What I'm Reading: January 2026 Library Journal Horror Review Column

      

My January 2026 Horror Review Column is now live on the LJ site and in the current issue of the print magazine! 

In this post I have gathered the titles with my three words and links to my full draft reviews on Goodreads. Click on the titles for readalikes and more appeal information. 

I am also giving away 2 of these books to 2 winners on the Horror blog today. Click here to see that post with the rules on how to enter.  

Back to the January 2026 reviews. First this month's 2 STARS: 

• Japanese Gothic by Kylie Lee Baker (two time frames, dreamlike/nightmarish, strong sense of place)
• My interview with the author also appears in this issue here.
• Wolf Worm by T. Kingfisher (Bug-Body Horror combo, Gothic with teeth, strong sense of place)

And the other 6 excellent titles: 

• Trad Wife by 
  Saratoga Schaefer (
  conversational narration, influencer horror, disquieting)
• The Glowing Hours by Leila Siddiqui (Gothic, retelling, menacing)
• The Fortune Tellers of Rue Daru by Olesya Salnikova Gilmore (menacing, political intrigue, historical) 
• Dead First by Johnny Compton (Supernatural Detective Horror, Emotionally Charged, Original Monster story)
• The Midnight Muse by Jo Kaplan (cursed bands, liberal use of ephemera/foreshadowing and flashbacks, monster in the woods)
• The Body by Bethany C. Morrow (religious cult horror, secrets and trauma, supernatural thriller)
  

2026 Horror Books Preview Part 1 with Backlist Access

Right before the end of 2025, I made what has become an 2x a year appearance on ARC Party with Robb Olson and Emily Hughes. This time we did the Jan-June 2026 Horror Preview. You can watch and/or listen here.

We have been doing these in December and June every year since December 2024, previewing the entire year in 2 epic podcasts where we each highlight 2 books per month for 6 months.

Robb made this amazing playlist of 5 existing podcasts so you can pursue them all. And without my prompting Robb did this and said it is because these books don't have a shelf life, you can read them anytime. 

My backlist promoting librarian heart was filled with this comment. He is 100% correct. And of you pair our previews with Emily Hughes' much more comprehensive lists, you get a very full picture of the horror genre over the last 6 years.

Emily's lists are always accessible-- current and backlist going back to 2020-- here. From that link you can break things down by year and even month.

Emily's lists should be your first stop for all of your horror collection development needs. What you should order ahead of time. What you missed that you can go back and add. There is even some readalike information in there with titles including annotations and comps. 

We love bringing you this episode 2x a year. It is a good amount of work but we all know it is worth it. It highlights Emily's work and provides an entry into the mass of information she has gathered while also shining a spotlight on the horror genre specifically. We even talk about trends we are seeing now that we have 5 of these under our belts.

Take a peek at the list for 2026 and give our podcast a listen as you are thinking about helping your horror readers in 2026 and beyond.

Speaking of that, I will have a whole bunch of reviews (by me) of upcoming 2026 Horror from the January 2026 issues of Library Journal and Booklist to round out the week here on the blog, and a giveaway of 2 of those titles on the Horror blog. Stay tuned!

Click here to access 2026 Part 1

Reading Resolutions for 2026: Part 2-- 2026 Goals

Yesterday I began the process of posting my 2026 reading resolutions by first looking back and assessing how I did on my 2025 resolutions. You can read that post here.

Today, I using what I learned doing that exercise yesterday and adding in what I already have planned for the coming year, I present my 2026 Goals-- the ones I will hold myself to for assessment a year from now. I use the term "reading resolutions" to keep the posts as similar as possible from year to year, but really this process is more akin to goal setting. However, since my work is defined by my mission, "training library workers to help leisure readers," reading is at the center of it all.

Please remember, I post both my assessment of the year that was and the upcoming year on back-to-back days to begin each new year so that they are easy to find yes, but also I am forced to hold myself to account for it all. Because I am a big proponent of the "lead by example" leadership style, if I am advocating for you to make resolutions and then go back and assess how you did before making the next year's resolutions, I also have to do it myself.

These are my resolutions and goals for 2026. I create these for myself specifically; however, I hope you can use them to help you craft resolutions that will work best for you.

Finally, I want to make a plea to do resolutions or goals for yourself no matter how you are feeling. They do not have to be lofty. I love this post from 2022 in Book Riot, with easily achievable reading resolutions. These are no stress, and may seem silly on first glance, but I think they are great. Having something as a goal gives you direction and encouragement to keep moving forward. Small victories add up to larger advancements. 

