NB: This week, we’re taking a look back at 2025. We’ve got a week of best-of posts to share, with reviews, cover snark, sales, and more. We hope you enjoy revisiting our archives, and most of all, we wish you and yours a wonderful holiday and a happy new year – with all the very best of reading.
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We’re counting down the best of our 2025 reviews, which I’m sure you’re all curious about. Time to reveal our top five reviews of this year. I’d love to know what your predictions are!
Let’s get into it!
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5. Serial Killer Games by Kate Posey (April 28)
Review by Lara
Grade: A
I went into this book totally oblivious. I didn’t even know what genre it was. I had been drawn in by the slick cover and the vague blurb. This is 100% the way I recommend you approach this novel. If you’ve read a few of my reviews and you tend to like the books I like, I recommend stopping here.
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4. Maid for Each Other by Lynn Painter (July 17)
Review by Lara
Grade: A-
This is an average length book at 368 pages. But it flew past in the blink of an eye. If I were to make a reading recommendation, I would say block off half a day and forbid anyone from interrupting you, then dive into this book and just revel in it.
I really really enjoyed this book. I wanted it to be so much longer so that I could immerse myself in more of their banter. I happily recommend this book to the Bitchery.
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3. Rules for Ruin by Mimi Matthews (May 19)
Review by Lara
Grade: A
This is my first Bad Decisions Book Club of 2025. Sleep became a distant memory with this book. For context, I have a newborn. I had the opportunity to sleep, but chose not to because this book was much more important. It is also the start of a series and it’s a series I’m now very excited about!
If you too would like to join the Bad Decisions Book Club and immerse yourself in a tale of vulnerability and courage, with excellent dialogue, emotional depth, and very clever characters, then this is the book for you.
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2. Variation by Rebecca Yarros (February 13)
Review by Elyse
Grade: C
Variation is a tough book to review. On one hand, I found myself putting aside things that I needed to get done in order to keep reading it, but on the other, I found the frequent “surprise” reveals in the plot to be so frequent that sometimes they felt silly.
The result was the plot tension was kind of up-down-up-down and made me feel a little seasick. Everyone in this book could have helped themselves a lot by just talking to each other.
I think a lot of readers looking for high emotion or high drama romance will like that up-down feeling, though. It just wasn’t for me, in part because of the uneven tension, and because I think some of the plot twists were a little over the top. That said, I was enthralled by the detailed professional lives of the characters, and it left me searching for more ballet-related romance fiction.
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1. Great Big Beautiful Life by Emily Henry (April 21)
Review by Lara
Grade: A
I dithered for a week before starting this book. I had it in my possession, but couldn’t get past the first page. I’m not sure if this is unique to me, but when I’m really looking forward to something, it’s very difficult for me to start it. Then, one morning I bit the bullet and pushed through to page two. From there, I tore through the book, snatching reading time wherever I could until I finished it this evening.
Afterward, I think I felt every emotion there is to feel.
I loved this novel. As much as it put me through the emotional wringer, the quality of the writing forced me to keep reading it and I am so very glad that I did. I think the one caution I would add is that this is more women’s fiction than it is contemporary romance. Regardless of genre specifics, Great Big Beautiful Life echoed for days after I finished it. I’m not sure I’ll ever revisit it, but I will certainly remember it.
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What did you think of our most popular reviews? Were there some you hoped to see in the top five? Let us know in the comments!