"I've read over 100 novels this year as a literary editor and these are my best books of the year (so far)"

We're more halfway through the year now and list of best books of the year grows ever longer, as there has been such a bounty of good writing in 2026. From dazzling debuts like the heartbreaking second world war drama Shock Of The Light to a new novel from Elizabeth Strout that is pure perfection in its representation of the emotional complexities of every day life, here are my picks.

Need some help choosing what to read next? Below, discover Good Housekeeping's pick of the best books of 2026 (so far).

Family Drama by Rebecca Fallon

Susan Bliss is a woman torn between two identities: in New England she’s a mum of young twins with a quiet life, in LA she’s a soap star with a big fan base. After her death, her husband chooses not to tell the children about their mother’s fame and as they grow up they both search to know her better. An intimate and vivid story about motherhood and identity.

May We Feed The King by Rebecca Perry

This wildly original historical novel kept me glued to the page with its vivid writing and rich detail. It begins with the story of a curator hired to create scenes in a former palace before continuing through the eyes of the king she has been asked to summon.

The Shock Of The Light by Lori Inglis Hall

I’m not usually much of a weeper when it comes to books, but The Shock Of The Light, Lori Inglis Hall’s emotionally charged Second World War-set novel, really got to me and left me in pieces. Twins Tessa and Theo are incredibly close growing up, until Tessa leaves to study at the Sorbonne in Paris rather than go with her brother to Cambridge as they’d previously agreed. The gap widens when they both join the war effort, with Theo signing up as an RAF pilot while Tessa is recruited to work undercover in France. Then, when the war ends, only Theo comes home.

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Nonesuch by Francis Spufford

Another Second World War novel but something completely different this time. Spufford, whose debut Golden Hill won the Costa First Novel Award, has spun a mesmerising fantasy novel that bends time and reality, yet remains deeply anchored in human emotion.

A Far-flung Life by ML Stedman

This is an epic story about familial loyalty, resilience and forgiving yourself for the mistakes of your past, and it’s one that really stays with you. Stedman mixes big emotions with beautiful writing to intoxicating effect. There are many gorgeous passages that are best read slowly, so the words can seep into you. I’ve already passed A Far-Flung Life on to several people – and I’m sure they won’t be the last.

California Gold by Jodie Chapman

I think this is Chapman’s best book yet. In 70s California, Chrissy picks up British hitchhiker Frank, and the two fall in love. Back in the UK, they build their dream home, inspired by the House of Tomorrow in Palm Springs, but their happiness ends abruptly – with devastating effects for their daughter.

Upward Bound by Woody Brown

Upward Bound is a daycare centre for autistic adults – some non-verbal – in southern California, and their experiences, along with the staff who work with them, are told here through a series of connected short stories. It’s a moving, illuminating glimpse into a world and perspective we rarely have access to.

The Wreck by Lizzy Stewart

This graphic novel is a provocative exploration of class, friendship and marriage. Fortysomething couple Fran and Adrian invite Fran’s best friend and her partner to share their countryside house to create a utopian community. For the first summer, it’s idyllic, but it doesn’t take long for old tensions to reappear.

The Calamity Club by Kathryn Stockett

Like Stockett's debut The Help, this new novel is set in the Deep South – this time in 1930s Oxford, Mississippi. Meg, an 11-year-old girl, has been left at Lafayette County Orphan Asylum. As a ‘big girl’, she’s unlikely to be adopted, a fact she’s told frequently by the house’s cruel director, Miss Garnett. Birdie has come to Oxford to beg for a loan from her sister, who’s married well, and when she volunteers at the orphanage, she and Meg form a friendship.

This chunky book is a big commitment, but it’s such a joy to immerse yourself in this world that the pages fly by. Whether you’re one of the millions of fans of The Help or not, this is a really special book that’s been well worth the wait.

People In Love by Claire Daverley

When her teenage best friend, Bren, turns up unannounced at Nora’s engagement party, it stirs up all sorts of emotions in her – mostly anger that he ran away 12 years ago and hasn’t been home since. I was a huge fan of Daverley’s debut, Talking At Night, and this has the same emotional intimacy and depth.

Whistler by Ann Patchett

In this touching novel, the always-wonderful Patchett turns her attention to father-daughter relationships. After a chance encounter brings Daphne back into contact with her stepfather, Eddie, she starts looking for answers to questions from her childhood that she’s never allowed herself to think about.

The Children by Melissa Albert

Books about the publishing world are everywhere now (I’m particularly looking forward to Sophie, Standing There by Meg Mason and Peck & Peck by Bonnie Garmus), but Melissa Albert’s dark literary fantasy about the children of a famous author is a standout.

