We’re embarking on a new year of books, inevitably packed with buzzy new releases, surprising publishing news, and readerly fads that will get everyone talking. Here at Book Riot, we can’t help but peek at the tea leaves and guess at what the biggest book trends will be in the coming year. I asked my colleagues at Book Riot and some other folks in the publishing and bookselling world for their book trend predictions for 2025, including what kinds of books will hit bestseller lists, shifts in popular genres, and publishing moves that might impact what we see on the shelves.
An important reminder: Most of the books that will be published in 2025 have been in the works for multiple years. Traditional publishing moves slowly and isn’t typically nimble enough to respond to trends in real-time. That’s why we often see self-published books paving the way for the biggest trends in the reading world. Big marketing budgets and publicity campaigns for traditionally published books can obviously make an impact on what titles readers hear about. But with an increasing number of folks relying on book recommendations from influencers on BookTok, BookTube, and Bookstagram, trends in recent years have sprung up more organically, making them harder and harder to forecast.
Last year, Book Riot contributor Arvyn Cerézo made five predictions for the biggest book trends of 2024. Arvyn had their eye on romance sub-genres like romantasy and speculative romance, which bore out in early 2024, as Rebecca Yarros’ Empyrean series continued to dominate bestseller lists. On the opposite side of trends, Arvyn suggested young adult book sales would continue to decrease. The years of dystopian series like The Hunger Games dominating bestseller lists seem to be behind us, especially as the YA segment of publishing continues to grapple with how to reach both its intended audience (young adults) and the readers who most frequently purchase YA books (adults).
Arvyn also foresaw a year full of conversations about books and artificial intelligence, and we indeed spent much of 2024 debating the usefulness and ethics of generative AI in the publishing industry. I believe those conversations are far from over, and AI will continue to be a hot topic in the book world for years to come. Let’s see what else we expect to dominate bookish conversations in 2025.
Cozy & Escapist Fiction
One of Arvyn Cerézo’s biggest predictions for 2024 was a steady uptick in cozy and escapist fiction. Cozy mysteries have long had a faithful following, and during the COVID pandemic, many readers turned to the genre for comfort during a stressful time. This trend spread into the cozy-ifying of other genres, like cozy fantasy, cozy sci-fi, and even cozy horror. Almost everyone I spoke to for this article agreed that we haven’t seen the cozy trend peak yet. With expected turbulence in politics on the national and international level, even more readers are likely to dip their toes in the cozy waters of books like the 2022 hit Legends and Lattes by Travis Baldree.
Fun fantasy, sci-fi, historical fiction, and other genres with escapist themes are also expected to make a splash. Frontlist and backlist genre fiction titles dominated bestseller lists in 2024, as well as romance books. Stories that promise a little joy, a good laugh, and a happy ending are likely to be big with readers in 2025. Christine Bollow, director of programs at Loyalty Bookstore and a juror of the 2024 Kirkus Prize for Fiction, suggested that we’ll see an uptick in popular witchy books following the success of the Wicked movie and Marvel series Agatha All Along in 2024.
Dark Near-Future Dystopias & Horror
On the other end of the spectrum, readers looking for an escape from current events might look toward darker, more twisted fiction, like twisty horror and grim near-future dystopian books. As Bollow pointed out, “The world is shit, people are stressed, and they want to vent their frustrations through dark books.” Multiple book professionals I spoke with suggested a return to vampire books, especially in dark fantasy and horror, like V.E. Schwab’s upcoming novel Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil.
Hannah Oliver Depp, co-owner of Loyalty Bookstore, agrees that readers will be looking for darker, more thrilling books in 2024. “The most requested thing I’m hearing from readers right now is for books about women’s revenge and angry women behaving badly,” Oliver Depp said. “I keep hearing, ‘I want to read books about women wreaking havoc.’” With consistent attacks on women’s and AFAB people’s bodily autonomy in the political arena, and with the recent release of the film adaptation of Rachel Yoder’s Nightbitch starring Amy Adams, similar books about women’s rage may get a boost.
Funny & Hopeful Stories
We could all use a laugh, and that need for release could lead to an interest in humorous books. Absurdist and laugh-out-loud funny books like Kimberly Lemming’s upcoming paranormal romance I Got Abducted by Aliens and Now I’m Trapped in a Rom-Com have been on the rise, and they’re poised to hit the mainstream. In nonfiction, the books that make the biggest waves are likely to have a good sense of humor or a hopeful, inspiring message.
