In mid-November, I shared a post with my thoughts on the opening round of the Goodreads Choice Awards. And now, the results are in — so let’s take a look, shall we?
Of the 15 winning books for 2025, I’ve read 8:
Fiction: My Friends by Fredrik Backman ❤
Historical Fiction: Atmosphere by Taylor Jenkins Reid ❤
Romance: Great Big Beautiful Life by Emily Henry ❤
Fantasy: Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil by V. E. Schwab ❤
Science Fiction: The Compound by Aisling Rawle
Horror: Witchcraft for Wayward Girls by Grady Hendrix ❤
Young Adult Fantasy & Sci-fi: Sunrise on the Reaping by Suzanne Collins
Nonfiction: Everything Is Tuberculosis by John Green
Of the remaining fiction books, none were actually on my radar to read… mainly because they’re in genres I don’t gravitate toward. As for the two other nonfiction books, I’d simply never come across them before. Now that I’m seeing the History & Biography winner, How to Kill a Witch, I’m intrigued! That’s one I’ll be looking for at my library in 2026.
Even though in many categories I voted for books that didn’t end up winning, I’m a fan of the ones that did win! Although I still question whether The Compound really belongs in the sci-fi category.
Without going back to confirm, my impression is that I’ve read more of the winning books this year than I did in the last few previous years — which doesn’t particularly mean anything, other than that I appeared to have read a bunch of popular books in 2025.
And actually, several of these are likely to make my list of favorites for this past year! I’ve put a little heart next to the books I especially loved. ❤
I do still miss the old approach for these awards, which included more categories/genres, another round of voting (if I recall correctly), and the much loved and lamented option to write-in nominees.
So… how are you all feeling about this year’s batch of winners?
Bookshelf Fantasies 
I’ve read 3 of the ones you’ve highlighted and didn’t vote for any of them. Well, actually I did vote for Friends in round 2 because my first pick didn’t make it.
Many of my 1st round votes didn’t make it to round 2! But honestly, I’m not sure any books stand a chance against some of the powerhouse winners like Taylor Jenkins Reid or Emily Henry or the Fourth Wing series.
True!
Fun to see which ones you’ve read and loved. I haven’t read any of these. Though a few are on my TBR list for next year. 😀
Whichever they are, I hope you enjoy them!
I’m ashamed to say I haven’t read any of these.
Ha, no shame when it comes to reading! I’m sure you read plenty of great books that just didn’t happen to make it to this process.
I’ve only read a few of this year’s winners but I don’t think there are any big surprises this year, except maybe GBBL taking romance over Ali Hazelwood and Abby Jimenez given the mixed reception of that one!
Funny, I really loved GBBL, although I know it wasn’t everyone’s cup of tea — but I’ve also gotten tired of Ali Hazelwood and was disappointed by AJ’s last book, so maybe my tastes just don’t align with most of the genre fans!
I loved GBBL too! I just remember seeing so many people disappointed by it that I was surprised it won the popular vote.
Ive read 2 and have a further 2 on my tbr!!!
Nice! I hope you enjoy the 2 still to come!
I’ve only read the Grady Hendrix book, and I’m not surprised it won, but I voted for When the Wolf Comes Home, and author that isn’t that popular. Sigh, I guess it’s sort of a popularity contest.
Definitely a popularity contest! That’s why in a few categories, even though I enjoyed/loved the winning books, I’d voted for others that I figured needed more support 🙂
I’m not surprised by any of the winners in the genres I read, but I was surprised by how HUGE the margin was between the winner and the second place book in most cases!
Interesting — I didn’t look at the margins, but for at least some of these (I’d guess Onyx Storm), I’d bet they’re huge
IIRC, Onyx Storm had almost 300,000 votes and the next book had around 60,000.
You definitely did better than me! I’ve only read two so far, which I did enjoy (My Friends and Witchcraft For Wayward Girls). Five of the others are high on my TBR though, with 5 star predictions for at least two (Atmosphere and Bury Our Bones In The Midnight Soil).
Those were both 5 star reads for me!!