10 Books Worth Reading Now, From The Thursday Murder Club to Michael Douglas's Memoir

A Fall Reading List of New Books and Old Favorites

Kathryn Stockett and Barbara Kingsolver both have new novels out this year, and Michael Douglas has just published his memoir, while the other seven books have already found a wide following. Several of the novels put older people at the center of the story, among them a widow who befriends an octopus and a woman of 79 who turns to crime. Two of the books are about staying healthy later in life.

1. The Calamity Club by Kathryn Stockett

Kathryn Stockett's second novel arrived in May 2026, 17 years after The Help, and went straight onto the New York Times bestseller list. It is set in Oxford, Mississippi, in 1933, during the Great Depression.

Meg, 11, is one of the older girls the county orphanage considers unadoptable. Birdie, a single woman who speaks her mind, has come to Oxford hoping her well-to-do sister will help the family back home. Charlie, a woman with a troubled past, is running out of luck, and once their lives cross, the three hatch a daring plan to take charge of their own lives. Buy on Amazon.

2. The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman

Elizabeth, Ron, Joyce, and Ibrahim are friends at Cooper's Chase, a luxury retirement village in Kent, England, and when a property developer is murdered, they set out to solve the case themselves. Richard Osman, a British television host, got the idea for the book after visiting an upscale retirement village.

It came out in 2020, along with an audiobook read by Lesley Manville, and became the first debut novel ever to be Britain's top seller at Christmas. Four more books in the series have followed, the latest being The Impossible Fortune in 2025. A Netflix film released in 2025 stars Helen Mirren, Pierce Brosnan, and Ben Kingsley. Buy on Amazon.

3. Partita by Barbara Kingsolver

Barbara Kingsolver's new novel came out on October 6 and is a Read with Jenna book club pick. Livia Cable grew up in rural Tennessee with a rare gift for the piano, but an injury ended her career as a concert pianist. She is now married to Charlie, a kind man she has known since childhood.

Her mother, a hoarder, has just died and left a house full of clutter, and around the same time Livia gets a call from Sigurd, the labor organizer she fell for and then lost while studying music at Indiana University. The story moves between those years and her life today. Buy on Amazon.

4. A Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman

Ove is 59, drives a Saab, and has a short temper that has made him the neighborhood grouch. His orderly days are thrown off when a young couple with two small daughters moves in next door and flattens his mailbox by accident. Slowly, the new neighbors and a scruffy cat draw this grumpy man out, and they all come to look out for one another.

Fredrik Backman's novel topped the New York Times bestseller list. It became a Swedish film in 2015 and was remade in America as A Man Called Otto, starring Tom Hanks. Buy on Amazon.

5. Outlive by Dr. Peter Attia and Bill Gifford

Peter Attia is a physician who hosts a popular health podcast called The Drive. In Outlive, written with Bill Gifford, he argues that mainstream medicine often acts too late against the four illnesses of aging that kill most people: heart disease, cancer, Alzheimer's disease, and type 2 diabetes.

He calls instead for a personal plan that starts now rather than waiting for illness. He puts exercise first, calling it the strongest medicine there is for a longer life, and the plan also covers eating, sleep, and emotional health. The book came out in 2023, reached No. 1 on the New York Times bestseller list, and has sold more than three million copies. Buy on Amazon.

6. The Well-Lived Life by Dr. Gladys McGarey

Gladys McGarey was 102 when this book came out and was still consulting as a doctor after she turned 100. Known as the mother of holistic medicine, she helped found the American Holistic Medical Association. She died in September 2024 at 103.

The book sets out her six secrets for a long and happy life, among them keeping body and mind moving, knowing that everyone is here for a reason, and treating love as the most powerful medicine. The book also tells her own story, including her childhood in India, a chance meeting with Mahatma Gandhi, and raising six children. Buy on Amazon.

7. Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt

Tova Sullivan, a widow, cleans the Sowell Bay Aquarium at night, more than 30 years after her 18-year-old son, Erik, disappeared on a boat in Puget Sound. Her company on those late shifts is Marcellus, a grumpy giant Pacific octopus who is far cleverer than anyone at the aquarium realizes. As the two grow close, Marcellus figures out what happened to Erik and looks for a way to let Tova know. Shelby Van Pelt's novel is now a Netflix film starring Sally Field. Buy on Amazon.

8. One Helluva Ride by Michael Douglas

Michael Douglas, now 82, tells his life story in this memoir, written with Shane Salerno and Michael Fleming Jr. As the son of Kirk Douglas, he grew up in his famous father's shadow.

He won his first Oscar at 31 as a producer of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, left the hit series The Streets of San Francisco to make movies, and won a second Oscar for playing Gordon Gekko in Wall Street. He also writes about his fight against stage IV cancer and his 25 years of marriage to Catherine Zeta-Jones. The book came out on October 6 and is available in large print and as an audiobook. Buy on Amazon.

9. The Little Old Lady Who Broke All the Rules by Catharina Ingelman-Sundberg

Martha Andersson is 79 and lives in a retirement home called Diamond House. When its new management starts cutting corners, she and four close friends grow tired of being sent to bed early and served overcooked food. Calling themselves the League of Pensioners, they turn to crime, and a simple robbery at a luxury hotel grows into a heist at the National Museum.

The comic novel by Swedish writer Catharina Ingelman-Sundberg has sold more than 1.2 million copies around the world and reached No. 1 in Canada, and two of its sequels have been bestsellers as well. Buy on Amazon.

10. Theo of Golden by Allen Levi

A stranger named Theo comes to Golden, a small Southern city, where a coffeehouse displays pencil sketches of local people. He buys them one by one and gives each sketch to the man or woman in it, asking only to hear their story. As the drawings change hands, secrets and regrets come out.

The book spread largely by word of mouth to become a No. 1 New York Times bestseller and was picked by both Katie Couric's and Jen Hatmaker's book clubs. It is the first novel by Allen Levi, a lawyer, judge, and singer-songwriter who lives on family land in middle Georgia. Buy on Amazon.