It has not been easy to put this list together: I read 161 books last year and apart from a few absolute standouts, there were dozens of good books that could all have made the cut on a good day. It is particularly true for non-fiction, where I could almost have separate top tens for certain topics. Anyway, I have suffered, I have doubted, I have agonised and here is the list.

The Door by Magda Szabó. The Door was the best fiction book I read in 2025. It was definitely not the most comfortable, however, and I had put off reading it for years exactly because I knew that it would not be an easy read. It looks at a relationship between two women, a younger writer and her older housekeeper, against the backdrop of Hungarian history. The themes are difficult to describe, but, ultimately, I think it’s about character – moral character in particular. And if I had a penny every time a somewhat weird book about an elderly Central-European woman makes my best books of the year list I would have two pennies, but it’s weird that it happened twice (shout-out to Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead).

Perfection by Vincenzo Latronico. This was, possibly, the best book (out of the 6 and a half that I read) on last year’s International Booker list, although I am still not sure that it was my favourite – you have to check the upcoming best fiction list to see what I mean. But Perfection is difficult to ignore considering its… perfection. The book looks at a young-ish couple living a modern life in Berlin, in what I feel is both a highly critical and sincerely empathetic way. The controlled, pitch-perfect tone perfectly (I know, sorry) matches the curated life of the protagonists. If you fit a certain demographic, you’ll almost certainly feel both attacked and seen by this book.

Audition by Katie Kitamura. Another controlled book, but this time about an accomplished, cold, aloof actress. I don’t always do well with books where I feel like an experimental subject, but this one worked so well on me that I didn’t mind. You are presented with conflicting information, multiple possible explanations for the relationships and events in the book. In the end, it is up to us what to believe and it’s interesting to see what one picks. It is a clever book, but it would not work without the sharp, propulsive writing – it is not often I finish a literary work in two sittings.

The Book of Records by Madeleine Thien. To counterbalance Perfection and Audition, we have Thien’s dreamy, time-blendy novel.  At first, it seems to be about a Chinese father and daughter in the near future, fleeing from an unspecified disaster to The Sea, an enclave for migrants from all over the world. But then Du Fu, Spinoza and Hannah Arendt also get involved, time becomes malleable and Thien explores everything from the horrors of history to mathematics to human betrayal. I’m not sure that the book is fully successful in handling all this, but it’s still a great example of what fiction can do. I loved the atmosphere and ambition of this and if you can handle a certain level of messiness and ambiguity, it is a fascinating read.

Things in Nature Merely Grow by Yiyun Li. Li’s memoir was the clear winner for me in the non-fiction category: it stunned me in both senses of the word. She is a writer whose two sons have died by suicide and this book is her way of dealing with that, especially with the death of her younger boy (she has written a fiction book about the death of the older one). It is a difficult book to describe or recommend: reviews usually say it’s about grief, but she rejects the term. Li is a very precise, unsentimental and unsparing writer, which some people tend to see as her being cold. I find her words truthful and moving, giving us a glimpse into the extremes of human experience without melodrama or emotional manipulation.

Proto by Laura Spinney. On a lighter note, Proto is a wonderful book about Indo-European languages. One of my niche interests is the proto-Indo-European language, the parent of almost all European and many Asian languages that was spoken – most likely – about 4000 years ago on the Pontic steppe. Spinney covers the birth of that mother language as well as the life of all its daughters. It’s well and accessibly written while covering the latest research in a really impressive manner. If you have any interest in languages and/or history, it’s highly recommended.

Free by Lea Ypi. Ypi’s memoir about her childhood before and after the fall of Albania’s terrifying communist regime in the early 90s is smart, moving and extremely interesting. It had been on my reading list for years and I am kicking myself for not reading it sooner. Ypi went on to become a professor of philosophy and politics at LSE, so her political analysis is impeccable, although perhaps too leftist (she is a Kantian Marxist) for some. Considering that Ypi and I are broadly the same age and grew up in post-Communist countries, it was fascinating to see where our experiences overlap and where they differ.

The New Age of Sexism by Laura Bates. I read more than a dozen AI and technology books in 2025 and many of them were very good. But if I could make everyone (especially men) read one of them, this would be it. I am getting more and more frustrated by the AI-optimism that never even acknowledges the downsides of this technology – in this particular case the generally negative and often devastating impact on women. From deepfake porn and submissive chatbots to online abuse and tech’s misogynistic bias, Bates covers it all with urgency and journalistic flair. It’s a frustrating, but important read.

