Fiction Staff Picks 2025

Recommended reads from staff at Puke Ariki, Community Libraries and the Museum

Updated December 18, 2025
K
Kōtui New Plymouth Libraries
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Fiction Staff Picks 2025

Recommended reads from staff at Puke Ariki, Community Libraries and the Museum

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All fours : a novel
July, Miranda
" The New York Times bestselling author returns with an irreverently sexy, tender, hilarious and surprising novel about a woman upending her life A semi-famous artist announces her plan to drive cross-country, from LA to NY. Thirty minutes after...
All the colours of the dark
Whitaker, Chris
Paper Book
NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * OVER ONE MILLION COPIES SOLD * From the author of We Begin at the End comes a soaring thriller and an epic love story that "hits like a sledgehammer . . . an absolutely must-read novel" (Gillian Flynn, author of Gone Girl). Read...
Atmosphere
Reid, Taylor Jenkins
Paper Book
#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER - GOOD MORNING AMERICA BOOK CLUB PICK - From the author of The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo and Daisy Jones & The Six comes an epic new novel set against the backdrop of the 1980s space shuttle program about the extraordinary lengths we go...
Birnam Wood
Catton, Eleanor
Paper Book
INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER A Best Book of the Year: The New York Times Book Review, NPR, The New Yorker, The Washington Post, The Atlantic, Time, Financial Times, Slate, The Chicago Public Library, Kirkus, The TelegraphA...
Broken country : a novel
Hall, Clare Leslie
Paper Book
Over 1 Million Copies Sold A REESE'S BOOK CLUB PICK | A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER "Broken Country by Clare Leslie Hall is an unforgettable story of love, loss, and the choices that shape our lives...but it's also a masterfully crafted mystery that...
Butter
Yuzuki, Asako
Audiobook
City of night birds : a novel
Kim, Juhea
Paper Book
REESE'S BOOK CLUB PICK "This story left me thinking about the ways we overcome setbacks and redefine what truly matters." - Reese Witherspoon (Reese's Book Club December '24 Pick) A once-famous ballerina faces a final choice--to return to the world of Russian dance that nearly broke...
The covenant of water : a novel
Verghese, Abraham
Paper Book
OPRAH'S BOOK CLUB PICK * INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * SUBJECT OF A SIX-PART SUPER SOUL PODCAST SERIES HOSTED BY OPRAH WINFREY From the New York Times-bestselling author of Cutting for Stone comes a stunning and magisterial epic of love, faith, and medicine, set in...
The crimson moth
Ciccarelli, Kristen
Paper Book
AN INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER! "A steamy game of cat and mouse between witch and witch-hunter, played out against a backdrop of opulence, secrets, and bloody history. I couldn't look away." - Kendare Blake, #1 New York Times bestselling author of...
Death of the author
Okorafor, Nnedi
Paper Book
THE INSTANT NATIONAL BESTSELLER Order now and receive the stunning DELUXE LIMITED EDITION while supplies last―featuring a special alternate cover design on the hardcover case, gorgeous sprayed edges, and exclusive endpapers. This breathtaking edition is only available on a limited...
Deep end
Hazelwood, Ali
A competitive diver and an ace swimmer jump into forbidden waters in this steamy college romance from the New York Times bestselling author of The Love Hypothesis. Scarlett Vandermeer is swimming upstream. A Junior at Stanford and a student-athlete who specializes...
The emperor of Gladness : a novel
Vuong, Ocean
Paper Book
The instant New York Times bestseller * Oprah's Book Club Pick * Named a Best Book of 2025 by TIME, The New Yorker, Harper's Bazaar, USA Today, NPR, People, Christian Science Monitor, Scientific American, and Kirkus Reviews * A 2026...
Fable for the end of the world
Reid, Ava
Paper Book
The Last of Us meets The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes in this stand-alone dystopian romance about survival, sacrifice, and love that risks everything. By encouraging massive accumulations of debt from its underclass, a single corporation, Caerus, controls all aspects of society. ...
Great big beautiful life
Henry, Emily
Paper Book
A REESE'S BOOK CLUB PICK ∙ AN INSTANT #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER ∙ Two writers compete for the chance to tell the larger-than-life story of a woman with more than a couple of plot twists up her sleeve in this dazzling and sweeping novel from Emily Henry. As...
Isola : a novel
Goodman, Allegra
Paper Book
REESE'S BOOK CLUB PICK * NATIONAL BESTSELLER * "A shocking story, made all the more stunning by the fact that it has its roots in true history."--Jodi Picoult, author of By Any Other Name "A new generation of survival story . . . an extraordinary book that reads like a...
The Jackal's mistress : a novel
Bohjalian, Chris
Paper Book
