Whether you’re looking for a sweeping historical epic, a memoir that will make you rethink everything you know about resilience, or a dystopian classic that feels more relevant than ever, this list has something for every reader. These seven books have earned their places on bestseller lists, presidential reading lists, and the shelves of readers around the world — and for good reason.
1. The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah
If you haven’t read this one yet, stop what you’re doing. This #1 New York Times bestseller is set in German-occupied France during World War II and follows two sisters whose paths through the war could not be more different. The Wall Street Journal and Buzzfeed both call it “heartbreakingly beautiful,” and that is exactly what it is — a story of survival, sacrifice, and the fierce resilience of women that will stay with you long after the last page.
2. Educated: A Memoir by Tara Westover
Few books will shake you the way this one does. Tara Westover grew up in the mountains of Idaho, born to survivalist parents who kept her out of school entirely. Through sheer determination and an unquenchable hunger for knowledge, she eventually earned a PhD from Cambridge University. Both Bill Gates and Barack Obama have featured it on their reading lists, and it deserves every bit of that attention. It is a memoir about the price of self-invention and what it truly costs to leave the world you were born into.
3. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
Some books endure because they deserve to. Harper Lee’s classic remains one of the most-read novels in the world, and Goodreads and BookBub experts continue to recommend it for its profound exploration of racial injustice and moral courage. Told through the eyes of young Scout Finch, it is a story that manages to be both deeply American and universally human. If it has been a while since you’ve read it, pick it up again — it hits differently every time.
4. Kin: A Novel by Tayari Jones
From the author of An American Marriage comes what Southern Living has already named one of the most anticipated novels of 2026. This family drama is earning early buzz as a “can’t miss” title for book clubs, with reviewers at BookClubChat leading the praise. If you loved Jones’s previous work, this one belongs at the top of your to-be-read pile. Watch for it.
5. Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi
This is the kind of novel that reminds you what fiction can do that no history book quite manages. Homegoing follows the generational lines of two half-sisters in 18th-century Ghana — one married to a British slave trader, the other sold into slavery — and traces their descendants across centuries. Literary critics consistently highlight Gyasi’s beautiful writing and the way she illuminates how history and power shape individual lives long after the original wound is forgotten. It is ambitious, heartbreaking, and extraordinary.
6. Normal People by Sally Rooney
Sally Rooney’s breakout novel follows two people from the same small town in Ireland — Connell and Marianne — as their relationship twists and deepens through university and into adulthood. The New Yorker praised Rooney’s razor-sharp dialogue, and The Washington Post called it a novel that “demands to be read compulsively.” It is quiet in the way a held breath is quiet, and it will keep you turning pages well past midnight.
7. 1984 by George Orwell
No list of essential reading is complete without this one. Orwell’s dystopian masterpiece about surveillance, government control, and the erosion of truth continues to top “best of all time” lists for a reason — it keeps getting more relevant, not less. Goodreads reviewers consistently note how thought-provoking it remains decades after publication. If you have never read it, now is absolutely the time. If you have, you already know why it belongs here.
Which of these is already on your shelf — and which one are you adding to your list? Drop a comment and let us know.
Vicki M Taylor 
Leave a comment