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The 50 most anticipated books of 2020

The 50 most anticipated books of 2020

By David Canfield

December 16, 2019 at 11:30 AM EST

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EW's 2020 reading must-list

It wasn't easy narrowing down next year's list of buzzy titles to just 50, so trust that this is going to be a great reading year. Here are the books we're most excited for, from major novels to fascinating memoirs to a Jim Carrey book we're struggling to explain. And click the release dates on each slide to make all the pre-orders your heart desires.

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Long Bright River by Liz Moore

Credit: Riverhead

Moore's confident Philadelphia-set police procedural — set to flood bookstores with a huge print run and press campaign behind it — lives up to the hype, evolving from its genre-heavy introduction into a compelling portrayal of two siblings on different sides of the law. (Jan. 7)

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Topics of Conversation by Miranda Popkey

Credit: Knopf

This provocative debut, consisting almost entirely of conversations between women, is threaded by an unnamed narrator meditating on desire, transformation, and yearning over 20 years of her life. (Jan. 7)

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The Better Liar by Tanen Jones

Credit: Ballantine

A woman conscripts a stranger to impersonate her dead sister; what could go wrong? Jones’ sensational debut has the bones of a thriller but reads like literary fiction: lean, shrewd, and gratifyingly real. (Jan. 14)

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Oligarchy by Scarlett Thomas

Credit: Counterpoint

The latest dark comedy from the Seed collectors author immerses readers in an English boarding school, where the daughter of a Russian oligarch has arrived and quickly notices that the thinner the woman, the more special the treatment they receive. And things get weirder from there. (Jan. 14)

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Cleanness by Garth Greenwell

Credit: Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Greenwell's long-awaited follow-up to What Belongs to You expands on the world of his lauded debut, following a queer American teacher in Sofia, Bulgaria preparing to leave his time abroad, as he reflects on the various intimate, haunting encounters — sexual and otherwise — that have characterized his time away. (Jan. 14)

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Uncanny Valley by Anna Wiener

Credit: Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Author Rebecca Solnit calls Wiener's memoir, about a young woman thrust into the world of Big Tech at a time of reckless and deceptive growth, "like Joan Didion at a startup." We're sold. (Jan. 14)

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American Dirt by Jeanine Cummins

Credit: Flatiron Books

Described as a modern-day Grapes of Wrath, Cummins' sweeping new novel tells the story of Lydia and Luca, a mother and son forced to flee their middle-class lives in Mexico for the uncertainty of the United States. (Jan. 21)

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Children of the Land by Marcelo Hernandez Castillo

Credit: HarperCollins

The award-winning poet turns to memoir with the devastating account of his family's immigration to the U.S., from terrifying encounters with ICE offers to his father's ultimate deportation. (Jan. 28)

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Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu

Credit: Knopf Doubleday

This formally innovative new work from Yu, an acclaimed novelist as well as a writer on hit shows including Westworld, investigates Asian-American identity and Hollywood conventions through a witty, heartfelt lens. (Jan. 28)

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All the Stars and Teeth by Adalyn Grace

Credit: Macmillan

Tomi Adeyemi is but one big name in the YA fantasy space to rave about this epic debut, "set in a kingdom where danger lurks beneath the sea, mermaids seek vengeance with song, and magic is a choice." The acquisition of this title was seriously competitive. (Feb. 4)

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The Big Goodbye by Sam Wasson

Credit: Flatiron Books

The biographer behind Fosse and Improv Nation has another compelling Hollywood story to tell, this one surrounding the making of Chinatown and the legends behind Jack Nicholson, Roman Polanski, and more. (Feb. 4)

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The Resisters by Gish Jen

Credit: Knopf

It's been a decade since we've had a Gish Jen novel, but The Resisters promises to be worth the wait. It's a typically inventive effort from the award-winning author, set in a realistic near-future America wherein a baseball prodigy is recruited to play in the Olympics. Ann Patchett says the book "should be required reading." (Feb. 4)

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Seduction by Clement Knox

Credit: Pegasus

A fascinating history of desire and attraction, Knox's dig into the archives runs from Enlightenment all the way to the present-day, and will reframe much of the way you think about this topic. (Feb. 4)

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Something That May Shock and Discredit You by Daniel Mallory Ortberg

Credit: Atria

The "Dear Prudence" columnist and expert culture commentator returns with his sharpest, wittiest collection yet, a survey of pop culture ranging from scathing to plain weird. (Feb. 11)

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Weather by Jenny Offill

Credit: Knopf

Love is already pouring in for the new book by literary darling Offill, a slim volume that nevertheless captures a country in crisis, through the lens of a struggling family and its librarian matriarch. (Feb. 11)

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Real Life by Brandon Taylor

Credit: Riverhead

Realities of race and sexuality threaten the peace of a tight college-town community over a late-summer weekend, when introverted Wallace, alienated from his white and seemingly straight peers, has a series of complex confrontations. (Feb. 18)

