Fiction · Contemporary
A Little Life — Hanya Yanagihara
A novel of staggering emotional ambition. Yanagihara takes four friends from college to old age in New York, centering one of them — the brilliant, damaged Jude St. Francis — in a portrait of trauma and friendship that asks whether damage can coexist with love, and whether love can survive damage.
Fiction · Historical Fantasy
Babel — R.F. Kuang
A dark academic fantasy about translation, empire, and resistance — sharp, angry, and meticulously researched.
Short Fiction · Classic
The Lady with the Dog — Anton Chekhov
How Chekhov changed what a short story could do — and why it still matters 125 years later.
Nonfiction · Essay
The Best American Essays 2025
The annual anthology that makes the case for the essay as the most alive form of literary nonfiction.
Fiction · Classic · Essay
How to Read Dostoevsky for the First Time
The Brothers Karamazov is 900 pages and worth every one of them — if you know where to start.
Essay · On Reading
On Reading Books You Don't Finish
Abandoning a book halfway isn't failure. It might be the most honest thing a reader can do.