The 10 Most Popular Books on Book Riot in October 2024

James is a Book Riot favorite, so it’s no surprise to find it here! This was named as one of the best books of the year by Publishers Weekly and Barnes & Noble. As more year-end lists come out, expect to see this title again! This month, it also won the Kirkus Prize, was longlisted for the Andrew Carnegie Medals, and was shortlisted for the National Book Award. It’s also a finalist for Barnes & Noble’s Book of the Year.

Erica Ezeifedi recommends this as one of the biggest book club books of the fall as well as one of the best books out in October: “discussing the reality of Blackness in America can be depressing, but Coates does it so well. At the risk of sounding clichéd, his latest is timely. It’s a collection of essays that explores how the stories we construct distort reality. He travels to Senegal, South Carolina, and Palestine, contending with myth and reality in each place.”

This one is a surprise. The only times it’s been mentioned Book Riot were last month’s most popular books on the site and as a bullet point in the post The Spiciest Books on BookTok in 2024, According to Readers, which was posted in June. That article didn’t get a big spike in traffic in September or October, so I’m not sure why it’s getting a lot of clicks. This was the #1 book on that list of spiciest books on BookTok, and it’s a mafia romance.

Sally Rooney is one of the biggest names writing today, so of course her newest has gotten attention on Book Riot. It’s a finalist for Barnes & Noble’s Book of the Year and a bestselling book of the week. The reviews have been rolling in from all over the book world, as a Check Your Shelf link round-up pointed out.

The paperback release of Fourth Wing in September put it back on the bestseller lists, and was also one of the 10 Most Popular Books on Book Riot in September 2024. It has also been on all the Most Read Books on Goodreads This Week round-ups. Book three in the series, Onyx Storm, comes out in January, and it’s one of the Most Anticipated Romance Novels of 2025.

This is another book that’s a staple on the Most Read Books on Goodreads This Week round-ups as well as the bestseller lists. It’s also a finalist for Barnes & Noble’s Book of the Year. Erica Ezeifedi recommends it as a great book club pick: “In the ’60s, a young nursing student, Frankie, comes of age. When her brother is deployed to Vietnam, she joins the Army Nurse Corps, thinking of herself as serving her country. But the reality of war sets in, and she finds her friends and herself broken. What’s more, her return to the U.S. and normalcy is anything but—the country is divided on its involvement in Vietnam, making her and other women’s sacrifices that much easier to forget.”

Most of the clicks for this one come from the Most Read Books on Goodreads This Week round-ups, though Jamie Canavés also shared some news this month about the upcoming adaptation. Mikkaka Overstreet recommends this as a pageturner you won’t be able to put down: “A woman becomes a housemaid for a rich family. She finds that the wife is a cruel, the husband is downtrodden, and the kid is a pawn. But here’s the twist: the housemaid has a dark secret that her suburban antagonist doesn’t know about. Who should you root for? Who can be trusted? Readers won’t know until the very last page.”