 

Okay now on to my 5 official resolutions for 2026:

2026 Resolution: Try A Year With No Specific Reading Resolution: As I mentioned yesterday, I feel like I finally figured out how to make sure I read the books I have to read for review and still fit in the books I want to read for joy. As 2025 went on, I didn't have to try to fit in non-work books. However, I also know that thinking you figured something out is not the same of holding yourself accountable to keep it going. So instead of declaring victory, I am going to make a cautious but intentional goal about my reading by trying not not have a specific reading resolution and yet still make the commitment to assessing how well that worked (or didn't). I toyed with the idea of just not having a reading goal this year, but as everything I do is tied to reading-- both for work and pleasure-- I am not ready to abandon having this as a goal. However, I am very excited to see what happens in 2026 without a specific reading goal and am looking forward to how this pans out.

2026 Resolution: No New Training Programs: This month marks the 25th anniversary of my graduation with my MLIS. I have been out of libraries as a worker since June of 2015 and in May 2025 I left my position as a library trustee. All of this means that my ties to a physical library are officially over in 2026. I don't think that means I am not qualified to keep training libraries, but I do want to start monitoring this part of my work. How much longer will I offer training programs to libraries? I know I am closer to the end of this time than the beginning. But that is all I know for sure. I have a very busy training schedule for the first quarter of 2026. This is common for the new year. These training programs were booked back in the late Summer and Fall of 2025. I am confident in the programs I have available and in keeping them updated for the time being. However, so that I have time to pursue the next three goals, I will not be creating new programs in 2026. I will update the ones I have, but I will not create custom one off programs for anyone this year. And, I am going to try to not actively promote the training side of my work as well. I would say I get about 50% of my work via word of mouth right now. I am interested to see what I get if I do no formal promotion. Maybe that will lead to the right amount of work for me to pursue new projects or maybe it will mean I am not busy enough. I will not know until I give it a try. I do know that the next 3 goals will not happen at all if I don't take away something, and for now, this is that something.

One step I took toward this goal happened in 2025, but I think it should be mentioned here. I purposely did NOT submit a single program proposal for ALA Annual in June of 2026. This resolution has been percolating since summer and I thought this step-- planning to attend ALA Annual without submitting a single program-- was a good idea. Please note, I am doing this with intentionality and chose this year to try it because ALA Annual is in Chicago and I d not have to travel to attend. Let's see what happens and how many things I end up getting asked to do without formally applying. It is the right time to give this a try.

2026 Resolution: Dive Deeper Into New Projects: And this is what I will use some of that non-training time for in 2026. Some of these are things that I have already started. For example, last year I focused on the academic journal Robin and I are working on ( out November 2026) and the Foundation for my local library, which I am also in the beginning stages of setting up. But toward the end of 2025 I also started a formal strategic planning process for the HWA Libraries Committee with a deliberate growth strategy. That already has a timeline set to culminate in late summer. 2025 also saw me get paid for many more moderating gigs for all genres. I really love moderating conversations with authors be it one-on-one or panels. I know I do a good job because people ask me to return and do more. This is an area I could consciously grow and promote from a professional standpoint. I have proven myself to be worth the money and I like the creativity and challenge of these more spontaneous events (compared to my very methodically planned out training programs). Finally, while I knew that my book tour would be fun, I did not realize how much opportunity it opened for me to moderate more conversations and do more of my own traveling. Why I Love Horror is a book that has a long tail, I can do events for it indefinitely. I can appear with authors for events that pair my book with their releases and even other horror related activities (like the one I have planned for late January in the Boston area-- details coming soon). I am also beginning to be asked to come to book clubs. If can keep traveling to libraries and conferences just on my book, do I even need the librarian part of the equation to justify where I go? Some of this connects to the above resolution as well. Selling books at events now makes me money. These are all things I will be devoting more of my time to than the more traditional training I focused on for the last 10 years. (Note: The biggest portion of my paying work is still reading and writing reviews; that will not change)

2026 Resolution: Allow Time for the Success of 2025 To Be Thoughtfully Applied: I made a goal in 2025 to double down on myself and well, as I discussed yesterday, it worked better than I could have ever expected. But what comes next? Well at this specific moment, nothing much different. As I said above, I have a busy schedule of trainings coming up in the next few months, but after that? Doors are being opened all over the place-- which ones do I go through? I need to really think about this in a vacuum. I think change will come to me but I need to be ready to embrace or reject it with more to go on than my current vibes. I need to be in a place mentally where I can think about each opportunity and make thoughtful decisions. The most comparable moment in my life to this moment is back in 2015 when I made the decision to leave library work and focus on providing training to libraries full time. That was not a decision I made all at once, or even in the same calendar year. It came at me incrementally and required I spend serious time contemplating it from every angle. That was 10 years ago but I still remember the time and research I put into taking this step. I am using that model from 2015 to help me through this exciting and scary time in my career. 

