This content contains affiliate links. When you buy through these links, we may earn an affiliate commission.
Can you guess what the top five most-read books were on Goodreads last month? If you follow this series week to week, there won’t be any surprises. Last week, Sunrise on the Reaping by Suzanne Collins dropped out of the top five, but it’s still #5 when looking at the entire month.
Speaking of last week, I noticed that the entire 50-title list of the most read books on Goodreads that week was white. Unfortunately, that’s also true of all 50 books on the list for July. Sarah J. Maas has seven titles on it. Freida McFadden has nine. And not one author of color has any title represented, at least as far as I can see.
It’s tempting to point the blame at Goodreads or publishers, but while they play a part, this is a reader problem. More than ten years after the founding of We Need Diverse Books, the bestseller and most-read lists look just as homogenous. It feels like we’ve done a lot of backsliding—not surprising, looking at the current political climate.
So, go beyond the top five or the bestseller lists this month. There are so many incredible books being published every week by authors of color. If you’re looking for recommendations, sign up for the In Reading Color newsletter. Because I assure you: the most-read books on Goodreads are not the best books out there.
Three New Books Out This Week You Should Know About
Here are a few new books that came out in July that deserve wider readership.
Book Deals
Sign up for our Book Deals newsletter and get up to 80% off books you actually want to read.
A Witch’s Guide to Magical Innkeeping by Sangu Mandanna
Once-powerful witch Sera Swan lost her magic abilities and was thrown out of her Guild after she resurrected her great-aunt Jasmine. Now she runs an inn with her no-longer-dead great-aunt and a talking fox, while also searching for a way to restore her powers. And then the answer arrives on their doorstep: guest Luke Larsen, a curmudgeonly historian who knows the spell for restoring magic. But Sera will have to convince him to help her and keep it hidden from the Guild if she wants to be witchy once more. —Liberty Hardy
Love Is a War Song by Danica Nava
After the success The Truth According to Ember, fans have been eager to read Danica Nava’s next romance. And now you can! Pop star Avery Fox caused a stir posing for a Rolling Stone cover wearing a feather warbonnet. She is Muscogee, but has been ridiculed by the public, so she’s staying with her estranged grandmother on a ranch for a while. There, she meets Lucas Iron Eyes. The two strike up a deal where she helps fundraise for the ranch in exchange for more insight into her and Lucas’s shared heritage and culture. If you liked that Nava allowed her characters to be messy in her debut, you’ll love this book, too. —Isabelle Popp
The Library at Hellebore by Cassandra Khaw
Alessa is forced to attend the Hellebore Technical Institute for the Gifted. Most of her fellow students, who are divided into Anti-Christs (world-eaters) and Ragnaroks (apocalypse-starters), were also forced in. They’re promised that the school is their best chance of survival. Except that on graduation day, the faculty starts feasting on students… which puts the surviving thing into question. Khaw’s Nothing but Blackened Teeth and The Salt Grows Heavy were both knock-out novellas, and I can’t wait to see what bloody, monstrous, dreadful things they bring to the world of dark academia. —Liberty Hardy
#5:
Sunrise on the Reaping by Suzanne Collins
The Hunger Games series is still just as relevant (if not more so) than it was when it started more than 15 years ago. Collins’s latest, which tells Haymitch Abernathy’s story, also sold 1.5 million copies in English in its first week. It was read by 74,000 users in July and has a 4.5 average rating.
#4:
The Tenant by Freida McFadden
McFadden has been a familiar name in this feature ever since The Housemaid exploded onto the bestseller lists. In her newest thriller, Blake and his fiancée rent out a room in their house to a new tenant. Soon, strange things start happening around the house, and the neighbors begin treating them differently. This one was read by almost 78,000 Goodreads users in July, and it has a 3.9 average rating.
#3:
One Golden Summer by Carley Fortune
Romance readers love a seasonal read, and this looks like it’s the summer romance of the year! It follows Alice, who spent a perfect summer at her Nan’s cottage when she was 17. Now an adult, she returns to take care of her injured Nan—only to run into the guy who she crushed on as a teen. But is this a summer fling or something more? This one was read by 87,000 users last month and has a 4.4 average rating.
#2:
Great Big Beautiful Life by Emily Henry
Emily Henry is a staple author on the bestseller lists and the Goodreads most read list, so it’s no surprise to see her newest title here. It follows two writers competing to write the official biography of a reclusive heiress. It was read by 93,000 users in July and has a 4.0 average rating.
#1:
Atmosphere by Taylor Jenkins Reid
Taylor Jenkins Reid is best known for The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo and Daisy Jones & The Six. Now, she’s back with a new novel about two women astronauts in the 1980s. It came out June 3rd and became an instant #1 New York Times bestseller. It’s also a Good Morning America Book Club Pick. Almost 118,000 Goodreads users marked it read last month, and it has a 4.4 average rating.
If you’re looking for more buzzy books, check out The Bestselling Books of the Week, According to All the Lists.
Find more news and stories of interest from the book world in Breaking in Books.
