The best books of 2026 span continents, decades, and every shade of human experience - from the playful and warm to the devastating and political. These five titles are curated for readers who want literary fiction that rewards attention: books you think about after you finish them, and return to in conversation for months afterward.
| Book | Best For | Key Feature |
|---|---|---|
| Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow - Gabrielle Zevin | Emotional depth | Creative friendship across decades |
| The Covenant of Water - Abraham Verghese | Epic family sagas | 700-page generational masterwork |
| Wellness - Nathan Hill | Marriage & contemporary life | Sweeping portrait of a modern couple |
| All Fours - Miranda July | Bold contemporary fiction | Radical midlife reinvention |
| Kairos - Jenny Erpenbeck | International literary fiction | 2024 International Booker Prize winner |
Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin
Gabrielle Zevin’s Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow is the rare novel that has something for everyone while feeling entirely specific and original. It follows two friends - Sam and Sadie - who build a video game company together from the late 1980s to the 2010s, tracing the evolution of their creative partnership alongside questions of love, ambition, failure, and identity. Zevin’s prose is warm and intelligent, and the novel manages to be both propulsive and emotionally devastating.
Pros:
- Accessible and gripping with deep emotional resonance
- Beautifully explores creativity, partnership, and ambition
- Works equally well for readers with no interest in video games
Cons:
- Some pacing unevenness in the middle section
- The non-romantic central relationship may frustrate readers expecting a love story
The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese
Abraham Verghese’s The Covenant of Water is a 700-page generational saga following a South Indian family in Kerala across nearly a century, from 1900 to 1977. A physician by training, Verghese brings both medical precision and lyrical warmth to his storytelling, exploring how a mysterious condition passes through generations alongside India’s own transformation. It’s a rich, humane novel that demands patience and rewards it with one of the most complete fictional worlds in recent literary fiction.
Pros:
- Extraordinarily rich in character, history, and place
- Verghese’s medical knowledge adds genuine depth to the narrative
- Sweeping yet intimate - the family feels completely real
Cons:
- Long at 700 pages - a true commitment of reading time
- Slow build in the early sections before the multigenerational scope opens up
Wellness by Nathan Hill
Nathan Hill’s follow-up to The Nix is a big, sprawling novel about a marriage, a neighborhood, and the contemporary American obsession with self-improvement. It follows Jack and Elizabeth - artists turned middle-class Chicago parents - as their marriage strains under the pressure of gentrification, social media, wellness culture, and the unfinished business of their pasts. Hill writes with humor and real insight about what it means to be a couple navigating modern life’s demands.
Pros:
- Sharply observed satire of wellness culture and modern marriage
- Warm, funny writing with fully realized characters
- Ambitious in scope - tackles many contemporary themes with intelligence
Cons:
- Very long - over 600 pages, and the satire can feel repetitive at points
- Some readers find the midlife-crisis subject matter more relatable than universal
All Fours by Miranda July
Miranda July’s All Fours is the most provocative and divisive novel on this list - and one of the most memorable. It follows a woman in her mid-forties who sets off on a road trip from Los Angeles to New York but impulsively stops 30 minutes from home, renting a motel room and gradually reinventing her life from within it. July’s writing is strange, funny, frank, and relentlessly focused on female desire and the terror of aging - a genuinely original voice doing something no other novelist is doing.
Pros:
- Utterly original voice - unlike anything else in contemporary fiction
- Funny, frank, and uncompromising about midlife female experience
- Short and completely absorbing - hard to put down once started
Cons:
- Divisive - the frank exploration of sexuality and desire is not for all readers
- The premise’s strangeness may feel off-putting before the novel’s logic clicks
Kairos by Jenny Erpenbeck
Kairos won the 2024 International Booker Prize for good reason - it’s a masterwork of precise, emotionally devastating prose. Jenny Erpenbeck’s novel, translated from German by Michael Hofmann, follows an affair between a young woman and an older man set against the final years of East Germany. The relationship becomes a lens through which Erpenbeck examines loyalty, power, ideology, and what it means when the world you know collapses entirely around you. It is not an easy read, but it is an essential one.
Pros:
- 2024 International Booker Prize winner - exceptional critical recognition
- Precise, devastating prose with no wasted words
- Connects personal and political history in a way that feels permanent
Cons:
- Difficult subject matter - the central relationship involves power imbalance and emotional abuse
- Translated fiction - some nuance requires trust in the translator’s choices
What to Look For
- Length vs. reading pace - both The Covenant of Water and Wellness are 600-700 pages; plan reading time before committing, or start with the shorter All Fours or Kairos.
- Tone and subject matter - this list ranges from warm and accessible (Tomorrow, and Tomorrow) to challenging and political (Kairos); match to your current reading appetite.
- Hardcover vs. paperback - several of these are now in paperback for making them excellent gift options at a lower price than their original hardcover releases.
- Award recognition - Kairos won the Booker International; James (from the companion article) won the Pulitzer - both are reliable signals of exceptional literary quality.
Final Thoughts
These five books represent some of the most ambitious and rewarding literary fiction available in 2026. If you’re choosing a starting point, Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow is the most immediately accessible and emotionally generous. If you want the most critically significant read, Kairos by Jenny Erpenbeck is the International Booker winner and genuinely deserves its prize.
Frequently asked questions
Is Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow suitable for readers who don't play video games?+
Absolutely. While video game development is central to the story, Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow is ultimately about creative partnership, friendship, ambition, and loss. Gabrielle Zevin's writing is warm and accessible, and readers with no gaming background consistently report that it's one of the most emotionally engaging novels they've read in years.
How long is The Covenant of Water by Abraham Verghese?+
The Covenant of Water is a substantial novel - around 700 pages - spanning four generations of a South Indian family across nearly a century. The length is well-earned: Verghese, a physician and author of Cutting for Stone, fills every page with rich character and medical detail. Most readers find it absorbing rather than daunting once they're invested in the family.
What is Kairos by Jenny Erpenbeck about, and why did it win the Booker Prize?+
Kairos is a love story set in East Berlin during the fall of the Soviet Union, following a young woman and an older man across a turbulent relationship that mirrors Germany's own political upheaval. It won the 2024 International Booker Prize for its precise, devastating prose - Jenny Erpenbeck and translator Michael Hofmann were praised for rendering complex emotional and political history in unforgettable language.