One concrete thing I am planning to do in order to give myself the serious time to think about where I am  now and where I should go next is to set a time to take a walk each week where all I do is think about the bigger picture. I take a walk a few times a week already but often I use it to listen to books or podcasts. And I don't schedule every walk. Starting now though, I will be serious and thoughtful about this. I will put a "thinking walk" on my calendar at the start of each week and honor it like any other business appointment. 

2026 Resolution: Explore Another Major Writing Project: This is one I have to do. I refuse to just do Why I Love Horror 2. It has to be something different. It has to be something that only I could write. And maybe it isn't another book. I really have no idea. That has not stopped well meaning people from giving me ideas all the time. I am thankful for those ideas, but I do need to schedule some of the time from the resolution before this one (including some of those walks) to just think about what I want my next major writing project to be. I will not work on something that I don't believe is needed out in the world. I want to come up with what that next something is before the end of 2026 (if possible) so that I can devote 2027 to working on it. Why plan this far ahead? Well it is necessary. Take the academic journal, Robin and I agreed to this publication last year around this time-- January 2025-- and we have been working on it since March 2025. It will not be out in the world until November 2026. If there is even a chance that I will be working on another major writing project in the near future, I need to commit now to leaving 2027 open from saying yes to anything else.

And that's a wrap on my annual 2 part series on resolutions. I will have my January reviews in Booklist and Library Journal up later this week. I will also be focusing on more year in review think pieces and reports as we lead up to my February 11th year in review program for PCI. My goal is to have everything I refer to I that program also accessible with commentary here on the blog, so that you do not need to see the program in order to have some benefit form the work I am doing to take everything from 2025 in RA Service and help you move into 2026 with confidence.

Reading Resolutions for 2026: Part 1-- Assessing How I Did in 2025

Today I am back to work for 2026, and as I like I do each new year, I am kicking off 2026 on the blog with my annual 2 part Reading Resolutions posts. First up, I am looking back at the year I just completed by taking an honest assessment of how I did on my 2025 goals. 

I like to lead by example. As the author of this blog, one that I know is used by thousands of library workers all over the country as a trusted resource, I also understand that I must not only hold myself to a very high standard, but also, I need to model the behaviors I think all of you should also try.

This is why every single year, before I set out my own reading resolutions, I publicly assess my resolutions from the previous year. Here is last year's post where I kicked off my 2025 goals by assessing my 2024 resolutions.

Before you run headlong into a new year, any year, I advocate for taking a step back to assess not only the goals you set for 2025, but also taking a hard look at where the goals you set at the start of the year met reality, making those goals harder or even invalid. This is NOT an exercise in feeling bad that you didn't keep resolutions or complete goals. No one ever gets everything done.

Rather the exercise of setting goals is about learning from the past and making adjustments moving forward. I have learned this by living it. This two step process of assessment before goal setting has saved me from burn out by forcing me to look at long held practices and make real changes, changes that have improved this blog and my professional life in general. In fact, if you have not done an assessment before, I highly recommend going back and looking at mine. I just went through the past 5 years of assessments before writing this post and it made me appreciate how much this process has helped me. I can literally see my growth and improvement. It is clarifying and quite honestly, inspiring. And honestly, when you can inspire yourself, that is a win.

But even if you have never done this before, please considering starting now. It is extremely important to look back at the year that was BEFORE you plan for the year to come, otherwise you are simply making goals in a vacuum, which helps no one. I will demonstrate why this is necessary for you today by using myself as your example. You cannot learn from the past without taking a moment to reflect.

But, before I get to myself, I want to make my annual plea to NOT make resolutions about the number of books you will read in a year. Many people set goals based on a number and in my experience this is never a good idea. It makes many anxious and leads to choosing books based on how quickly you can finish them. It is quality not quantity. Sometimes a book that takes you a month to finish will help you more [whether professionally or personally because it nourished your soul] than 5 that you could have rushed through in that same time frame. I have more to say on this topic here. 

Do what you want, of course, but that is my opinion on this issue.

Now on to the leading by example part. Here is the full post where I laid out my 2025 Resolutions with details. As a reminder those resolutions were:

2025 Resolutions: Read More Nonfiction

2025 Resolution: Update My Signature Presentation

2025 Resolution: Actively Promote Others Who Can Do This Work

2025 Resolution: Start Officially Training Trustees

2025 Resolution: Begin To Think Bigger

Now as I aways do, I will take all 5 goals together and assess what I did well and what I need to work on.

