Matt's Books and Music

Yesterday I undertook the first half of my 2025 Bookish Superlatives. That post focused on questions of format, style, and readerly expectation. Today in Part 2, I’ll turn to genre and authors representing specific communities.

Genres

Best Romance

You & Me, by Tal Bauer (2022)

Coming in hot with an unexpected pick at the start, this story about two football dads who try to navigate fatherhood, their baggage from their previous relationships, and their burgeoning feelings for each other, was so much better than it needed to be.

Honourable mentions: Take Two (Danielle Hawkins, 2024); Great Big Beautiful Life (Emily Henry, 2025); The Shots You Take (Rachel Reid, 2025 🇨🇦); A Night to Surrender (Tessa Dare, 2011); The Last Guy on Earth (Sarina Bowen 2025)

Best Science Fiction / Speculative Fiction

Vanishing World, by Surata Murata (2015)

Science Fiction has grown to become one of my most reliable genres over the past few years. This year my favourite was Sayaka Murata’s Vanishing World, originally published in Japanese in 2015. While this is on the more speculative fiction side of things, it explores a society in which in vitro fertilization has become so widespread that sex between spouses, and eventually sex itself, becomes taboo. An absolutely fascinating and thought-provoking work.

Honourable mentions: Lock In (John Scalzi, 2014); Ender’s Game (Orson Scott Card, 1985); Murder by Memory (Olivia Waite, 2025); The Martian (Andy Weir, 2011)

Best Fantasy / Alternative History

Blood Over Bright Haven, by M.L. Wang (2024)

This genre has decreased in its importance in my reading life over the years, but when it hits, it really hits, and I definitely had some big wins this year. Chief among them was Blood over Bright Haven, a standalone novel about an eager young magician who comes to learn the dark secrets behind her city’s magic. It’s absolutely fantastic.

Honourable mentions: Fishing for the Little Pike (Juhani Karila, 2019); Isabella Nagg and the Pot of Basil (Oliver Darkshire, 2025); Wild Life (Amanda Leduc, 2025 🇨🇦); The Goblin Emperor (Katherine Addision, 2014)

Best Historical Fiction

The Remembered Soldier, by Anjet Daanje (2019)

A book that could only have been set when it was, it deals with the long shadow of the First World War for the residents of a Belgian town. This is a brilliant book that is all about the historical setting, so it’s the obvious choice here.

Honourable mentions: Seascraper (Benjamin Wood, 2025); In the Absence of Men (Philippe Besson, 2007); Wolf Hollow (Lauren Wolk, 2016)

Best Non-Fiction (excluding Memoir)

Between Two Rivers, by Moudhy Al-Rashid (2025)

My non-fiction reading tends to ebb and flow, but despite not doing any research deep-dives, 2025 was a banner year. I selected my number one pick because of its high degree of difficulty. Al-Rashid managed to pack thousands of years of culture and history into a slim 300-ish pages, and do so in a way that was both responsible and entertaining. I’m still kind of in awe.

Honourable mentions: An African History of Africa (Zeinab Badawi, 2024); Everything Is Tuberculosis (John Green, 2025); Proto (Laura Spinney, 2025); After 1177 BC (Eric Cline, 2024), Native Nations (Kathleen DuVal, 2024)

Best Memoir

Things in Nature Merely Grow, by Yiyun Li (2025)

I don’t read a lot of memoir, but wow did I read some amazing ones this year! It was a tight battle in the end but I couldn’t not award Yiyun Li’s exploration of the aftermath of the loss of her second child to suicide. As insightful and wise as it is devastating, this is a work of pure genius, wrought in and out of the worst imaginable circumstances.

Honourable mentions: Shakespeare: The Man Who Pays the Rent (Judi Dench & Brendan O’Hea, 2024); Memorial Days (Geraldine Brooks, 2025); Jennie’s Boy (Wayne Johnston, 2023)

Best Spirituality or Theology

It’s Easier Than You Think, by Sylvia Boorstein (1995)

In recent years, I’ve increasingly struggled to find books in this genre that move the needle for me. But after a couple years where my ‘best spirituality’ title was fiction, this year I was blessed by a few powerful reads in the faith and spirituality genre. My top pick is Sylvia Boorstein’s contemporary classic introduction to Buddhism. It’s simple, matter-of-fact, jargon-free, and just tells the truth about the human experience. It couldn’t be better than it is.

Honourable mentions: How We Learn ton Be Brave (Mariann Edgar Budde, 2023); The Jesuit Guide to (Almost) Everything (James Martin, 2010); Kingdom, Grace, Judgment (Robert Farrar Capon, 2002); Mother Maria Skobtsova: Essential Writings (Maria Skobtsova, 2002)

Best Literary Fiction

The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny, by Kiran Desai (2025)

Literary fiction took up a huge proportion of my reading this year — more than ever — helped by the fact that this year’s major award long lists were filled with books with compelling premises. The one that stands out most to me is Kiran Desai’s The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny. Not only is it a rich multigenerational family saga, but I also felt like it makes more sense of our fraught twenty-first century than anything else. If literary fiction is defined as fiction that uses writing to articulate something about the human condition, then this is absolutely the top.

