Books

must reads

8 New Books You Should Read This May

 A grumpy bookshop employee’s musings, an investigation of parenthood in the digital age, and an essential history of OpenAI. By Emma Alpern and Jasmine Vojdani
book review

The Romance of Being Unreadable

 In his debut novel, Ocean Vuong took pains to be illegible, then blamed the reader for reading. In his new book, he is finally ready to talk. By Andrea Long Chu
careers

Carol Leifer’s Many Comedy Lives

 She wrote on SNL’s weirdest season, dozens of Seinfeld episodes, and the Conan-hosted Oscars. She’s got stories. By Andy Hoglund
  1. up next
    ACOTAR Book 6: Everything Sarah J. Maas Has Said So FarSarah J. Maas confirmed she’s been working on the next installment of A Court of Thorns and Roses.
    By Alejandra Gularte
  2. and the winner is…
    Branden Jacobs-Jenkins Finally Wins His First Pulitzer for PurposeAnd New York theater critic Sara Holdren is a finalist in Criticism.
    By Jason P. Frank
  3. graphic design is my passion
    What Kind of Ugly Should a Book Cover Be?The new Europa all-in-one edition of Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan quartet is the wrong kind of garish.
    By Fran Hoepfner
  4. vulture lists
    42 Book-to-Screen Adaptations to Add to Your 2025 Reading ListForever seems like a show Murderbot would love.
    By Emily Maskell
  5. a long talk
    ‘I’m Looking for Someone to Fight, Not Someone to Run Over With My Car’Andrea Long Chu on her new book, Authority; the so-called crisis of criticism; and how she chooses her subjects.
    By Arielle Angel
  7. the uptown girl
    Christie Brinkley Gave Billy Joel One Too Many ChancesIn her new memoir, the model recounts her ex-husband’s drunken outbursts, including a chaise longue thrown through patio doors.
    By Devon Ivie
  8. best of 2025
    The Best Books of 2025 (So Far)What if Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow was written like The Savage Detectives?
    By Vulture Editors
  9. coming soon
    Sunrise on the Reaping Casts Its Plutarch HeavensbeeJesse Plemons has joined the Hunger Games prequel, out November 2026.
    By Bethy Squires
  10. shameless
    ‘It’s Cynical, Manipulative, and Cruel’Booksellers are not happy about the tech giant’s decision to hold its big annual book sale during Independent Bookstore Day.
    By Emma Alpern
  11. coming soon
    Belly Faces the Battle of the BrothersOne final decision for the last season of The Summer I Turned Pretty.
    By Alejandra Gularte
  12. azkaban for all
    The Harry Potter TV Show Casting Is Getting MessyBook fans are spamming HBO’s socials begging the channel to recast Snape.
    By Fran Hoepfner
  13. vulture lists
    6 Great Audiobooks to Listen to This MonthIncluding a novel about a woman attracted to jumbo jets.
    By Marshall Heyman
  14. books
    There Is No Safe WordHow the best-selling fantasy author Neil Gaiman hid the darkest parts of himself for decades.
    By Lila Shapiro
  15. spellcasting
    Harry Potter Hires Its Hogwarts ProfessorsPaapa Essiedu, Nick Frost, Janet McTeer, and more are headed to the teachers lounge.
    By Rebecca Alter
  16. well read
    McNally Jackson Is Starting a Book FestivalThe city’s big little indie-bookstore chain is betting on the idea that readers want something more than the standard launch party.
    By Emma Alpern
  17. chapters
    “It Feels Like We’re Lost in the East Village and Can’t Find a Way Out”Jeffrey Seller, co-producer of ‘Rent,’ on Jonathan Larson and his show’s bumpy road to success.
    By Jeffrey Seller
  18. say it ain’t so
    Weezer Bassist’s Wife Shot by Police, Arrested for Attempted MurderJillian Lauren is “all right,” her husband said — and so is his band’s Coachella set.
    By Justin Curto
  19. endings
    What Sunrise on the Reaping Means for the World of the Hunger GamesSpoiler warning for just about every book in the series.
    By Ashley Wolfgang
  20. book review
    Katie Kitamura Gets Too AbstractAudition’s lack of novelistic detail is both a strength and a weakness.
    By Emma Alpern
  21. books
    The National Book Foundation’s New ‘5 Under 35’ Is HereFrom a heady tale of non-monogamy to a haunted voice assistant, this year’s nominees confront a changing world.
    By Emma Alpern
  22. beast mode
    MrBeast Starts a New Chapter As a James Patterson Co-AuthorTheir joint thriller novel is reportedly already at the center of an eight-figure bidding war.
    By Jennifer Zhan
  23. we tell ourselves stories
    A First Look Into the Joan Didion ArchivesHer papers and John Gregory Dunne’s open to researchers at the New York Public Library today.
    By Christopher Bonanos
  24. chat room
    Mike Campbell Doesn’t Know How He Got So LuckyThe Heartbreaker on his unspoken bond with Tom Petty, “sideman syndrome,” and Bob Dylan being jealous of “The Boys of Summer.”
