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Welcome to Today in Books, our daily round-up of literary headlines at the intersection of politics, culture, media, and more.
The NYPL Best Books of 2025
The New York Public Library is one of our most venerable library spaces, and it’s a tastemaker, so readers pay attention when they release their annual best books. And here we have this curated list with books selected by esteemed NYPL librarians! It’s sorted for adults, teens, and kids, and includes big, buzzy titles alongside under-the-radar reads. In Adults, we have Katie Kitamura’s latest, Audition; King of Ashes by S.A. Cosby; and The Wilderness by Angela Flournoy; with Dead Girl Cameo: A Love Song in Poems, a docupoetic debut by m. mick powell; Drome, a graphic fiction by Jesse Lonergan; and The Jamaica Kollection of the Shante Dream Arkive: being dreamity, algoriddims, chants & riffs, part of a “speculative ancestral project” by Marcia Douglas. This is one of the most interesting Best Of lists I’ve seen yet. *Chef’s kiss*
The Washington Post‘s Best Books of 2025
And we have another (much shorter) one. WaPo released its list of the 10 best books of the year, selected by the staff of the outlet’s Book World. They keep it minimalist with only a Fiction and Nonfiction category, and five books on each list. One of my best books of the year, Stone Yard Devotional by Charlotte Wood, made the Fiction list, as did my current read, which I am certain will be a best for me, The Wilderness. In Nonfiction, we’ve got A Flower Traveled in My Blood: The Incredible True Story of the Grandmothers Who Fought to Find a Stolen Generation of Children by Haley Cohen Gilliland, which I’ve seen repeated across Best Ofs. Because awareness seems to be flagging these days, it’s worth pointing out that this list is stunning in its lack of diversity.
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Weird News of the Week
Kristen Bell was surprised by the news that she would be in a new 52-episode series from Fox News Media religious vertical Fox Faith: The Life of Jesus Podcast. Bell was among more than 100 actors signed on to the project, according to the press release for the pod. It turns out that Bell had recorded the voice of Mary Magdalene being used for the new series for a different and long-forgotten audiobook project 15 years ago, and FOX News Audio gained the now-repurposed audio Bible through a licensing deal. According to a rep for actor Brian Cox, who’s also attached to the new pod and who called Fox News “the devil,” he was unaware of the project. But a Fox News spokesperson told Rolling Stone they have “full cooperation and participation by all the actors involved.” Something tells me they won’t have the full cooperation of all 100 actors in promoting this new series…
The Most Read Books on Goodreads This Week
Check out some great new releases you should know about, and find out which books are dominating Goodreads reading lists (spoiler alert: Freida McFadden has multiple books in top spots).
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