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Awards & Book News

South Korean novelist Han Kang, best known for 2016’s Booker Prize–winning The Vegetarian, wins the Nobel Prize in literature. NYT, Washington Post, NPR, and The Guardian have coverage. PBS News Hour has the ceremony.

The shortlist for the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize is announced; Kirkus has the news.

BBC’s Between the Covers book club has revealed its books and guests for its eighth season, starting with Chris Whitaker’s All the Colors of the Dark (Crown), The Bookseller reports.

Winners of the New Mexico-Arizona Book Awards are announced.

Winners of Scholastic UK’s inaugural Graphic Novel Prize are announced, Publishers Weekly reports.

Created by Humans, a company that helps writers license their works for use by AI, has forged a partnership with the Authors Guild, NYT reports.

New Title Bestsellers

Links for the week: NYT Hardcover Fiction Bestsellers | NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Bestsellers | USA Today Bestselling Books

Fiction

The Boyfriend by Freida McFadden (Poisoned Pen) ensnares No. 5 on the USA Today Bestselling Books list.

Lies He Told Me by James Patterson & David Ellis (Little, Brown) steals No. 6 on the NYT Hardcover Fiction Bestsellers list.

The Mighty Red by Louise Erdrich (Harper; LJ starred review) rushes to No. 7 on the NYT Hardcover Fiction Bestsellers list.

Triangle by Danielle Steel (Delacorte) circles No. 8 on the NYT Hardcover Fiction Bestsellers list.

A Song To Drown Rivers by Ann Liang (St. Martin’s) flows to No. 12 on the NYT Hardcover Fiction Bestsellers list.

Nonfiction

Be Ready When the Luck Happens by Ina Garten (Crown) serves up No. 1 on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Bestsellers list.

The Message by Ta-Nehisi Coates (One World) reaches No. 2 on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Bestsellers list and No. 4 on the USA Today Bestselling Books list.

Revenge of the Tipping Point: Overstories, Superspreaders, and the Rise of Social Engineering by Malcolm Gladwell (Little, Brown) knocks down No. 3 on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Bestsellers list and No. 8 on the USA Today Bestselling Books list.

Black Saturday: An Unfiltered Account of the October 7th Attack on Israel and the War in Gaza by Trey Yingst (Harper Influence) gets No. 4 on the NYT Hardcover Nonfiction Bestsellers list and No. 13 on the USA Today Bestselling Books list, though some retailers report receiving bulk orders.

The Coming Golden Age: 31 Ways To Be Kingdom Ready by David Jeremiah (Thomas Nelson) is ready for No. 7 on the USA Today Bestselling Books list.

Heal Your Gut, Save Your Brain: The Five Pillars of Enhancing Your Gut and Optimizing Your Cognitive Health by Partha Nandi (Mayo Clinic Pr.) rises to No. 14 on the USA Today Bestselling Books list.

Reviews

NYT reviews The Hidden Globe: How Wealth Hacks the World by Atossa Araxia Abrahamian (Riverhead): “Finding solace in a place without borders makes for a nice conclusion, but it skips over the question of what to do about the rest of the world—the hidden globe of Abrahamian’s title. The answer might require another book”; War by Bob Woodward (S. & S.): “Woodward isn’t interested in partisanship or ideology. His subject is high statecraft, the exercise of power at its loftiest reaches, which mostly involves heads of government and their lieutenants talking—and frequently swearing—on the telephone”; Play Nice: The Rise, Fall, and Future of Blizzard Entertainment by Jason Schreier (Grand Central): “One of Schreier’s great strengths is that he can control a crowd. He brilliantly maintains many different threads—corporate, personal, artistic—while giving so many coders, designers and money-minded executives their due, all without putting too much strain on his book’s momentum”; The Elements of Marie Curie: How the Glow of Radium Lit a Path for Women in Science by Dava Sobel (Atlantic Monthly): “As in her earlier books, Sobel writes elegantly about science, unspooling Curie’s pursuits in the lab like a mystery”; and three military histories: The Vietnam War: A Military History by Geoffrey Wawro (Basic), America First: Roosevelt vs. Lindbergh in the Shadow of War by H.W. Brands (Doubleday), and The Clausewitz Myth: Or the Emperor’s New Clothes by Azar Gat (Chronos).

LA Times reviews Q & A by Adrian Tomine (Drawn and Quarterly): “On the one hand, Q & A is something of a how-to book…. But even more, I read it as, if not quite a memoir, then as a sequence of sketches that together add up to an impressionistic self-portrait in its own right.”

Washington Post reviews What Does It Feel Like? by Sophie Kinsella (Dial): “What Does It Feel Like? is not the kind of book that uses silliness and joy to divert readers from their lives. But, in a sense, it’s a way for readers who have been rescued by Kinsella to repay her—to witness what she’s gone through as she uses words to process her pain and search for catharsis.”

LitHub selects “5 Book Reviews You Need to Read This Week.”

Briefly Noted

People shares an excerpt from Al Pacino’s memoir, Sonny Boy (Penguin Pr.), due out October 15.

Vulture has “A Beginner’s Guide to Junji Ito” on the occasion of the release of Uzumaki, Adult Swim’s new Ito adaptation.

The Millions talks to Emily Van Duyne, author of Loving Sylvia Plath: A Reclamation (Norton).

Jami Attenberg, author of A Reason To See You Again (Ecco), answers NYT’s “By the Book” questionnaire.

A new independent UK publisher, Akoya Publishing, has announced its launch with a slate of 10 books set for 2026, The Bookseller reports.

The Pulitzer Prize finalist Austrian American novelist Lore Segal has died at age 96; The Guardian has an obituary.

Lily Ebert, Holocaust survivor, author of the memoir Lily’s Promise (HarperOne), and TikTok star, has died at 100; NYT has an obituary.

LitHub recommends “Five Books That Showcase the Fascinating Landscape of European Folklore” and five novels that explore the complexities of the stock market.

Reactor shares five horror novels about obsession.

CrimeReads searches for “a decent father” in psychological thrillers.

Authors on Air

LitHub’s Fiction/Non/Fiction podcast interviews Jeff Sharlet, author of The Undertow: Scenes from a Slow Civil War (Norton).

Tor and LitHub’s Voyage into Genre podcast interviews Terry J. Benton-Walker, author of The White Guy Dies First (Tor Teen), and Sarah Henning, author of The Lies We Conjure (Tor Teen), about writing scary stories for kids.

Shelf Awareness rounds up the schedule for this weekend’s Book TV on C-SPAN 2.

The rights to Mason Coile’s new horror novel, William (Putnam), have been optioned, Deadline reports.

There’s a TV series in the works based on Alexandra Andrews’s debut psychological thriller Who Is Maud Dixon? (Back Bay); Deadline has the news.

Amazon MGM has produced a series based on George R. Stewart’s Earth Abides (Harper Voyager), which comes out December 1 on MGM+, Deadline reports.

Deadline has news on the cast of Paramount’s reimagination of Stephen King’s thriller The Running Man, which was adapted for the big screen in 1987.

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