Last Updated on January 23, 2025 by Adrienne
It’s fun to do an end-of-year reading recap and look back at the books that made the biggest impression on me. Here are my very favorite reads from 2024 – and I’d love to hear what books made your list.
The Rachel Incident by Caroline O’Donoghue
Lovely, witty debut from Irish writer O’Donoghue about a young woman navigating life, friendships and love set against the backdrop of the 2008 recession. Some acclaimed books about 20-somethings (looking at you, Sally Rooney) make me feel every bit of my almost 40 years in a very curmudgeonly way, but this was relatable and I loved the characters and story.
The Red Lotus by Chris Bohjalian
Bohjalian’s books are hit or miss for me. I enjoyed his novel The Flight Attendant (turned into a popular HBO series starring Kaley Cuoco) but others have left me flat. The Red Lotus is my favorite of his books and is a great thriller. When Austin disappears on a bike vacation to Vietnam, it’s left to his emergency room doctor girlfriend to figure out what might have happened to him, and the trail leads her straight to the research lab at the hospital where they both work. It reminded me of the best of Michael Crichton’s science thrillers.
Real Americans by Rachel Khong
I absolutely loved this novel about three generations of a Chinese-American family. Each of the novel’s three sections is told from the perspective of a different member of the family: Lily, the daughter of Chinese immigrants, who is swept off her feet by rich finance guy Matthew in late 90s New York, Lily’s son Nick, who grows up feeling like a misfit on a remote island in Washington and sets off in search of his biological father, and Lily’s mother May, a geneticist who escaped the Cultural Revolution. I love a good family drama with a compelling story arc and this is a fantastic one. In fact, I enjoyed Khong’s writing so much I also picked up her debut novel, Goodbye Vitamin, which is also great.
Excavations by Kate Myers
I really enjoyed this fun debut novel from archeologist-turned-writer Myers, about a group of women on different life paths who reunite for a dig on a remote Greek island under the direction of an esteemed professor. It’s part mystery, part academic satire, part rom-com – and thoroughly entertaining. It’s also a perfect book to pack for a trip to Greece (or really any island destination!).
The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley
If, like me, you enjoy a dash of sci-fi in books but don’t normally gravitate towards books that are straight sci-fi, this is the book for you. Blending sci-fi, historical fiction, spy thriller, romance and workplace comedy, Bradley spins an unputdownable tale about a British civil servant who is assigned to work as a bridge for an “expat” – but these expats are no ordinary immigrants, they’re a collection of time travelers pulled from throughout history as part of a top secret government research project. Her expat – a British Navy commander who actually died on an ill-fated polar expedition – is pulled from 1847, so parts of the novel are as hilarious as you’d expect as this 19th century man adjusts to 21st century life. But there’s also a sweet love story and sinister government dealings, and it all comes together to make a great story.
The God of the Woods by Liz Moore
I feel like The God of the Woods was the book of 2024 and deservedly so. As in Long Bright River (one of my faves when I read it a few years back), Moore deftly combines intriguing mystery with compelling family drama and creates the most richly drawn characters. This isn’t a thriller in the sense of the staying up all night turning the pages to find out whodunit, but the central mystery – about the disappearance in the 1970s of a 13 year old girl at the summer camp her parents own in the Adirondack mountains – drives the narrative nicely and over the course of the story you come to know the missing girl’s family (still reeling from the accidental death of her older brother years before), the camp’s caretakers who have a complicated relationship with the camp owners, and the detectives assigned to investigate the case.
Here One Moment by Liane Moriarty
I’ve enjoyed many of Moriarty’s books, but this is her best one yet in my opinion. On what is otherwise an uneventful flight from Tasmania to Sydney, a woman in a trance-like state walks down the aisle of the plane and gives each passenger a prediction of precisely how and when they’ll die. Many are happy to hear things like “Age 88, in your sleep” but other passengers receive grim predictions about death at much younger ages by means like suicide, domestic violence or drowning. Though disturbed, they try to put the words out of their minds as the ramblings of a crazy woman…until the predictions start coming true. The novel follows the lives of those on the plane as well and how their predicated deaths impact them and their loved ones, as well delving into the back story of the apparent psychic. It’s long and the ending requires a bit of suspension of disbelief but on the whole I loved it and I thought she wove the character’s intersecting lives together beautifully.
The Wedding People by Alison Espach
The Wedding People has what seems like a fairly depressing premise – a recently divorced woman who’s also mourning the loss of her beloved cat travels to a luxury hotel in Newport, Rhode Island to end her life – but it’s surprisingly light-hearted and uplifting, with quirky characters you’ll come to adore as main character Phoebe gets inadvertently swept up in the events of a wedding taking place at the same hotel.
Show Don’t Tell by Curtis Sittenfeld
I’ve enjoyed Curtis Sittenfeld’s writing so much ever since I read her debut novel Prep, which came out when I was in college, and I feel like I’ve grown up with her characters. This excellent short story collection (out February 25, 2025) has sharp and relatable musings on friendships, marriage and motherhood in middle age. I especially enjoyed the story where we catch up with Lee from Prep, and the story about a former babysitter for the family of the now-billionaire founder of an online bookselling startup.
You Are Here by David Nicholls
This is a delightful British rom-com about two middle-aged people who think the best of life has passed them by, but end up finding a second chance at great love while on a hiking trip across England with friends. It’s a funny and heart-warming book, and also a great piece of travel writing that really made me want to book a stay at a quaint English inn in the Lake District.
If you’re looking for more reading inspiration, check out my 2023 and 2022 lists, or my reading lists for Cuba and Turkey.
What great books did you read last year? What are you looking forward to reading in 2025?
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