The Best Book Club Books for 2026 (with Discussion Questions)

A great book club pick isn't always a great book. It's a book with a gap in it — a decision you can defend, a character you can't agree on, an ending that splits the room.

What makes a good book club book

• Under 400 pages. People finish it, so people show up.
• A moral question, not just a plot.
• At least one character everybody reads differently.
• Widely available, in paperback and in libraries.

Picks that always start an argument

Book	The argument it starts
Shatter Me — Tahereh Mafi	Is Juliette powerful or being used?
Verity — Colleen Hoover	Which version of events do you believe?
The Housemaid — Freida McFadden	Who deserved what happened?
It Ends With Us — Colleen Hoover	Would you have made the same choice?
Fourth Wing — Rebecca Yarros	Is the world cruel or just honest?

Shatter Me is our current book club pick, and the discussion thread is open to anyone with an account.

Five discussion questions that work for any book

1. Which character would you refuse to be friends with, and why?
2. What did the author leave out on purpose?
3. Where did you stop trusting the narrator?
4. What would change if this were set in Ireland today?
5. Would you recommend it — and to whom specifically?

Print them, screenshot them, steal them.

Running a small club without the faff

Pick a date before you pick a book. Keep the group under ten. Let people who didn't finish come anyway. And rotate who chooses, or the same person's taste quietly becomes the club's taste.

If you need a shared shelf, my shelf lets you track your own reads, and Goodreads Groups still does the job for polls.

Where to get the books

Local libraries are the cheapest route — Libraries Ireland lets you reserve across counties. If you'd rather own it, I post pre-loved and new copies as book packages, and the monthly book box works nicely as a club subscription. My own verdicts on most of these are in reviews, and there's a reading bingo card if your club likes a challenge.