What Went Well:

• As I mentioned in my post to end 2025 here, I have figured out how to make sure I am reading more widely and especially in the genres I enjoy for fun. The key for me is the listen to the books I am reading for enjoyment since all the books I read for review (work) are in print. I easily read more nonfiction this year because of this. Like a lot of goals, this one was around for a few years and I figured out more about myself by intentionally trying to hit the goal. And the results of this goal will make a return tomorrow in my 2026 goals as well.
• I did make some big changes to my signature presentation in what I emphasize, the examples I use, and how I go about delivering it. I think it is a better experience for all who are a part of the training especially those in person. I already have a handful of chances to keep this momentum going in early 2026 as well.
• I have worked to help other trainers expand their programs and helped them to find more jobs. Librarians in adult, schools, and children's. I also have continued to mentor a newer library director as well as my more informal mentoring of those who reach out for advice. While I will not make this a goal next year, 2025 definitely marked the point in my career when I went from saying yes to all the training jobs to thinking about who else could do them just as well as me and maybe even better.
• Well thinking bigger kinda exploded. I never thought my book would do as well as it has. I thought it would be popular with the people I knew. I did not anticipate how big the book tour would be, or how many people came for me and not just to meet the famous authors (there were many for the authors, don't get me wrong). I did not think would be in almost every Barnes and Noble -- that part has been weird. I was in People Magazine (online) and in the Wall Street Journal. The cover reveal was on CrimeReads. I have signed a contract for Spain to release an edition and a specialty version is in the works. And I definitely never thought an honor like Chicagoan of the Year for Books was something I would even be considered for. This is on top of the work I have done to start a foundation at La Grange Library (still on-going) and co-edit an Academic Journal with Robin (articles are beginning to roll in). I have moved very far outside of my normal library consultant lanes faster and it a wider swing than I would have thought possible 12 months ago. I am happy about this, but as I will mention below, I need to be cautious about how it affects me. 

What I Still Need to Work On:

• Spending the year trying to promote others to take on some of my training work and updating my RA for All presentation has led to new questions for me and my work. How much longer do I want to be doing this training thing. As I get further removed from working in a library, and the world in which I have influence expands, I do not know how my presentations to library workers on RA will fit in going forward.
• I had to abandon training trustees due to giving my book tour the time and space it deserved. And I think being over half a year removed from my 24 years as a trustee has made me LESS inclined to train trustees. I will say it also helps that the state of IL is doubling down on mandatory trustee training as the rule, not the exception, so I know others are already trying to make that happen. I am fine letting others step in. This is a great example of a goal that was there for me to explore but in the end, it is better for me to abandon it than pursue it. Others can do this better and with more enthusiasm.
• I am thinking about not setting a reading goal for the first time in a long time. But if I do that, I might need to add something that makes sure I check in with myself. In many ways this seems like such an unimportant goal to worry about and yet, I know it actually is very important both to me  as a professional in the book world and as a human who loves reading. And since I think I unlocked the problem this year, I 100% need to hold myself accountable there.It easy to declare victory, but it is much harder to keep the success going without conflict.
• In a similar vein, while my commitment to "thinking bigger" in 2025 paid off in ways I never could have imagined, I do not want my success in 2025 to lead to me making decisions that move me too far into a direction I might not be ready to go yet or even want to go. This is an example of when success without contemplation of what the success means could be a bad thing. I am going to cautiously test new waters in 2026 and continue to see if how I feel about making some larger changes in the future, but I need to take baby steps.

Okay, that's a wrap on 2025's goals and how I did. Back tomorrow with 2026's goals.

What I'm Reading: Becky's Best Books I Read in 2025

For the ninth year in a row, I am doing my best books that I read during this calendar year in a category list rather than in some kind of ranked order, Why? Because why I loved these particular books matters more to me than the order in which I would place them. How I interacted with them, how they affected me, how they stayed with me over the course of the calendar year, this is what is most important because it is why they are my on personal "Best" list.

Some of the categories are the same from year to year, others change. This is because the books I read each year create their own experiences and categories to me personally and I want to capture that experience along with the titles. I am not a robot, I am a human reader, even if reading and suggesting titles is my job. In order to remind myself [and all of you] of the joy in what we are paid to do, I strive to create a year end best list that captures, celebrates, and acknowledges that.

By this time, lots of people have already weighed in with critically acclaimed "best" lists for weeks, but I always wait to post this until end the year here on RA for All. I am keeping that tradition both because I like traditions, but also for ease of retrieving this list and other from years' past. To find any of my year's best read lists, from any year, all you have to do is click on the year in the right gutter on the blog scroll down). It brings up every post for that year in reverse chronological order, meaning that the last post of the year is first. Always the librarian, I am sharing my favorite reads AND cataloging them in an easy to retrieve way. 

I also wait to post this because my list is about my reflections on myself as a readers over the last 12 months. It is not just another best list. This is a list that is personal to me, my tastes, and my weird quirks. I need time and quiet to really think about it. I have been sitting with the categories for a a few weeks.

