Top Book Club Picks for 2026

Woman Down by Colleen Hoover

Publication date: January 13, 2026

The perennial book club fave is back with a twisty new thriller that follows an author hunkered down in a remote lakeside cabin attempting to work on her comeback novel.  When a detective shows up with disturbing news she is finally struck with inspiration, but the lines between fiction and reality begin to blur. 

The Last of Earth by Deepa Anappara

Publication date: January 13, 2026

This highly anticipated historical novel set in nineteenth-century Tibet follows two outsiders—an Indian schoolteacher spying for the British Empire and an English “lady” explorer—as they venture into a forbidden kingdom.

My Husband's Wife by Alice Feeney

Publication date: January 20, 2026

The "Queen of Twists" is back again with a psychological marriage thriller in which a woman comes back home from a run to find that her key doesn't work and that her husband claims that the strange - yet eerily similar to her - woman who answers the door is his wife. 

Room 706 by Ellie Levenson

Publication date: January 20, 2026

In this tense and thrilling exploration of desire, a married woman is trapped with her lover in a hotel under siege: If she knew it would end this way, would it ever have begun?

Half His Age by Jennette McCurdy

Publication date: January 20, 2026

The author of the acclaimed memoir I'm Glad My Mom Died makes her fiction debut with this novel about sex, consumerism, class, desire, loneliness, the internet, rage, intimacy, power, and the (oftentimes misguided) lengths we’ll go to in order to get what we want.

It's Not Her by Mary Kubica

Publication date: February 3, 2026

A tranquil family vacation is shattered when Courtney Gray hears blood-curdling screams from the lakeside cottage next door and discovers her brother and sister-in-law dead, with her niece missing. As the police descend on the resort, secrets emerge both about Courtney's family and the isolated town in this twisty, unputdownable thriller from the author of Local Woman Missing.

Keeper of Lost Children by Sadeqa Johnson

Publication date: February 10, 2026

From the author of The House of Eve comes this a new novel demonstrating the transcendent power of love.  An American woman’s vision in post WWII Germany ties together the lives of three people: the wife of an American officer who discovers an orphanage filled with mixed race children, a Philadelphian who volunteers for the desegregated army and meets a German woman, and a girl who is given the opportunity to attend an all-white boarding school. 

The Astral Library by Kate Quinn

Publication date: February 17, 2026

Historical fiction fave Kate Quinn (The Briar Club, The Rose Code) dips her toe into fantasy with this adventure novel for anyone who has ever wished they could live inside a book.  Foster child Alix Watson discovers a hidden door in the Boston Public Library and meets the Librarian, who guards a fantastical hidden library.  When danger arises, Alix and the Librarian flee through the Regency drawing rooms of Jane Austen to the back alleys of Sherlock Holmes and the champagne-soaked parties of The Great Gatsby.

And Now, Back to You  by B.K. Borison

Publication date: February 24, 2026

B.K. Borison put a new spin on Sleepless in Seattle with her best-selling First-Time Caller.  Her newest opposites attract romance takes inspiration from When Harry Met Sally as two competing meteorologists are forced to find common ground.

Cleopatra by Saara El-Arifi

Publication date: February 24, 2026

The life of the legendary Egyptian queen is sumptuously told from her own point of view, making us revisit what we know of the storied "seductress."  Saara el-Arifi peels away the myth and propaganda to tell a fully human story.  

The Ghost Women by Jennifer Murphy

Publication date: February 24, 2026

Set in 1972 at a remote art academy with a dark history of witch trials, this atmospheric thriller follows Detective Lola Germany as she investigates a series of ritualistic murders at St. Luke's Institute of the Arts. When students begin turning up dead, each body carefully arranged to mirror ancient tarot cards, Lola must navigate a web of secrets involving a mysterious coven of student witches, a centuries-old monastic order, and forces that blur the boundary between past and present.

The Night We Met by Abby Jimenez

Publication date: March 24, 2026

Perennial beach read favorite Jimenez (Just For The Summer) is back with a compelling novel that explores compelling novel that explores the messy choices life can throw our way.  Months ago, Larissa made what she didn't know would be a life-altering decision, choosing which guy to get a ride home with from a concert.  She and Chris are now great friends, but he wasn't the one who gave her a ride and now she's dating his best friend.  Standing by on the sidelines is slowly killing Chris, but making a move would destroy someone else. How can something that feels so right be absolutely impossible?

Wretch by Eric LaRocca

Publication date: March 24, 2026

This nightmarish, haunting, tech-Gothic thrill ride explores sorrow, memory, and the unabashed complexity of love as a transgressive act.

After his husband dies, Simeon Link finds himself overcome by grief and seeking comfort in an unusual support group called The Wretches, who offer an addictive and dangerous source of relief. They introduce Simeon to a curious figure known as Porcelain Khaw—a man with the ability to let those who are grieving have one last intimate moment with their beloved...for a price.

Hallucinatory, fiendish, and destructively beautiful, Wretch transports us to a world where not everything is as it seems, and those we love may be the ones who haunt us most.