Funny books face an even bigger opportunity for children’s literature, as more and more research shows a rapid decline in how many of today’s kids read for pleasure. Amy Andrews, children’s book buyer at East City Bookshop, said that kids are currently drawn to funny books across age ranges, from picture books like X. Fang’s We Are Definitely Human to middle grade titles. Capturing kids’ imagination with humor could be the key to re-engaging them in reading by choice.
Multiple big publishing houses who made loud commitments to addressing their own roles in systemic racism in 2020 have now laid off the leaders selected to do that important work.
Renewed Interest in Classics
I’ve noticed in conversations with readers as an author, bookseller, and bibliologist for Tailored Book Recommendations that more readers are looking to explore classics, both those they read in school and authors they’ve never previously explored. Noah Grey Rosenzweig, a writer and literary agent at Triangle House Literary, also thinks 2025 could be a big year for classics, especially for younger generations looking to go further than their high school reading assignments.
“No idea is brand new, and the excitement about adaptations and retellings that have swept 2024 leads me to think (and hope) that readers will want to return to the source of these texts in a meaningful way,” Rosenzweig said, referencing authors like Willa Cather, Kate Chopin, Gabriel García Márquez, Oscar Wilde, and Leo Tolstoy. “So much literature is out there waiting to be rediscovered decades and centuries after having been written.”
As today’s political climate continues to highlight the cyclical nature of our world, more readers might find themselves interested in classic books that feel especially relevant, like Octavia Butler’s The Parable of the Sower, a 1993 dystopian novel set in 2024 that saw a notable uptick in sales last year.
One of the biggest shifts we’ve seen in the book industry in recent years has been in the massive success of self-published books.
A Decrease in Diversity
In 2024, even before the November election, professionals in the book world started ringing alarm bells about a decrease in diversity, equity, and inclusion initiatives at publishers. Multiple big publishing houses that made loud commitments to addressing their own roles in systemic racism in 2020 have now laid off the leaders selected to do that important work. And much of the growth we’ve seen in diversity on bestseller lists and big-budget marketing campaigns in recent years has shrunk, making many of the most prominent “Best of 2024” book lists and annual bestseller lists overwhelmingly white and straight.
Several of the folks with whom I discussed upcoming trends shared concerns about publishing continuing to shy away from DEI work and giving fewer resources to books by marginalized authors in 2025. As DEI programs are defunded and pushed to the back burner, I unfortunately expect that decision to be reflected in the books that get the most publicity.
On the other hand, with a new administration in DC, some readers may make a renewed commitment to antiracist reading. But bookseller Hannah Oliver Depp predicts that the most popular titles will be backlist books—primarily the same books that gained in popularity in 2020, were added to “to be read” lists, and never actually picked up by readers. Oliver Depp pointed to the recent success of Isabel Wilkerson’s Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents, originally published in 2020, which became a surprising bestseller at Loyalty Bookstore in the final two months of 2024.
Self-Pub to Trad-Pub Pipeline
One of the biggest shifts we’ve seen in the book industry in recent years has been in the massive success of self-published books, partially driven by word-of-mouth recommendations from readers on social media platforms like TikTok. And as we’ve seen these self-published books by authors like Colleen Hoover, Kennedy Ryan, and Travis Baldree rocket to the top of bestseller lists, we’ve also seen traditional publishers scooping up rights to those books and republishing them under their imprints.
“I think we’re going to continue to see big publishers re-publishing indie books that have caught a major following, usually on social media,” said Book Riot Contributing Editor Trisha Brown. “And I think we’re going to see the impact that has on other authors having an even harder time finding a way in to mainstream publishing.” Other book professionals agreed, suggesting that as the big publishing houses reduce risks and look for safe bets, they’ll focus more resources on acquiring self-published books with a proven following.
On a related note, publishers have increasingly utilized things like limited-release special editions with sprayed edges, foil-printed titles, and/or alternate covers as a way to draw in readers who may have already read and loved books being republished. The success of these special features has spread beyond re-released books and has become a new way to convince readers to purchase physical copies of books instead of less expensive digital copies, and we expect their popularity to continue.
That brings us to the end of Book Riot’s biggest book trend predictions for 2025! Are we correct? Only time will tell. And until our next set of annual predictions, we’ll keep you updated on interesting updates in the world of books.