--- description: New titles from George Saunders, Joan Didion, Haruki Murakami and others title: TIME's Most Anticipated Books of 2017 image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltde093bcdab65f2d0/6988d9b9bc6cfc69913e2a3c/time-logo.jpg?branch=production --- * [Ideas](/section/ideas/) ## Ideas Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close * [Books](/tag/books/) ## Books Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close # These Are TIME's Most Anticipated Books of 2017 by [Sarah Begley](/author/sarah-begley/) ## Sarah Begley Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Dec 24, 2016 12:00 PM CUT by [Sarah Begley](/author/sarah-begley/) ## Sarah Begley Update your preferences in [Account Settings](/account/preferences/) Close Dec 24, 2016 12:00 PM CUT ### _Letters to a Young Muslim_  Farrar, Straus and Giroux By Omar Saif Ghobash The United Arab Emirates’ ambassador to Russia writes a series of letters to his son raising questions about how to be a good Muslim in the 21st century. While examining the lure of extremism for some young Muslims, he makes the case for moderates to come together and forge a path forward that is true to the religion yet adaptive to contemporary realities. [Out Jan. 3](https://www.amazon.com/dp/1250119847/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") ### _Difficult Women_  Grove Press By Roxane Gay The author of [_Bad Feminist_](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0062282719/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") and [_An Untamed State_](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0802122515/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") returns with a collection of stories about women in a hostile world, coping with everything from duplicitous husbands to sexual assault. [Out Jan. 3](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0802125395/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") ### _Transit_  Farrar, Straus and Giroux By Rachel Cusk In the second installment of a trilogy that began with _Outline_, Cusk’s reticent, observant narrator once again creates a series of profiles in miniature through her conversations with friends, strangers and family members—all the while remaining opaque to the reader herself. [Out Jan. 17](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0374278628/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") ### _Homesick for Another World_  Penguin Press By Ottessa Moshfegh The acclaimed short-story writer returns to the form after the success of her novel [_Eileen_](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0143128752/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") (a finalist for the Man Booker Prize) with stories about loners, losers, misfits and creeps, depicted with humor though their situations are pathetic, if not tragic. [Out Jan. 17](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0399562885/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") ### _Autumn_  Pantheon By Ali Smith The author of _How to Be Both_ kicks off a new tetralogy of interconnected though independent novels arranged around the seasons. The story explores the nature of time and the cyclical forces of culture. [Out Feb. 7](https://www.amazon.com/dp/1101870737/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") ### _Amiable With Big Teeth_  Penguin Classics By Claude McKay A newly-discovered final novel by Harlem Renaissance author Claude McKay is finally seeing publication, decades after it was written. The story documents conflict among black intellectuals in the late 1930s as Communists and black nationalists grapple over international conflicts. [Out Feb. 7](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0143107313/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") ### _Six Four_  Farrar, Straus and Giroux By Hideo Yokoyama In this Japanese crime novel, massively celebrated in its home country, a former detective who once investigated the kidnapping of a young girl now has his own daughter go missing. Against his wishes, he’s forced to revisit the case that went so wrong. [Out Feb. 7](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0374265518/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") ### _Lincoln in the Bardo_  Random House By George Saunders The short story master ([_Tenth of December_](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0812984250/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined")_,_ [_CivilWarLand in Bad Decline_](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0812987683/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined")) goes long-form with a novel about Abraham Lincoln’s trips to his son’s grave. While the sitting president mourns his son’s death, spirits around the cemetery observe him in grief. [Out Feb. 14](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0812995341/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") ### _South and West: From a Notebook_  Knopf By Joan Didion The legendary essayist, novelist and memoirist ([_The Year of Magical Thinking_](https://www.amazon.com/dp/1400078431/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined")_;_ [_Slouching Toward Bethlehem_](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0374531382/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined");[ _Play It As It Lays_](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0374529949/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined")) opens up her notebooks from 1970 and 1976 to reveal her thinking on interviews about the American South, California and the Patty Hearst trial. [Out March 7](https://www.amazon.com/dp/1524732796/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") ### _Exit West_  Riverhead Books By Mohsin Hamid Hamid ([_The Reluctant Fundamentalist_](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0156034026/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined")) depicts an unnamed Muslim city where war is breaking out as two young people are falling in love. As the fighting intensifies and the casualties mount, the young couple learns of enchanted doors that transport people out of the city and into safer parts of the world. But when they arrive in these Western cities, they must deal with new kinds of hostility. [Out March 7](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0735212171/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") ### _White Tears_  Knopf By Hari Kunzru Two white music enthusiasts find themselves on a dark and mysterious journey after posting a phony recording on the internet: they present it as a lost recording of a 1920s blues musician, though it was made in a park in the current day. But a collector gets in touch to reveal that the recording is actually real. [Out March 14](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0451493699/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") ### _American War_  Knopf By Omar El Akkad El Akkad’s debut novel imagines a Second American Civil War breaking out in 2074\. When a Louisiana girl at a displaced persons camp is approached by an official, she doesn’t realize what violence and controversy