The best books of 2022

It’s estimated that over 2 million books are published each year. That would mean that over 5,000 books are published every day. That’s 208 books per hour! By the time you’re done reading this, 15 more books will be born. Please... nobody check that math. Reading is my thing, not numbers.

Obviously, no one can read all of those books, although that does sound like a pretty enviable job. So as subjective as it may be, it’s still fun to take a look at 100 of the most raved about books from the past year, according to the sources we’ve compiled, which include The New York Times, Library Journal, School Library Journal, Shelf Awareness, Amazon Editors' Top 100 and Publishers Weekly. We aimed to include a diverse range of titles and to highlight the books that were included multiple times on these "Best of" lists.

From a boy who inherits the keys to a parallel world to a transformative understanding of wasps, there was a lot of variety in the books published this year.” Take a look at some of the very best in fiction and nonfiction from 2022, and then borrow from your public library through the Libby reading app:

FICTION

COMICS & GRAPHIC BOOKS

• Talk to My Back by Yamada Murasaki

HISTORICAL FICTION

• The Daughter of Doctor Moreau by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
• Four Treasures of the Sky by Jenny Tinghui Zhang
• The Ghetto Within by Santiago H. Amigorena
• A Lady for a Duke by Alexis Hall
• Miss del Río by Bárbara Mujica
• Trust by Hernan Diaz
• The Wild Hunt by Emma Seckel

HORROR/SUSPENSE/THRILLER

• Anywhere You Run by Wanda M. Morris
• Blood Sugar by Sascha Rothchild
• Fairy Tale by Stephen King
• Geiger by Gustaf Skördeman
• The Hacienda by Isabel Cañas
• Killers of a Certain Age by Deanna Raybourn
• Manhunt by Gretchen Felker-Martin
• The Passenger by Cormac McCarthy

HUMOR

• Delilah Green Doesn’t Care by Ashley Herring Blake
• Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus

LITERATURE

• Black Cake by Charmaine Wilkerson
• The Candy House by Jennifer Egan
• Checkout 19 by Claire-Louise Bennett
• Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingsolver
• The Furrows by Namwali Serpell
• My Government Means to Kill Me by Rasheed Newson
• Joan is Okay by Weike Wang
• Nightcrawling by Leila Mottley
• Now is Not the Time to Panic by Kevin Wilson
• Olga Dies Dreaming by Xochitl Gonzalez
• Our Missing Hearts by Celeste Ng
• Pure Color by Sheila Heti
• The Rabbit Hutch by Tess Gunty
• Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt
• The Return of Faraz Ali by Aamina Ahmad
• The School for Good Mothers by Jessamine Chan
• True Biz by Sara Novic
• We Are the Light by Matthew Quick
• Young Mungo by Douglas Stuart

MYSTERY

• The Bangalore Detectives Club by Harini Nagendra
• Jackal by Erin E. Adams
• The Maid by Nita Prose
• The Woman in the Library by Sulari Gentill
• A World of Curiosities by Louise Penny

ROMANCE

• By the Book by Jasmine Guillory
• Before I Let You Go by Kennedy Ryan
• The Dead Romantics by Ashley Poston
• Part of Your World by Abby Jimenez
• Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin
• Thank You for Listening by Julia Whelan
• You Made a Fool of Death with Your Beauty by Akwaeke Emezi

SCIENCE FICTION & FANTASY

• Daughter of the Moon Goddess by Sue Lynn Tan
• How High We Go in the Dark by Sequoia Nagamatsu
• The Immortal King Rao by Vauhini Vara
• Scattered All Over the Earth by Yoko Tawada
• Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel
• The Spare Man by Mary Robinette Kowal
• Spear by Nicola Griffith
• The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna
• When Women Were Dragons by Kelly Barnhill

SHORT STORIES & POETRY

• If I Survive You by Jonathan Escoffery
• Lesser Known Monsters of the 21st Century by Kim Fu
• Liberation Day by George Saunders
• Night of the Living Rez by Morgan Talty
• Nobody Gets Out Alive by Leigh Newman
• The Study of Human Life by Joshua Bennett
• Time is a Mother by Ocean Vuong

NONFICTION

BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY

• Black Folk Could Fly by Randall Kenan
• Ducks by Kate Wheaton
• His Name is George Floyd by Robert Samuels
• I’m Glad My Mom Died by Jennette McCurdy
• In Love by Amy Bloom
• Inciting Joy by Ross Gay
• Shy by Mary Rodgers
• Stay True by Hua Hsu
• Solito by Javier Zamora
• South to America by Imani Perry
• What My Bones Know by Stephanie Foo
• When They Tell You to Be Good by Prince Shakur

COOKING & FOOD

• Bagels, Schmears, and a Nice Piece of Fish by Cathy Barrow
• Mi Cocina by Rick Martínez

HISTORY

• The Divorce Colony by April White
• Index, a History of the by Dennis Duncan
• Indigenous Continent by Pekka Hämäläinen

SCIENCE & NATURE

• Endless Forms: the Secret World of Wasps by Seirian Sumner
• An Immense World by Ed Yong
• Into the Great Emptiness by David Roberts

SOCIOLOGY

• Stolen Focus by Johann Hari
• The Trayvon Generation by Elizabeth Alexander

YOUNGER READERS

JUVENILE

• Choosing Brave by Angela Joy
• The Door of No Return by Kwame Alexander
• In the Key of Us by Mariama J. Lockington
• Kapaemahu by Hinaleimoana Wong-Kalu
• Magnolia Flower by Zora Neale Hurston
• Powwow Day by Traci Sorell
• Pride by Stella Caldwell

YOUNG ADULT

• African Town by Charles Waters
• Family of Liars by E. Lockhart
• The Honeys by Ryan La Sala
• I Kissed Shara Wheeler by Casey McQuiston
• Improbable Magic for Cynical Witches by Kate Scelsa
• Our Crooked Hearts by Melissa Albert

Check out the entire list here and borrow and read in the Libby app.