Honourable mentions: <redacted so as not to spoil my top books of the year>

Best Short Story Collection

A Road Between Us, by Bindu Suresh (2025 🇨🇦)

Short story collections are hard for me to judge because they’re often uneven. For me the one that best matched excellence with consistency was Bindu Suresh’s A Road Between Us, a collection of loosely connected stories about cosmopolitan life.

Honourable mentions: Street of Riches (Gabrielle Roy, 1955 🇨🇦); Strangen Pictures (Uketsu 2022); Waiting for the Long Night Moon (Amanda Peters, 2024 🇨🇦); Coexistence (Billy-Ray Belcourt, 2024 🇨🇦); Other Worlds (André Alexis, 2025 🇨🇦); A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms (George R.R. Martin, 2015)

Creepiest Paranormal-Horror

Strange Pictures, by Uketsu (2022)

After a banner year in 2023, I’ve struggled to find creepy books that work for me. But the top this year was definitely Uketsu’s unique and masterful collection Strange Pictures. I can’t say too much about it without spoiling it, but it more than lived up to the hype.

Honourable mentions: We Love You, Bunny (Mona Awad, 2025 🇨🇦); Strange Houses (Uketsu, 2023); The Call of Cthulhu (H.P. Lovecraft, 1928)

Most Mysterious Mystery or Thrilling Thriller

The Tiger and the Cosmonaut, by Eddy Boudel Tan (2025 🇨🇦)

I started the year strong with this category, but fell off quite a bit after the winter. But then I picked up this title from the Giller Prize shortlist and it felt so fresh and exciting. It’s about small-town secrets, marginalization, and family, with a chilling puzzle at its centre. Fun fact: It also takes place in the community to which my dad retired, which was a huge surprise!

Honourable mentions: The Nothing Man (Catherine Ryan Howard, 2020); Death in the Spires (K.J. Charles, 2024); The Body in the Library (Agatha Christie, 1942); Booked for Murder (P.J. Nelson, 2024)

Coziest Cozy / Comfiest Comfort Read

The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion, vols. 1-8, by Beth Brower (2019—)

In a world that feels increasingly chaotic and frightening, cozy reads are becoming a needful staple in many people’s reading diets, and I’m no exception to this. The coziest books I read this year, complete with a quirky neighbourhood, plucky heroine, gaggle of delightfully charming men, and limited and low-stakes plots, were Beth Brower’s Unselected Journals series.

Honourable mentions: A Night to Surrender (Tessa Dare, 2011); The Windsor Knot (S.J. Bennett, 2021); Cat’s Cafe (Gwen Tarpley, 2020)

Best Play

Elizabeth Rex, by Timothy Findley (2000 🇨🇦)

I run hot and cold on plays as literature, so I don’t even acknowledge them every year. But I read some good ones this year that deserve some attention. The one I picked is as fascinating as it is funny, centering on an imagined conversation between the actor in Shakespeare’s company who plays the women’s roles and Queen Elizabeth I, as they discuss, debate, and even argue what it means to be a man, a woman, and someone whose job forces them to blur those lines.

Honourable mentions: The Skin of Our Teeth (Thornton Wilder, 1945); Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (Tennessee Williams, 1955); Medea (Euripides, 341 BCE)

Communities

Best Children’s or Middle Grade Fiction

Wolf Hollow, by Lauren Wolk (2016)

To my mind, the best fiction for children is ‘age-appropriate’ but doesn’t shy away from hard, real-life themes and language. It doesn’t talk down to kids, but meets where they are and helps them to grow up. Unfortunately, such books are rarer now than they were in the golden age of children’s literature, but I still read some great ones this year. The best was Wolf Hollow by Lauren Wolk, which is about a girl who learns some harsh lessons about the world when a neighbour who ‘isn’t quite right in the head’ is accused of terrible crimes in her small town.

Honourable mentions:

• Children’s: The Dog Who Followed the Moon (James Norbury, 2024)
• Middle Grade: The Undead Fox of Deadwood Forest (Aubrey Hartman, 2025); Olivetti (Allie Millington, 2024); The Truth about Triangles (Michael Leali, 2024)
• Older Middle Grade/ YA Cusp: Orbiting Jupiter (Gary D. Schmidt, 2015)

Best Young Adult / New Adult Fiction

n/a

Unfortunately for me, the few YA titles I read this year were ‘just okay’. I fear YA may be in a rut, as I seem to encounter the same story over and over again. Here’s to better things in 2026.

