Book reviews, August 2025
38 books reviewed by the critics in August 2025, most-reviewed first.
Ruth
Kate Riley
5 of 5 critics positive · 8 reviews
Vulture
Phoebe Greenwood
7 of 7 critics positive · 8 reviews
Gunk
Saba Sams
4 of 5 critics positive · 7 reviews
The Names
Florence Knapp
6 of 6 critics positive · 7 reviews
Frankly
Nicola Sturgeon
0 of 1 critics positive · 6 reviews
Love’s Labour
Stephen Grosz
1 of 2 critics positive · 5 reviews
The Confessions of Samuel Pepys
Guy de la Bédoyère
0 of 3 critics positive · 5 reviews
The Quiet Ear
Raymond Antrobus
5 of 5 critics positive · 5 reviews
In the Green Heart
Richard Lloyd Parry
1 of 2 critics positive · 4 reviews
Katabasis
R. F. Kuang
1 of 3 critics positive · 4 reviews
The Adversary
Michael Crummey
3 of 3 critics positive · 4 reviews
The Expansion Project
Ben Pester
3 of 3 critics positive · 4 reviews
A Noble Madness
James Delbourgo
3 reviews, verdicts not stated · 3 reviews
Circular Motion
Alex Foster
2 of 3 critics positive · 3 reviews
Everything Evolves
Mark Vellend
3 reviews, verdicts not stated · 3 reviews
Everything We Do Is Music
Elizabeth Alker
1 of 1 critics positive · 3 reviews
Progress
Samuel Miller McDonald
1 of 2 critics positive · 3 reviews
The Origin of Language
Madeleine Beekman
1 of 2 critics positive · 3 reviews
Watching Over Her
Jean-Baptiste Andrea
1 of 1 critics positive · 3 reviews
Authority: Essays on Being Right
Andrea Long Chu
1 of 1 critics positive · 2 reviews
Bloody Awful in Different Ways
Andrev Walden
1 of 1 critics positive · 2 reviews
Chasing the Dark
Ben Machell
1 of 1 critics positive · 2 reviews
False War
Carlos Manuel Álvarez
1 of 1 critics positive · 2 reviews
Good and Evil and Other Stories
Samanta Schweblin
2 of 2 critics positive · 2 reviews
The Genius of Trees
Harriet Rix
2 of 2 critics positive · 2 reviews
TonyInterruptor
Nicola Barker
1 of 2 critics positive · 2 reviews
Alexandrian Sphinx
Peter Jeffreys and Gregory Jusdanis
1 review, verdicts not stated · 1 review
Decolonizing Language
Ngugi wa Thiong'o
1 of 1 critics positive · 1 review
Great Eastern Hotel
Ruchir Joshi
1 of 1 critics positive · 1 review
Hailstones Fell without Rain
Natalia Figueroa Barroso
1 of 1 critics positive · 1 review
Hawke PM
David Day
1 of 1 critics positive · 1 review
Interviewing Hitler
Richard Evans
1 review, verdicts not stated · 1 review
Kataraina
Becky Manawatu
1 of 1 critics positive · 1 review
Learned Behaviours
Zeynab Gamieldien
1 of 1 critics positive · 1 review
Pissants
Brandon Jack
0 of 1 critics positive · 1 review
The Benson Diary
A.C. Benson
0 of 1 critics positive · 1 review
The Magician of Tiger Castle
Louis Sachar
1 of 1 critics positive · 1 review
Transcendence for Beginners
Clare Carlisle
1 review, verdicts not stated · 1 review