You can also use this post to help other readers, but because it is so specific to me, it is actually better used by you as a conversation starter. (Click here for my post about turning conversation starters into displays) For example, you can ask people "What is the most fun you had reading a book this year?" or "What title was the biggest surprise to you?" Those are questions readers can answer much more quickly and easily than "What was your favorite book of 2025?" And these are the types of questions that engender dialog.

The categories I have listed here provide great conversation starters to offer to your patrons. You can even use my answers to keep the conversation going by saying, "I was thinking about this question because I read another library workers list and got the idea."

The point of my "Best" list is to both offer books that I loved this year, while also presenting an example of a regular reader view of a "Best" list.

Below you will find my list of the best books I experienced in 2025 (regardless of publication year) in 17 categories created by me. It is an arbitrary amount, but so what? It's my list of what mattered to me the most this year so I get to decide how I present it.

Each title includes my three words and a link to a longer review which will explain more about the book and give you insight as to why it is a "best" book for that category for me.

Some general comments about my list this year:

• This year I had an experience that I have never had in 25 years of being a librarian and that is the fact that I have one overall best book and it could be slotted into almost every category as such.
• I have to say it, but this was also the first year I wrote a book for general readers. That will be captured in my list below because my book coming out was the BEST moment of my reading year.
• I read a lot of mysteries for the second year in a row and all were on audio. I also increased my NF by reading them on audio.
• My audio reading went up overall and I not only know why, I now share the reason in my training programs. Since I read so much print for review, for a few years I was finding it hard to turn off my reviewing brain and just enjoy a book as a fan. But, I have now realized that when I listen to a book, my brain understands that it is NOT for work and I have no problem just sitting back and enjoying it. This was a huge discovery I made into my own reading preferences and it led to me reading more books for fun this year than I have in many years.
• And of course-- Horror is everywhere on this list (even some titles that did not make my horror best list) because for me as a reader, it fits in more categories than just the ones for its genre. While I know that is unique to me as a reader, I wonder if that is true for you and a different genre. I am sure it is for many of your readers. If they have a favorite genre, they loved the books they loved for reasons that go beyond their genre classification. This is always important to remember as we help readers.

I'll be back on January 5, 2026 with Part 1 of my Reader Resolutions-- an assessment of how I did on 2025's goals, followed by Part 2 where I will set out my goals for 2026 on January 6th. Have a safe and Happy New Year.

Now what you have been waiting for.....my list with links to my reviews and my three words!

Becky's Best Books I read in 2025

Best Overall Book: The Buffalo Hunter Hunter  by Stephen Graham Jones-- There is not a better book I read in 2025 than this novel. It is a masterpiece of American fiction, I could have been my answer to at least 6 categories below, so I gave it it's own category. (historical, revenge, riveting)

Best Feel Good Read: The entire Thursday Murder Club Series thus far-- all on audio and I binged the first 4 in the first 4 months of 2025 and then listened to the 5th right after it came out. (fun, mature main characters, cozy but still serious issues)

Book That Stayed With Me All Year: Angel Down by Daniel Kraus-- this one was an easy call. This book written as one single sentence was memorable and ambitious, but he also pulled it off! (visceral, ambitious, reads like a chant)

 

Book That I Am Recommending to Everyone I Know: Why I Love Horror: Essays on Horror Literature by Becky Siegel Spratford. I mean it is true. I don't have three words but here is the Booklist starred review.

Best Debut: Listen to Your Sister by Neena Viel-- I am excited to new reading her second book for my April 2026 LJ column and I will be conducting an interview with the author in the same issue. (family trauma, steadily building dread that burst open to all out terror, original)

The Most Fun I Had Reading a Book: Starter Villain by John Scalzi-- I needed a fun book to read on my vacation and just before I went into my book tour. This book was the PERFECT choice. (fun, thought provoking, fast paced)

Best Audio: Fair Play by Louise Hegarty-- hands down this was the book I loved BECAUSE I listened to it. If I read it in print, it would not have made this list. (Meta, Thought Provoking, Siblings)

Best One Sitting Read: Killer on the Road by Stephen Graham Jones

Best Book From 2024 Best Lists That I Read in 2025: Somewhere Beyond the Sea by TJ Klune (return to a beloved world and its characters, belonging, cozy with serious issues)

Best Surprise: The Country Under Heaven by Frederic S. Durbin (vignettes, weird western, thought-provoking)

Best Speculative Fiction: Best of All Worlds by Kenneth Oppel-- A YA books every adult should read. (Existentially Terrifying, Thought Provoking, Unique Band of Survivors story)

