Beth Novey

There are a <em>lot </em>of cooks at NPR. Every time we ask our staff for recommendations for our annual, year-end books guide, we get back a veritable smorgasbord of cookbook offerings.

If you’ve found yourself reading the same picture book over and over (and over and over) to a small but determined audience we see you and salute you! Is it time to add a few new titles to the mix?

NPR staff suggest graphic novels and memoirs from our Books We Love list: “I Must Be Dreaming,” “Mimosa,” and “Artificial: A Love Story.”

Of <em>course, </em>leave it to the gigantic nerds at NPR to throw a literary tailgate ... but to thine own self be true, even if it means getting stuffed into your locker later this afternoon.

King’s first novel, <em>Carrie, </em>turns 50 on Friday, and in honor of her birthday we asked you to share your favorite Stephen King story. More than 1,000 replies poured in in just a few days.

Trees communicate. They migrate. They protect. They heal. We climbed into the NPR archives to find some of our favorite arboreal fiction, nonfiction, and kids’ lit — get ready to branch out.

Every year, we ask NPR staff and book critics to share their favorite titles in our annual Books We Love guide. Behind the scenes, it's fun to spot trends and see what gets nominated again and again.

If you are ready to depart from the well-trodden tried-and-true at bedtime, here are 10 new picture books that NPR critics and staff loved in 2024.

More than 1,100 of you wrote to tell us about the books that broadened your horizons, that you kept through every move, that inspired you to become English majors, librarians, writers and teachers.

Noah Wyle, Owen Cooper, Seth Rogen, Jean Smart, Tramell Tillman, Jeff Hiller and Stephen Colbert are all taking home awards tonight. Check out our list of winners.