    By Devon Ivie
  25. chat room
    Bob the Drag Queen Doesn’t Play About Harriet TubmanHis debut novel imagines the abolitionist as a modern hip-hop artist, and he’s already writing a stage adaptation with a dream cast in mind.
    By Jennifer Zhan
  26. encounter
    Can Simon & Schuster Become the A24 of Books?The imprint’s new publisher is betting on it.
    By Cat Zhang
  27. let me in your window
    This Is Not the First Miscast Wuthering HeightsMargot Robbie doesn’t look like Cathy Linton — but neither do most Cathy Lintons.
    By Fran Hoepfner
  28. backstories
    The Gag Order That Birthed a BestsellerBehind the making of Careless People, the Facebook tell-all that its publisher insists is “not a book of news.”
    By Madeline Leung Coleman
  29. diet pepsi by addison rae
    How Did Colleen Hoover Get Here?Breaking down the romance author’s success and stagnation.
    By Fran Hoepfner
  30. a long talk
    Michelle Zauner’s Success Nearly Destroyed HerAnd then the Crying in H Mart film fell apart. But she’s changing her fortune with a new Japanese Breakfast album.
    By Delia Cai
  31. double trouble boil bubble etc.
    Now These Two Are Fighting?The rapper and author go head-to-head on X.
    By Fran Hoepfner
  32. book review
    The Gay Dirtbag Lives OnKristen Arnett’s specialty is queer women in Florida who are Going Through Some Stuff.
    By Sam Worley
  33. books
    Torrey Peters Speaks LumberjackThe Stag Dance author on exploring transness as a feeling through logger slang. “I was like, I just want to write these weird words.”
    By Andrea Long Chu
  34. metafiction vibes
    “It’s Pretty Human, But It’s Still Bad.”Analyzing OpenAI’s ‘metafictional literary short story’ with an open-minded English professor.
    By Emma Alpern
  35. books
    Cynthia Ozick Is UndiminishedNearing 97, she’s universally praised, freshly republished, and (maybe even) more widely read than ever. She’s also a world-class emailer.
    By Linda Hall
  36. cheat sheet
    Say ‘I Do’ to the Divorce MemoirEveryone’s writing about the end of their marriage, for better or worse.
    By Emma Alpern
  37. book review
    Transness Gets Metaphorical in Torrey Peters’s Stag DanceShe examines the messy underbelly of DIY trans culture, diving into the cringier aspects of queer growing pains.
    By Grace Byron
  38. backstories
    Toni Morrison’s Lost PlayWhy did the novelist’s only staged drama disappear for so long?
    By Elon Green
  39. book review
    The Minority Report Gets a Trump-Era UpdateLaila Lalami’s The Dream Hotel is an alarming dystopian approximation of what we might be headed toward.
    By Sam Worley
  40. book review
    Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Frustrating ReturnHer new novel Dream Count suffers from the retrograde gender politics and bad writing that has defined her career of late.
    By Sanjena Sathian
  41. neighborhood news
    ‘So You All Got the Email …’At the launch for Susan Morrison’s Lorne after a reply-all blizzard.
    By Paula Aceves
  42. jang-jang-jang-jang
    The Monkey Saves the Stephen King Adaptation by Skewering ItThe closer you look at The Monkey, the more you can see its deliberate subversions of the tropes that have come to define the Stephen King movie.
    By Louis Peitzman
  43. julianne ‘the resistance’ moore
    Why Is the Pentagon So Scared of Julianne Moore?Book-ban insanity comes for Freckleface Strawberry.
    By Rebecca Alter
  44. done
    A Court of Thorns and Roses TV Series Doesn’t Survive Valentine’s DayA rose by any other name still dies in development hell.
    By Alejandra Gularte
  45. coming soon ;)
    Miranda July and STARZ Go Public With Their RelationshipThe All Fours author says the network “really digs into the reality of who women are and what we want.”
    By Fran Hoepfner
  46. testimonies
    Salman Rushdie Relived His Stabbing Attack in Court Testimony“It occurred to me that I was dying,” the author recalled.
    By Jennifer Zhan
  47. controversies
    Stephen ‘tWitch’ Boss’s Family Speaks Out Against Allison Holker’s Memoir“That was his story to tell.”
    By Justin Curto
  48. the grub street diet
    Author Andrew Lipstein Believes There Are Two Kinds of Bagel Shops“There are those that try to dominate you, and there are those that want to be dominated.”
    By Paula Aceves
  49. shhhhh!
    Dan Brown Wants to Tell You A SecretRobert Langdon is back!!!!!!
    By Emily Heller
  50. sister sister sister
    Lola Kirke Tells Us She’s Not Like Other KirkesBut she is still a Kirke.
    By Fran Hoepfner
  51. profile
    Sarah McNally’s Book ClubThe owner of the McNally Jackson literary empire is reshaping the city’s reading life.
    By Matthew Schneier
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