Best Horror [That wasn't mentioned already] TIE: When the Wolf Comes Home by Nat Cassidy (the power of fear, immersive terror, pulp homage) and A Game in Yellow by Hailey Piper (discomfort, an original retelling of a classic work, cursed book)

• [See also this post for a more detailed discussion of my personal Best Horror of 2025]

Best Historical Fiction: The Starving Saints by Caitlin Starling-- so this is clearly historical but fantasy historical. I am fine with doing this for 2 reasons. 1. BHH was the best historical I read (see the top of the list) 2. It's my list and I loved this book; one of the reasons I loved it was the setting. (richly detailed, highly unnerving, 3 points of view)

Best Collection: The Poorly Made and Other Things by Sam Rebelein -- this is a great example of how a collection also be a great united volume. (Cursed Land, Madness, Unnerving)

Best Nonfiction: Daughter of Daring: The Trick-Riding, Train-Leaping, Road-Racing Life of Helen Gibson, Hollywood's First Stuntwoman by Mallory O'Meara-- this book reminded me why I chose to be an American Studies major. (fascinating, enlightening, fun)

Best Memoir: Raw Dog: The Naked Truth About Hot Dogs by Jamie Loftus. This book could have been put in a few categories (audio, most fun, book I am recommending to everyone I know, and surprise), but each time I made a final decision, it got dropped. But just the fact that it kept popping up in my mind meant it had to be here somewhere. So I made this category so that it could be included. (Funny, irreverent, but also sweet and charming)

 

Best Under the Radar Read: The Sofa by Sam Munson-- also the winner of best line in a Becky review of 2025. "...readers will be giving their own couches the side-eye for a while after finishing this one. (Horror in the mundane, dark humor, intensely psychological)

Libraries Year in Review 2025: Most Checked Out Titles, Top Stories and More

Today is the next to last blogging day of 2025 and I wanted to use this space to gather up the US Library "Year in Review." While you can obviously use this post to get a very solid sense of the year we are about to leave behind, remember, it will also help you figure out where we are going. More on that from me right at the start of January.

I am hoping each of you has a chance before the end of 2025 (or if you are off, early in 2026) to take a look through the links I have posted here. 

First and foremost, the aggregated list of the most checked out books from 40 US Public Libraries via Book Riot. You can see the top fiction and nonfiction here and then at the end of the post, you can click on any of the 40 libraries who lists were used to make this aggregated list.

Book Riot gathered a nice mix of libraries in terms of size and location. They also added a narrative with some observations at the start of the post here. I will be using their work (with citation) in my own Year in Review presentations coming in February.

The most checked out books in general, and more specifically, at your own library, is another kind of best lists, this one driven by library patrons, with more genre, and more backlist than 2025 titles.

Obviously censorship is still a major issue as another year wraps up. But this year, the American Library Association, Book Riot, Florida Freedom to Read Project, PEN America, and Texas Freedom to Read Project all came together to sound the alarm on the major censorship crisis they’ve observed in 2025. Together they put together the comprehensive-- 2025 Book Censorship Wrapped: Trends, Challenges, and Successes Over The Year. You should not go into 2026 without reading this, no matter what your role at your library happens to be.

Publishers Weekly also had an article gathering the top library stories of 2025 here with of course the shuttering of B&T as the top story. But you know it was a doozy of a year when Carla Hayden getting fired was only story #5 out of 10. Each story in the article is linked to more of their reporting on that topic. 

They also shared this year end report on Hoopla's trend and growth categories. It is interesting to compare this article to the aggregated list of the most checked out books above. 

Libby hasn't done their most borrowed report for 2025 yet. When they do I will post it. But they do a most borrowed post every single month of the year. Click here to see those titles in reverse chronological order.

There are sure to be more year in review pieces worth sharing with you, but this is all I have before I stop blogging until 1/5. 

Come back tomorrow for my annual Best Books post.

Using Awards Lists As a RA Tool: National Book Critics Circle Longlist

This is part of my ongoing series on using Awards Lists as a RA tool. Click here for all posts in the series in reverse chronological order. Click here for the first post which outlines the details how to use awards lists as a RA tool.   

The National Book Critics Circle Award Finalists were announced, one category at a time, all this week. You can see the full announcement here and the specific category announcements in the linked list below.

Since 1974, the NBCC, made up of mostly literary critics, honors outstanding writing and fosters a national conversation about reading, criticism, and literature. 

The 2025 finalists are in 8 categories are:

• Fiction
• Nonfiction
• Biography 
• Autobiography
• Poetry
• Criticism
• Gregg Barrios Book in Translation

The separation of nonfiction, biography, and autobiography not only allows for more nonfiction to be honored, but is acknowledges the big difference between biography and autobiography both the obvious distinction of how it is written and the fact that the appeal for readers is different as well.