One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This by Omar El Akkad. I have two geopolitically topical (sadly) books on this list. The first is El Akkad’s very personal take on Gaza, which is less about Palestine as such and more about the West’s response. The author was born in Egypt but has lived most of his life in Canada and the US, embracing the stated values of his new homelands. The book chronicles his gradual disillusionment with the actual state of these values, especially when applied to the Middle East. I was not expecting the book to resonate with me so personally, but there were clear parallels with how I have felt in recent years about the West and Ukraine.

America, América by Greg Grandin. My second geopolitical pick is Grandin’s magisterial look at the relationship between the US and South America. If you need some broader context for what the US did in Venezuela, this is the book to read. It’s another frustrating one and the Americans (in the narrower sense) do not come out of it particularly well. Yes, Grandin is clearly on the side of the south, but he is such a good historian that even if you don’t agree with his interpretation of every single situation, you’ll still learn a massive amount.

City of Miracles by Robert Jackson Bennett. The third book in RJB’s Divine Cities series is in fact standing in for the entire trilogy. I reread City of Stairs and City of Blades last year and then finally managed to read City of Miracles as well. This epic political fantasy with gods, spies and colonialism is only rivalled by NK Jemisin’s Broken Earth series in my personal ranking of the best fantasy books of all time. I don’t have space for a proper review here, but if you love complex fantasy with strong themes and nuanced characters but also like a proper plot and lots of cool stuff, do yourself a favour and read it. If you have read the author’s more recent and more popular Shadow of the Leviathan series (that I also love), then they share some DNA, but Divine Cities goes lighter on the mystery and heavier on worldbuilding.

The Raven Scholar by Antonia Hodgson. If you just want your fantasy to be fun, then may I suggest The Raven Scholar? It has trials, it has murders, it has clans devoted to animal gods, it has mysterious dragons, it has a bookish protagonist that cannot let an error go uncorrected (I have been compared to Neema Kraa more times than I care to admit). It is also told by a collective of ravens which to my mind is reason enough to read it. I found it fun and engaging and read its more than 650 pages in three days.

The Everlasting by Alix E. Harrow. Or perhaps you prefer a lyrical love story that is also a mind-bending time-loop situation as well as an examination of nationalism and hero worship? Excellent, as I have just the book for you. The Everlasting is a longer, more complex version of Harrow’s Six Deaths of the Saint, which, if you ask me, is pretty much a perfect short story. It doesn’t really matter if you have read it, though, as The Everlasting is different enough (in case you have read the shorter version) and does not require any knowledge of the Six Deaths (in case you have not). It is about a lady knight upon whose shoulders others have built a nation and a historian who is obsessed with her and what if they aren’t actually hundreds of years apart. Do read it if you wanted This is How You Lose the Time War to be longer and with more commentary on fascism. Do not read it if you have no patience for yearning. Or simply no patience.

Peenar by Gregor Kulla. Kulla’s stream-of-consciousness book about being young, having a body, making music and standing out was my favourite Estonian-language read in 2025. I struggle with Estonian fiction, I am not sure if I become hyper critical when I read it or things simply do not speak to me or the books I pick are objectively not great. I get on much better with Estonian poetry where the language seems less stiff, the construction of the sentences less obvious, the themes less trite. Perhaps it helps that Peenar almost reads like poetry, as it’s written in little vignettes. But it’s also just interesting to read. Is it the deepest thing ever written? Of course not. Does it feel fresh and real and like an actual slice of someone else’s life? Yes.

The Last Devil to Die by Richard Osman. This is kind of an honourable mention, as I do not have a better place to post it. I read Osman’s We Solve Murders in 2024 and loved it. So I finally, FINALLY decided to read The Thursday Murder Club series last year. And yes, everyone was right, it’s absolutely delightful. I think it’s important to have a cosy crime series in your life that you can turn to when you need it. Again, The Last Devil to Die is standing in for all five books, because it’s perhaps my favourite (although maybe not, perhaps I like the third book more, I don’t know). Also, the audio books are amazing, in case you prefer to consume your books that way.

So this is it for now. Too long, but it would have taken me two more months to whittle it down. If you still remember 2025, let me know what your favourite books were.