In The Children, Guinevere and Ennis Sharpe have two childhoods: in one, they grow up in semi-feral conditions in a Vermont farmhouse, free to roam and adventure, with parents who are neglectful at best and abusive at worst. In the other, they’re captured in the pages of the bestsellers written by their mother, Edith, where magic is real and they’re protected from harm.

Contrapposto by Dave Eggers

Over his 26-year career (which began with the memoir A Heartbreaking Work Of Staggering Genius – a must-read if you haven’t already) Dave Eggers’ books have covered an eclectic mix of subjects, from the deeply personal to dystopian tech satires and real-life human rights stories. His latest novel, Contrapposto, is more of a character study – and a deeply satisfying one. It’s the story of Robert ‘Cricket’ Dibb, who’s raised in a dysfunctional home in Indiana by an uninterested mother and her abusive boyfriend. His only escape is drawing, encouraged by his grandfather, Silas. Also on his side is friend Olympia Argyros, who becomes a lifelong companion and champion.

This is a big-hearted, funny novel about friendship and art – more intimate than his usual style, but with the rich characterisation and commentary Eggers is known for. A pleasure to get lost in and a hard one to forget.

Everything Was Beautiful And Nothing Hurt by Ben Reeves

Death is the narrator of this sublime story. Travis (aka Death) lives in a small town with his cat, where his role is to be with people at the end of their lives, shepherding them onwards but never intervening… until he meets a neighbour called Dalia and her eight-year-old daughter.

The Things We Never Say by Elizabeth Strout

Strout can do no wrong in my eyes and this new standalone novel, the first in over a decade, is an exquisite exploration of what makes a life well-lived. Much-loved high-school history teacher Artie has all the markings of happiness - a loving marriage, a good job, a close family - yet he feels an overriding desire to end his life. It's only when he finds out a huge secret that has been kept from him for years, that he rethinks everything.

Where Are The Kings? by Donal Ryan

Ryan has a talent for creating characters that readers care deeply about and 12-year-old Jack, whose mum has just died, got my whole heart. When his dad can’t look after him, Jack goes to live with his grandparents, uncles and an aunt in their noisy, chaotic home. Jack is smart, funny and heartbreakingly sad, but also unreliable and flawed. His loneliness and grief are so well written and his confusion shows in the slightly hallucinatory sentences Ryan writes.

The grief comes in jumps and starts (as anyone who’s lost a loved one knows), as Jack struggles to understand who he is now, without his mum. Told with warmth and heart, this slim but emotionally deep novel is touching and one you can’t help but be moved by.

Under Story by Chloe Benjamin

After a family tragedy, brilliant scientist Laurel Salter runs away to the most isolated place she can think of: a research base on Antarctica. There, she washes dishes and gets to know her co-workers, building a new life for herself in the narrow, rather claustrophobic confines of the McMurdo Station.

She’s heard rumours about the Arc, a mysterious light that appears above the base, but when she sees it, it blows her mind. No one knows what the Arc is or what it means, but news travels and the visual phenomenon starts to draw in physicists from around the world, including Laurel’s ex-husband, Eli.

Here, the story takes a mind-bending turn, as Laurel begins to explore the idea of a duoverse, an alternative universe created at the time of the Big Bang where time moves backwards. To her, it offers the chance to heal old wounds and perhaps even save a life. Can she persuade Eli to risk it all and rewrite the past?

Although the premise of an anti-universe is pure sci-fi, the emotions are deeply human. This exploration of grief, time and connectivity expanded my mind in the very best way and I know I’ll be thinking about it for a long time.

Switzy by Emma Cline

This quietly beautiful novel charts the last days of David, a wealthy businessman, on his way to Switzerland to end his own life. It’s not always an easy read, but it’s funny, relatable and poignant, as David thinks about his life, how he’s got so many of his priorities wrong and his urge now for connection.

Partita by Barbara Kingsolver

After winning both the Women’s Prize for Fiction and Pulitzer Prize for Fiction with Demon Copperhead, Barbara Kingsolver returns with another triumphant novel set in the same Appalachian landscape. Partita is the story of Livia Cable, a piano teacher living on a small Tennessee dairy farm near to where she grew up. One day, she receives a call from a man she hasn’t seen in 20 years and it tips her quiet life off-balance. He wants to see her and gives her a week to decide.

Partita is a quieter, less hard-hitting novel than Demon Copperhead but no less emotional. When Livia’s dream of being a concert pianist is cut short, we feel her devastating loss. The way Kingsolver describes how Livia has to find a way to go on when the future she’d worked for is no longer possible will be deeply relatable to many readers. What the novel lacks in electricity, it makes up for in intimacy and reflection. Truly, this is a stunning story about love, ambition, loss and the enduring importance of art. Like Demon Copperhead, it deserves to win all the awards.