I always like comparing the National Book Award finalists to the NBCC. They are fairly similar, but you can see distinctions, especially if you follow reviews as I do. The NBA is chosen by a group of mostly authors, while the NBCC is driven by the critics. You can especially see trends emerging over time if you look at both. Thankfully, both awards make the backlist easy to access. [There is a box on the top right gutter of the "Awards" page for the NBCC.]

This year for example, while some of the fiction books on the longlists overlap, the National Book Award Winner is not even on the NBCC list, the other nominees are all different. This is great because it gives you many more "best" options for readers. Add in the Booker Prize and you get the big picture view of the best books published in English in any given year.

While "best" books aren't always the most popular with readers, they are the harbinger of larger movements. For example, as award finalists have gotten more diverse, the demand for more titles by marginalized voices has made it way into the conversation about all books.

So use this award list as a resource, as I note in the introduction to this post above, but also, think about grouping similar awards together, consider their backlists from the last 5 years (NBCC has easy access here), and see if you can notice a few trends or changes yourself. When we embrace trends and larger movements as they are developing, we show our patrons we understand them. Anticipating what they want is not that hard if you pay attention and it leads to more check outs.

Editor's note: The blog will return on Monday (12/22) with some library specific year in review content and then on Tuesday (12/23) I will end the year of posts with my Best Books Becky Read in 2025. After that, the blog will be on vacation, returning Monday, January 5, 2026.

Attack of the Best Lists 2025: LitHub's Ultimate Best Books List (and more)

This post is part of my year end "Attack of the Best Lists" coverage. To see every post in my "Attack of the Best Lists 2025" coverage [and more backlist best of the year options] you can click here.  

Today I have the list I have been waiting for-- LitHub's aggregation of all the major best lists. From the landing page:

The Ultimate Best Books of 2025 List
Reading All the Lists So You Don’t Have To Since 2017
By Emily Temple 

Happy List Season, children. I hope you’ve been good. Just like every year, I have arrived to present to you the Ultimate List, otherwise known as the List of Lists—in which I read all (or at least many) of the Best Of lists on the internet and count which books are recommended most. 

Is consensus the same as quality? Not always. Is this basically a popularity contest? Sure. But if you want to know which books The Critics are talking about, this is one way to do it. (Three of my own personal favorite books of the year made it to the top five below, which I can only assume means I am either a) boring or b) correct or c) both??) 

This year, I processed 58 lists from 49 outlets, which collectively recommended more than 1,300 different books (…help). 90 of those books made it onto 5 or more lists (weirdly this is the exact same number as last year, despite there being more books recommended in total this year), and I have collated these for you here, in descending order of frequency.

I know I have been doing my Attack of the Best Lists 2025 coverage since late October, but honestly, if you only have time for 1 list, this is it. Temple has done the most focused work of anyone out there. And the results, are RA gold for you. The post she has created seamlessly combines adult fiction, nonfiction, and GNs into one list. Further, she not only does the compiling for you, the sources are listed and linked (!) at the bottom of the page, so you can have DIRECT access to the most influential' best lists, and the aggregation of which titles are on the most lists, with just this one click. It is crowdsourcing, and an end of the year lists resource to dive deeper, all in one place.

And for just a moment, before going further, I need all of you to look at the books appearing on 12 lists because we have Stephen Graham Jones alongside Nobel Prize winner Han Kang! Look this year was not the best overall, but I for one am going to celebrate SGJ being on par with Kang as a win.

Back to more best books coverage on Lit Hub as they also has a few of their own best list content that is worth a look:

• 173 Best Book Covers of 2025
• Lit Hub's 43 Favorite Books of 2025
• 100 Notable Small Press Books of 2025
• The Best Reviewed Nonfiction of 2025 (via BookMarks)
• The Best Reviewed Fiction of 2025 (via BookMarks)
• The Year's Best Literary Podcasts

And I want to especially highlight LitHub's roundup of the 50 Biggest News Stories of 2025 with links to more info on each

Multiple layer of backlist and indexing are also happening in every list, meaning you can embrace "Best" across multiple years. Reminder, "Best" titles have a longer shelf life than the current year. Last year's best titles, even 5 years ago, are great suggestions for a wide swath of readers. LitHub makes it easy, all year long, with their clear, consistent, and accessible tags at the bottom of their posts. All of these tags pull up useful information in reverse chronological order, meaning you decide how far into the backlist you want to dig.

Here are some of the tags that can help you all year long and include easy backlist access:

• Reading Lists (best lists all year long end up here)
• Ultimate Lists (both end of year and summer going back to 2017)

[Also, I wanted to remind people of the extremely useful Best of the Decade lists they made in 2019. Those are also a great "best" resource, one that truly embraces the treasure trove that is the backlist.]

But wait, there is more...