INSTANT NATIONAL BESTSELLER * #1 BOSTON GLOBE BESTSELLER * USA TODAY BESTSELLER * In this Civil War love story, inspired by a real-life friendship across enemy lines, the wife of a missing Confederate soldier discovers a wounded Yankee officer and must decide what she's willing to risk...
The kill list
Forsyth, Frederick
Paper Book
An extraordinary cutting-edge suspense novel from the master of international intrigue and #1 New York Times–bestselling author. In Virginia, there is an agency bearing the bland name of Technical Operations Support Activity, or TOSA. Its one mission is to track, find, and...
Magic hour : a novel
Hannah, Kristin
Paper Book
From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Women comes an incandescent story about the resilience of the human spirit, the triumph of hope, and the meaning of home. In the rugged Pacific Northwest lies the Olympic National Forest--nearly a million acres of...
The names
Knapp, Florence
THE YEAR'S BREAKOUT NOVEL AND WORD-OF-MOUTH HIT--A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER AND READ WITH JENNA PICK "Dazzling. . . Knapp tirelessly and beautifully replicates not just loss and grief but endless rebirth and delight." --The Washington Post "Elegant. . ....
One golden summer
Fortune, Carley
Paper Book
THE #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER! ∙ A radiant escape to the lake from #1 New York Times bestselling author of Every Summer After and This Summer Will Be Different As featured in The New York Times ∙ People ∙ Good Morning...
Onyx storm
Yarros, Rebecca
Paper Book
Accolades: AN INSTANT #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * TV series now in development at Amazon MGM Studios with Michael B. Jordan's Outlier Society * Amazon Best Romantasy Books of the Year 2025 * Apple Books Fantasy & Paranormal Romance Novel Best Sellers 2025, #4 * Apple Books...
Orbital
Harvey, Samantha
Paper Book
WINNER OF THE BOOKER PRIZE 2024 * A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER **New York Times Book Review Book Club Pick** **Stephen Colbert's The Late Show Book Club Pick** Winner of the 2024 Hawthornden Prize Shortlisted for the 2024...
Problematic summer romance
Hazelwood, Ali.
The Instant #1 New York Times Bestseller! What is wrong meets what feels right in this romance set in Italy by the New York Times bestselling author of Deep End. Maya Killgore is twenty-three and still in the process of figuring out...
Quicksilver
Hart, Callie
Paper Book
From global phenomenon Callie Hart comes a Sunday Times bestselling highly addictive enemies-to-lovers Romantasy with razor-sharp banter, heart-stopping action, and blistering hot romance that you won't be able to put down! 🗝️ Do not touch the...
Say you'll remember me
Jimenez, Abby
Small things like these
Keegan, Claire
Paper Book
**OPRAH'S BOOK CLUB PICK 2024** **NEW YORK TIMES BOOK CLUB PICK 2024** NOW A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE STARRING CILLIAN MURPHY A New York Times Bestseller * Shortlisted for the 2022 Booker Prize * Winner of the Orwell Prize for...
Speak to me of home : a novel
Cummins, Jeanine
Summer romance
Monaghan, Annabel
Paper Book
" The heart-tugging and hilarious story of a professional organizer whose life is a mess, and the summer she gets unstuck with the help of someone unexpected from her past, by the bestselling author of Same Time Next Summer and Nora Goes Off Script. ...
The vanishing place
Rankin, Zoë
Instant #1 International Bestseller * A New York Times and Washington Post's Best Thriller of 2025 A shocking murder in the New Zealand bush--and the witness who looks all too familiar--draws a woman back to the very place she swore she'd never return to in this...
What happened to Nina? : a thriller
McTiernan, Dervla
Paper Book
A New York Times' best thriller of the year! From the #1 internationally bestselling author of The Murder Rule comes an emotional novel of suspense about two families at war. Nina and Simon are the perfect couple. Young, fun and deeply in love. Until they leave for a weekend at his...
Wild dark shore
McConaghy, Charlotte
Paper Book
REESE'S BOOK CLUB PICK * INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * #1 AMAZON BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR SO FAR 2025 A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR (NPR, TIME, USA Today, The Economist, Scientific American, Good Housekeeping, Reader's Digest, HuffPost, The Globe...
With a vengeance : a novel
Sager, Riley
Paper Book
THE INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER A haunted past. A train with no stops. Thirteen hours to reckon with the truth. In 1954, Anna Matheson boards a luxury overnight train bound for Chicago that she's commissioned, along with a list of names and a...
You are here
Nicholls, David
Paper Book
THE INSTANT #1 SUNDAY TIMES BESTSELLER A Good Housekeeping "Book We're Most Looking Forward To" * An Independent Today "Best Fiction Books to Read" * A GQ Magazine (UK) "Best Book of 2024" * A Harper's Bazaar (UK) "Best Novels to Read" * A ...
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