I saw this book listed as a best of 2025, and it sounded intriguing, so I purchased it with an Audible credit. What an interesting book! It is rich in allegory and moves with a measured pace. I can see why those who crave action and excitement are not drawn to it, but it is beautifully written and has one of my favorite themes: redemption. I also loved the narrator’s voice.

Here’s the scoop:

A NEW YORK TIMES TOP TEN BOOK OF THE YEAR
A WASHINGTON POST TOP TEN BOOK OF THE YEAR
A LOS ANGELES TIMES TOP FIFTEEN BOOK OF THE YEAR

Shortlisted for the 2024 Booker Prize, a novel about forgiveness, grief, and what it means to be good, from the award-winning author of The Weekend.

“Stone Yard Devotional is as extraordinary as you’ve heard.” —The Washington Post

“An exquisite, wrenching novel of leaving your life behind.” —New York Times Book Review

“Meditative (but by no means uneventful).” —New York Times

“Riveting prose about how humans beat back despair.”—Los Angeles Times

Burnt out and in need of retreat, a middle-aged woman leaves Sydney to return to the place she grew up, taking refuge in a small religious community hidden away on the stark plains of rural Australia. She doesn’t believe in God, or know what prayer is, and finds herself living this strange, reclusive existence almost by accident.

But disquiet interrupts this secluded life with three visitations. First comes a terrible mouse plague, each day signaling a new battle against the rising infestation. Second is the return of the skeletal remains of a sister who disappeared decades before, presumed murdered. And finally, a troubling visitor plunges the narrator further back into her past.

Meditative, moving, and finely observed, Stone Yard Devotional is a seminal novel from a writer of rare power, exploring what it means to retreat from the world, the true nature of forgiveness, and the sustained effect of grief on the human soul.

I won’t lie to you – this was a book that I would step away from, listen to something else, and then go back to it. Like many of Backman’s novels, it moved slowly and I was not sure what was happening until all the pieces came together, and then I was overwhelmed by the beauty of the story. The same thing happened when I read Anxious People. I was asking myself, “what is happening here??” and then suddenly I was like, “I love this novel!” and sobbing.

Here’s the scoop:

A 2026 Audie Award Finalist for Best Fiction Narrator

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER A Fallon Book Club Pick
WINNER OF THE 2025 GOODREADS CHOICE AWARDS FOR BEST FICTION
A Most Anticipated Book of 2025: Goodreads USA TODAY Marie Claire BookPage Literary Lifestyle Book Riot Sunset Magazine Totally Booked with Zibby Owens

The #1 New York Times bestselling author of Anxious People returns with an unforgettably funny, deeply moving tale of four teenagers whose friendship creates a bond so powerful that it changes a complete stranger’s life twenty-five years later.

Most people don’t even notice them—three tiny figures sitting at the end of a long pier in the corner of one of the most famous paintings in the world. Most people think it’s just a depiction of the sea. But Louisa, an aspiring artist herself, knows otherwise, and she is determined to find out the story of these three enigmatic figures.

Twenty-five years earlier, in a distant seaside town, a group of teenagers find refuge from their bruising home lives by spending long summer days on an abandoned pier, telling silly jokes, sharing secrets, and committing small acts of rebellion. These lost souls find in each other a reason to get up each morning, a reason to dream, a reason to love.

Out of that summer emerges a transcendent work of art, a painting that will unexpectedly be placed into eighteen-year-old Louisa’s care. She embarks on a surprise-filled cross-country journey to learn how the painting came to be and to decide what to do with it. The closer she gets to the painting’s birthplace, the more nervous she becomes about what she’ll find. Louisa is proof that happy endings don’t always take the form we expect in this stunning testament to the transformative, timeless power of friendship and art.