New Nonfiction Books to Read in 2025
The new 2025 nonfiction books worth reading this year, including books on nature, the government, and our bodies.
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If reading more nonfiction is on your list of goals this year, there are some great new nonfiction books out in 2025.
Nonfiction doesn’t typically top my reading list, but I do try to fit in a few every year. The ones that have caught my eye this year reflect my interests: nature, health, friendships, and one on government that feels very personal at this point in history.
I’d love to know what nonfiction books are on your radar this year. I’ll update here if I add more to my list, and will add reviews below as I read these books.
Who Is Government: The Untold Story of Public Service
Author: Michael Lewis
Publish Date: March 18, 2025
Source: Riverhead Books
Genres: Nonfiction
In an exploration that is personal to so many of us that have worked in government for years, Michael Lewis enlisted a number of renowned authors to find and tell interesting stories of people working in various corners of government. From stories about improving safety—and undoubtedly saving lives—to chasing down cybercriminals to reducing waste while serving a greater good, these are unsung heroes whose work won’t win awards, but it does make a difference.
I know firsthand the devotion to public service that everyone who touches government work brings to their jobs. Though I am not technically a government employee, I have worked in government for 20 years and the recent layoffs, budget cuts, and gutting of programs has been devastating. I encourage everyone to read this and understand that real work is happening behind the scenes, and the impacts will be real when that work abruptly stops.
Everything Is Tuberculosis
Author: John Green
Publish Date: March 18, 2025
Source: Crash Course Books
Genres: Nonfiction
In 2019, on a visit to Sierra Leone, author John Green (best know for YA novels like The Fault in Our Stars) met a boy named Henry who was afflicted with tuberculosis. They became friends, and Green also became an advocate for improving access to treatment of this curable disease that nonetheless kills 1.5 million people every year. Everything is Tuberculosis tells Henry’s story, but also the story of the disease, the healthcare inequities that keep it prevalent, and why it’s important to address them. Most reviewers so far have gone in skeptical about their interest in tuberculosis, but ultimately find this fascinating and worth the read.
Notes to John
Author: Joan Didion
Publish Date: April 22, 2025
Source: Knopf
Genres: Nonfiction
Joan Didion began seeing a therapist in 1999. She wrote about those sessions in a journal, as letters to her husband, John. Much of her writing centers around her worries about her daughter, Quintana, who was an alcoholic, but the raw journals reveal previously untold things about Didion, including about her health, anxiety, and her work. I admit to some reluctance to read the private journal of someone so recently deceased, who did not necessarily intend for it to be published, but Didion’s reflections have such resonance that many fans have not been able to resist the pull of this book. How do you feel about it?
On Muscle: The Stuff That Moves Us and Why It Matters
Author & Narrator: Bonnie Tsui
Publish Date: April 29, 2025
Source: Algonquin Books via Libro.fm ALC
Genres: Nonfiction
On Muscle is an examination of muscle, how we build it, how it builds us (physically, emotionally, and mentally), and its relevance to how we live and age. From weight lifters to sprinters to disabled yogis to double-Dutch jump ropers, Tsui covers a lot of ground, and it’s all riveting science, well-told with fascinating story and memoir.
As a lifelong weight lifter and former swimmer and rower, I felt a kinship with Tsui, who is also all of those things (her previous book, Why We Swim, is on my TBR)—and much of my listening to this book actually happened while lifting weights. Like Tsui, I’ve always found lifting to be about more than the muscle; it is also about the focus and the meditative quality that makes it mentally healing. I love author R.O. Kwan’s reflections on powerlifting and writing, and find it an apt companion to this book. If you have any interest in the body, I highly recommend this book.
Bad Friend: How Women Revolutionized Modern Friendship
Author: Tiffany Watt Smith
Publish Date: May 6, 2025
Source: Celadon Books
Genres: Nonfiction
My friends have been a lifeline over the years, and I love a good book about friendships. Rather than extolling the joys of friendship, however, Bad Friend examines the complexities of it—those moments when we’re bad friends, when friendships break up, or when they’re just plain wrong for us. Through personal anecdotes and research, Smith finds the beauty in the mess, and a more realistic vision of female friendship.
We Can Do Hard Things: Answers to Life’s 20 Questions
Author: Glennon Doyle, Abby Wambach, Amanda Doyle
Publish Date: May 6, 2025
Source: The Dial Press
Genres: Nonfiction
Glennon Doyle joins her wife, Abby Wambach, and sister Amanda to gather the wisdom of their friends and 118 others who have traveled through difficult times. Inspired by their own struggles—Glennon’s anorexia diagnosis, Abby’s loss of her brother, and Amanda’s breast cancer diagnosis—the three endeavor to put together small bits of wisdom for when you need them most. Doyle’s writing (and mostly her writing style) has not always resonated with me, and I’m also not a big “self-help” reader. However, I really appreciated Untamed, and some bits of hope and wisdom in these turbulent times would not go amiss, so I’m willing to give this one a shot.
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Ocean: Earth’s Last Wilderness
Author: David Attenborough and Colin Butfield
Publish Date: April 24, 2025
Source: Grand Central Publishing
Genres: Nonfiction
Ocean takes us to the least explored parts of our world, but the one that is arguably the most important to our own and our planet’s well-being. Attenborough explores eight unique habitats in the ocean, and envisions a hopeful future in which the oceans—and our planet—recover. I love a book that inspires awe (though the forests tend to be my preferred topic), and I’m currently reading Richard Powers’ Playground. If this novel on the oceans inspires as much awe as The Overstory, I think this nonfiction selection will be a good companion read (and with Sir David Attenborough narrating, the audio version is a must).
Is a River Alive?
Author: Robert Macfarlane
Publish Date: May 20, 2025
Source: W.W. Norton & Company
Genres: Nonfiction
I guess I’m in my water era, when it comes to my awe-inspiring reading, and some of my favorite nature authors are leading me there. Robert Macfarlane wrote the astonishing Underland: A Deep Time Journey and after that exploration, I’m more than willing to follow him into the river. What I love about Macfarlane’s writing is how he explores both the natural world and the people with deep connections to it, and how both shape each other. Here, he explores rivers in Ecuador, Canada, and India, making the ancient argument that the rivers themselves are living beings.
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