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Soot by Dan Vyleta

Set in the early 20th century, EW called Vyleta's 2016 novel Smoke a "sprawling, ambitious novel, a Dickensian tale tinged with fantasy." Now he returns with a sequel that only builds on what came before it. (Feb. 25)

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Anna K by Jenny Lee

Credit: Flatiron

This red-hot retelling of Anna Karenina -- described as a mashup of Gossip Girl and Crazy Rich Asians -- landed a TV deal way back in January, with its adaptation now confirmed at HBO Max. (March 3)

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Deacon King Kong by James McBride

Credit: Penguin

Just as Showtime's star-studded The Good Lord Bird adaptation hits the screen, McBride returns with an improbably hilarious tapestry of late '60s Brooklyn, and an eclectic group of individuals that bore witness to a fatal shooting. (March 3)

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The Night Watchman by Louise Erdrich

Credit: HarperCollins

The reliably excellent, National Book Award-winning author goes especially personal with her latest, taking the action back to 1953 in a novel based on the life of her grandfather, a night watchman who carried the fight against Native dispossession from rural North Dakota all the way to Washington, D.C. (March 3)

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These Ghosts Are Family by Maisy Card

Credit: Simon & Schuster

Our choice for the big, generations-spanning family novel on this list, Card's ghostly, surprising debut considers the bonds of blood, the weight of secrets, and the scars of trauma. (March 3)

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Writers & Lovers by Lily King

Euphoria breakout author Lily King returns with a portrait of the artist as a young woman, in which the determination to live a creative life bristles against experiences of grief, loneliness, and romance. (March 3)

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Separation Anxiety by Laura Zigman

Credit: Ecco

A simple premise — a wife and mother starts, for lack of a better term, wearing her dog — gives way to an affecting, funny study of a slowly unraveling woman vying to course-correct. (March 3)

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The Mirror and the Light by Hilary Mantel

Credit: Henry Holt

Mantel's Booker Prize-winning, stunningly evocative Wolf Hall trilogy wraps with what we can only imagine is an epic finale. The finale begins in May 1536, tracing the final years of Thomas Cromwell in the wake of Anne Boleyn's death. (March 10)

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My Dark Vanessa by Kate Elizabeth Russell

Perhaps the most anticipated first novel of the year, Russell's riveting, timeline-shifting saga of the relationship between a high-school student and her teacher, and its #MeToo-tinged fallout, is sure to spark conversation (and debate). (March 10)

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New Waves by Kevin Nguyen

Credit: Penguin Random House

Nguyen's debut provides a clever glimpse into the world of New York tech, as a high-level programmer and a low-level customer service rep band together for revenge against the company taking them for granted. But when tragedy strikes, everything changes. (March 10)

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The City We Became by N.K. Jemisin

Credit: Orbit

The first novel from Jemisin since she made history at the Hugo Awards with the ending to her decade-defining Broken Earth trilogy? Set in an alternate-version New York and kicking off a new series? Yeah, we're there. (March 24)

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The Everlasting by Katy Simpson-Smith

Credit: Harper Collins

A tricky, ambitious examination of love in Rome that weaves between four centuries and follows four characters, asking big questions while finding grace in small lives. (March 24)

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The Glass Hotel by Emily St. John Mandel

It's another haunting, elegiac novel from the Station 11 author, this time following a brother and a sister wading through loss and shock as two major events -- an International Ponzi scheme collapse, and a mysterious disappearance at sea -- hurtle them in heartbreaking but gorgeous directions. (March 24)

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Wow, No Thank You, by Samantha Irby

Credit: Penguin Random House

Samantha Irby may be spending more time in LA, but she's still the same old "cheese fry-eating slightly damp Midwest person." (Her words, not ours.) This much is clear in her riotous new book of bad dates, worse food experiences, and general befuddlement at the world. (March 31)

Account

The 50 most anticipated books of 2020

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EW's 2020 reading must-list

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Long Bright River by Liz Moore

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Topics of Conversation by Miranda Popkey

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The Better Liar by Tanen Jones

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Oligarchy by Scarlett Thomas

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Cleanness by Garth Greenwell

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Uncanny Valley by Anna Wiener

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American Dirt by Jeanine Cummins

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Children of the Land by Marcelo Hernandez Castillo

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Interior Chinatown by Charles Yu

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All the Stars and Teeth by Adalyn Grace

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The Big Goodbye by Sam Wasson

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The Resisters by Gish Jen

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Seduction by Clement Knox

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Something That May Shock and Discredit You by Daniel Mallory Ortberg

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Weather by Jenny Offill

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Real Life by Brandon Taylor

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Soot by Dan Vyleta

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Anna K by Jenny Lee

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Deacon King Kong by James McBride

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The Night Watchman by Louise Erdrich

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These Ghosts Are Family by Maisy Card

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Writers & Lovers by Lily King

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Separation Anxiety by Laura Zigman

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The Mirror and the Light by Hilary Mantel

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My Dark Vanessa by Kate Elizabeth Russell

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