she’s getting herself into. [Out April 4](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0451493583/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") ### _What it Means When a Man Falls From the Sky_  Riverhead Books By Lesley Nneka Arimah This debut story collection depicts family, friends and lovers in crisis: ghosts, floods and a child woven from hair all appear. [Out April 4](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0735211027/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") ### _Anything Is Possible_  Random House By Elizabeth Strout The Pulitzer-winning author of [_Olive Kitteridge_](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0812971833/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined")presents another portrait-of-a-community-as-novel; this time, the characters featured originally appeared in this year’s critically acclaimed [_My Name Is Lucy Barton_](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0812979524/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined"). [Out April 25](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0812989406/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") ### _The Secrets of My Life_  Grand Central Publishing By Caitlyn Jenner The transgender icon shares the details of her life, from her accomplishments as an Olympic athlete to her highly public (and publicized) transition. [Out April 25](https://www.amazon.com/dp/1455596752/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") ### _The H Spot: The Feminist Pursuit of Happiness_  Nation Books By Jill Filipovic The feminist writer investigates what women need to be happy, and how structural problems prevent them from fulfilling those needs. Through conversations with individual women, she suggests solutions and policies that will even the playing field and give women more time to pursue joy. [Out May 2](https://www.amazon.com/dp/1568585470/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") ### _Into the Water_  Paula Hawkins attends the Edinburgh International Book Festival on August 13, 2016 in Edinburgh, Scotland. Awakening—Getty Images By Paula Hawkins The bestselling author of [_The Girl on the Train_](https://www.amazon.com/dp/1594634025/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") will release a new psychological thriller; [this time,](http://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/industry-news/book-deals/article/72148-riverhead-acquires-new-hawkins-novel.html "undefined") the victims are a single mother and a teenage girl who are found dead at the bottom of a river. [Out May 2](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0735211205/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") ### _House of Names_  Scribner By Colm Tóibín The Irish author ([_Brooklyn_](https://www.amazon.com/dp/1501106473/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined"), [_The Master_](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0743250419/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined")) retells the story of Clytemnestra, ruling ancient Mycenae in her husband King Agamemnon’s absence and plotting to kill him when he returns from Troy. [Out May 9](https://www.amazon.com/dp/1501140213/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") ### _Men Without Women_  Knopf By Haruki Murakami The frequent Nobel contender ([_Norwegian Wood_](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0375704027/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined")_,_ [_1Q84_](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0307476464/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined")) will publish a humorous story collection about men on their own. [Out May 9](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0451494628/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") ### _You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me_  Little, Brown and Company By Sherman Alexie The versatile author ([_Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian_](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0316013692/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined"), [_The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven_](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0802121993?tag=timecom-20 "undefined")) has written a memoir about his mother, a loving yet abusive figure who elicited complex feelings. After her death at the age of 78, Alexie will pay tribute to her with 78 essays and 78 poems. [Out June 13](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0316556645/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") ### _The Seventh Function of Language_  Farrar, Straus and Giroux By Laurent Binet Binet ([_HHhH_](https://www.amazon.com/dp/1250033349/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined")) begins his new novel with a premise that is at once highbrow and ridiculous: What if Roland Barthes’ death was not an accident, but a murder? The plot that unfolds involves Jacques Derrida, Umberto Eco and the search for a lost manuscript. [Out Aug. 1](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0374261563/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") ### _Three-Fifths a Man: A Graphic History of the African American Experience_  Farrar, Straus and Giroux By Sid Jacobson and Ernie Colón This graphic history presents the major events of the African-American experience, from slaves arriving at Jamestown to the successes of the Civil Rights movement. [Out Sept. 12](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0809093693/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") ### _Hit Refresh_  Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella at the 2016 Microsoft Annual Shareholders Meeting at the Meydenbauer Center November 30, 2016, 2016 in Bellevue, Washington. Stephen Brashear—Getty Images By Satya Nadella The Microsoft CEO shares his own story and reflects on his company’s progress and mission to constantly evolve in an ever-changing world. [Out Nov. 15](https://www.amazon.com/dp/0062652508/?tag=timecom-20 "undefined") ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"OpinionNewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/4599336/most-anticipated-books-2017/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/4599336/most-anticipated-books-2017/"},"headline":"These Are TIME's Most Anticipated Books of 2017","datePublished":"2016-12-24T12:00:34.000Z","dateModified":"2026-05-11T04:59:14.434Z","description":"New titles coming from George Saunders, Joan Didion, Haruki Murakami and many others","url":"https://time.com/4599336/most-anticipated-books-2017/","keywords":["Books"],"thumbnailUrl":"","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Sarah Begley","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/sarah-begley/"}],"articleSection":"Ideas","image":[],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/section/ideas/","name":"Ideas"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"/tag/books/","name":"Books"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/4599336/most-anticipated-books-2017/","name":"These Are TIME's Most Anticipated Books of 2017"}}]}] ```