LitHub owns CrimeReads and they have their own Best of 2025 lists (but no useful tags to collection them all. Here are those best lists:

• Best Crime Fiction, Mysteries, and Thrillers 2025
• Best Traditional Mysteries 2025
• Best International Crime Novels of 2025
• Best Horror Fiction of 2025
• Best Noir Fiction of 2025
• Best Debut Crime Novels of 2025
• Best Espionage Fiction of 2025

Via Chicago Tribune-- Chicagoan of the Year in Books: If you’re into horror, thank the librarian Becky Spratford

I mean, knew this was coming, but it still feels odd. I am the person behind the curtain always, but at the same time, all of us who hep readers in public libraries are.

I am proud to stand here to promote all of us and the work we do.

I was honored to be chosen for this and even more honored to take the pictures in the adult stacks at the La Grange Public Library-- a building a literally was a part of building in my time on the library board. I was there for 24 years, from when we passed the referendum to build the library until it opened, and now after those 20 years of binds have been paid off. 

I have an account for the Tribune and am sharing this gift link here. It will be in the print paper on 12/21.

Thank you to all of the authors who provided quotes to Chris Borelli. Thanks also to Chris who is a huge supporter of books in general and Horror specifically. We are lucky to have him on the beat here in Chicago when so many other cities just ignore books coverage. 

I will leave the article here for posterity but then, I am going back behind the curtain.

Chicagoan of the Year in Books: If you’re into horror, thank the librarian Becky Spratford

Click the image to read the article
(gift link)

2026 State of Reading via Everand and Fable

As the year comes to an end and well into the new year, we will be seeing reports on the biggest books and reading stories of the year. I am gathering many of them here on the blog in anticipation of my big 2025 RA Year in Review coming in February via PCI (slides will be here on the blog for free).

One of the more interesting reports I have seen in the last few days cam from Everand and Fable and used 2025 data to create a 2026 State of Reading Report. I was pleasantly surprised by some of the conclusions they drew. First a summary of the report via PW here:

Personal recommendations continue to drive book discovery more than algorithms, social media, and other digital tools, according to the 2026 State of Reading Report released today by Everand and Fable, the online reading and book club platforms owned by Scribd.

The report, based on user activity data from both platforms and a survey of more than 1,600 U.S. adults using the platforms, found that "people I know personally" ranks as the top source of book discovery, holding its position even as AI-driven recommendation tools proliferated in 2025. That human connection extends to sharing a book with a friend or family member, which proved more popular then "saving to a shelf" as the most common action readers take after finishing a book.  

"Despite rapid technological progress and a year defined by AI experimentation, readers are choosing relationships over recommendations," said Tony Grimminck, CEO of Scribd. "While word of mouth isn't novel, this shift is happening within digital reading, as people find new spaces—like Everand and Fable—where sharing can scale." 

The report draws on user activity data from Everand between Jan. 1–Oct. 31, 2025, and from Fable users between Jan. 1—November 5, 2025. 

Fable was acquired by Everand earlier this year and the company reports than 820,000 people joined a new book club on Fable the platform year. The sociability of clubs is proving popular, with 37% of all surveyed readers participating in at least one and the most active readers belonging to three or more clubs on average. In-person clubs are the most popular, followed by fully virtual and then hybrid clubs. 

The report also documents format shifts in digital reading. Audiobooks edged ahead of e-books as the most common way people read digitally, though more than half of readers report using both formats. Smartphones have become the top reading device, driven by convenience and portability, though 25% of readers still prefer print. 

More than half of surveyed readers say they're reading more than last year, with the fastest growth among 18–24-year-olds. Fable users finished an average of 20 books in 2025, while the remaining half completed between 6–15 books per year. Average reading streaks hit 29 days, up 300% year-over-year, with nearly a quarter million readers maintaining 30-day streaks. 

Those surveyed cited stress relief as a primary motivation, with 54% pointing to it as their reason for reading more this year and 83% reporting they feel relaxed when reading. Half of readers reread three or more books this year, mainly for comfort and escapism. 

Romance; mystery, thriller and crime; and science fiction and fantasy remained the most-read genres in 2025. However, 80% of readers tried a new genre this year. Rebecca Yarros's Empyrean series dominated the most-read titles, with the three books in the series taking the top three spots. Yarros's books garnered one million hours read on Everand this year.

I urge you all to click here and explore the 2026 State of Reading Report in its entirety. I will be using some of the data and conclusions in my February program as well. There is a lot here for us to parse and then use to better serve our patrons. But like I always do, I want to take all of the year end information, from best lists to best seller, from biggest news stories to trends, and more to give you the most efficient and effective consolidation of information so that you can craft your 2026 service plan without having to dig through everything yourself.