Best Queer Fiction

Ordinary Saints, by Niamh Ní Mhaoileoin (2025)

When I look at my ‘best queer book’ I want it to be a book not just by a queer author, but something that articulates something powerful about queer lives. This year, that book was Ordinary Saints, by Irish author Niamh Ní Mhaoileoin. It centres around questions of faith, religion, history, and family that are so common for queer people of all stripes, and it deals with them in a way that is compassionate and responsible towards all concerned.

Honourable mentions:

• Gay Male / MM: My Brother’s Husband (Gengoroh Tagame, 2014); Coexistence (Billy-Ray Belcourt, 2024 🇨🇦); You & Me (Tal Bauer, 2022); Isaac’s Song (Daniel Black, 2025); Buckeye (Patrick Ryan, 2025); In the Absence of Men (Philippe Besson, 2007); The Shots You Take (Rachel Reid, 2025 🇨🇦); A Room Above a Shop (Anthony Shapland, 2025)
• Lesbian / Sapphic / FF: We Could Be Rats (Emily Austin, 2025 🇨🇦)
• Trans and/or Genderqueer: Woodworking (Emily St. James, 2025); Elizabeth Rex (Timothy Findley, 2000 🇨🇦)
• All: Tales From Beyond the Rainbow (Pete Jordi Wood, 2023)

Best Indigenous Fiction

Coexistence, by Billy-Ray Belcourt (2024 🇨🇦)

After being an intentional focus of my reading the past two years, Indigenous fiction was a smaller piece of my reading pie this year. Curiously all but one I’ll consider here today are short story collections. My favourite was Coexistence, by Billy-Ray Belcourt, which explores the complex dynamics of Indigeneity, queerness, power, and interracial dating.

Honourable mentions: Waiting for the Long Night Moon (Amanda Peters, 2024 🇨🇦); Legendary Frybread Drive-In (ed. Cynthia Leitech Smith, 2025); Shutter (Ramona Emerson, 2022)

Best Fiction by an Author of Asian Descent

The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny, by Kiran Desai (2025)

India has long been a powerhouse of English-language literature, and as more and more works by Japanese and Korean authors get published, and the increasing presence of literature by Western-born authors of Asian heritage, this category gets fuller and fuller by the year. This year, the book that stood out most was Kiran Desai’s The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny, which masterfully navigates between life in India and the USA for two Indian families in the late twentieth century.

Honourable mentions:

• Japanese fiction: Hunchback (Saou Ichikawa, 2023); Strange Pictures (Uketsu, 2022); Vanishing World (Sayaka Murata, 2015)
• Asian Diaspora: The Magnificent Ruins (Nayantara Roy, 2024); All Our Ordinary Stories (Teresa Wong, 2024 🇨🇦); Blood Over Bright Haven (M.L. Wang); Lesser Known Monsters of the 21st Century (Kim Fu, 2022 🇨🇦); The Road Between Us (Bindu Suresh, 2025 🇨🇦); Flashlight (Susan Choi, 2025); The Tiger and the Cosmonaut (Eddy Boudel Tan. 2025 🇨🇦)

Best Fiction by a Black Author

Other Worlds, by André Alexis (2025 🇨🇦)

I have to admit that African fiction fell off my radar this year, and nothing from this vast continent of literary giants stood out. But I did discover a new-to-me favourite Black author in André Alexis; I read six of his books this year and really enjoyed them all. Of these, today I’ll highlight his Giller-longlisted collection Other Worlds. These stories were all unique, thought-provoking, and entertaining.

Honourable Mentions: Isaac’s Song (Daniel Black, 2025); Pastoral (André Alexis, 2025 🇨🇦); Frying Plantain (Zalika Reid-Benta, 2019 🇨🇦)

Best Canadian Literature

The Tiger and the Cosmonaut, by Eddy Boudel Tan (2025 🇨🇦)

Again, when it comes to these community-based categories, I always want to highlight a book that isn’t just written by someone in the community, but could really only have been written by someone in the community, and which speaks to the particularity of that community. So, when it comes to Canadian literature, I want it to explore themes like Canadian history and identity, immigration and displacement, and such. So, books that I absolutely loved, like Maria Reva’s Endling, Aurora Stewart De Peña’s Julius Julius, or Amanda Leduc’s Wild Life don’t really fit the bill. On the limiting criteria I’ve given myself, then, the book I’ll highlight is Eddy Boudel Tan’s The Tiger on the Cosmonaut. Focusing on a queer Southeast Asian Canadian’s return to the small BC town that had chased him out, it is a compelling mystery, while also delving into serious issues of identity and belonging.

Honourable mentions: All Our Ordinary Stories (Teresa Wong, 2024 🇨🇦); We Could Be Rats (Emily Austin, 2025 🇨🇦); Street of Riches (Gabrielle Roy, 1955 🇨🇦); Waiting for the Long Night Moon (Amanda Peters, 2024 🇨🇦); Other Worlds (André Alexis, 2025 🇨🇦); The Road Between Us (Bindu Suresh, 2025 🇨🇦)