bruce Lee and the Making of Asian America by Jeff Chang. In the different genre lists, there’s nonfiction, religion, and lifestyle.

One of my favorite prizes is the Southern Book Prize, an award decided by Southern indie book sellers. There are fiction, nonfiction, and young readers categories. This year, the nonfiction finalists are:

Southern Book Prize winners will be announced on February 14, 2026, on Valentine’s Day.

You can find me over on my substack Winchester Ave or over on Instagram @kdwinchester. As always, feel free to drop me a line at [emailprotected]. For even MORE bookish content, you can find my articles over on Book Riot.