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30 Perfect Books for Fall Book Club Discussions
Fall is hands down my favorite season. I love the vibrant colors and the cozy smell in the air. If you’re looking for some great books to discuss with your book club this season, you’ll love this list. I’ve rounded up 15 book club books that are perfect for fall. These reads are heartwarming, atmospheric, and totally gripping. From fall-themed romances to cozy mysteries and even fall classics, the list has something for every kind of reader. ou will also find I have fall-themed book club kit and helpful answers about book clubs in general.
What Books Are Included in The List?
Like I mentioned, you can find all sorts of genres here. I’ve included multiple genres for so many reasons: to keep things interesting, to give everyone in the club something they’ll enjoy, and to make sure you’ll never get stuck in one genre.
15 Must-Read Book Club Books For Fall 2024
The Spellshop by Sarah Beth Durst
The Spellshop is Sarah Beth Durst’s debut in romantasy—a lush cottagecore tale full of stolen spellbooks, unexpected friendships, sweet jams, and even sweeter love. Kiela, a librarian with social anxiety, flees a revolution with her sentient spider plant assistant, Caz, and returns to her childhood home. There, she meets a handsome and nosy neighbor and starts a secret spellshop. This book is perfect for the fall season with its magical, heartwarming story that feels like a Hallmark movie mixed with mythical creatures.
The Spellshop is Sarah Beth Durst’s romantasy debut–a lush cottagecore tale full of stolen spellbooks, unexpected friendships, sweet jams, and even sweeter love.
Kiela has always had trouble dealing with people. Thankfully, as a librarian at the Great Library of Alyssium, she and her assistant, Caz—a magically sentient spider plant—have spent the last decade sequestered among the empire’s most precious spellbooks, preserving their magic for the city’s elite.
When a revolution begins and the library goes up in flames, she and Caz flee with all the spellbooks they can carry and head to a remote island Kiela never thought she’d see again: her childhood home. Taking refuge there, Kiela discovers, much to her dismay, a nosy—and very handsome—neighbor who can’t take a hint and keeps showing up day after day to make sure she’s fed and to help fix up her new home.
In need of income, Kiela identifies something that even the bakery in town doesn’t have: jam. With the help of an old recipe book her parents left her and a bit of illegal magic, her cottage garden is soon covered in ripe berries.
But magic can do more than make life a little sweeter, so Kiela risks the consequences of using unsanctioned spells and opens the island’s first-ever and much needed secret spellshop.
Like a Hallmark rom-com full of mythical creatures and fueled by cinnamon rolls and magic, The Spellshop will heal your heart and feed your soul.
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The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah
The Four Winds is about Elsa Martinelli, a mother trying to survive in Texas during the Great Depression. The land is dry, the crops are dead, and dust storms are destroying everything. Elsa has to choose between staying and fighting for the farm she loves or leaving it behind and heading west to California. This story shows the courage, hope, and sacrifice of one woman during one of the hardest times in American history. Also check out good books to read after The Four Winds.
Texas, 1934. Millions are out of work and a drought has broken the Great Plains. Farmers are fighting to keep their land and their livelihoods as the crops are failing, the water is drying up, and dust threatens to bury them all. One of the darkest periods of the Great Depression, the Dust Bowl era, has arrived with a vengeance.
In this uncertain and dangerous time, Elsa Martinelli—like so many of her neighbors—must make an agonizing choice: fight for the land she loves or go west, to California, in search of a better life. The Four Winds is an indelible portrait of America and the American Dream, as seen through the eyes of one indomitable woman whose courage and sacrifice will come to define a generation.
From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Nightingale and The Great Alone comes an epic novel of love and heroism and hope, set against the backdrop of one of America’s most defining eras—the Great Depression.
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The Butcher by Jennifer Hillier
The Butcher is about Matt, a young chef who inherits his grandfather’s old house in Seattle. While fixing it up, he finds a locked crate with a gruesome secret inside. The discovery links back to the Beacon Hill Butcher, a serial killer thought to be dead for thirty years. At the same time, Matt’s girlfriend Sam believes her mother was one of the Butcher’s victims. As she searches for the truth, Matt is trapped between his family’s past and a terrible secret that could destroy them both. This is a really disturbing book for your autumn your book club discussion.
A rash of grisly serial murders plagued Seattle until the infamous “Beacon Hill Butcher” was finally hunted down and killed by police chief Edward Shank in 1985. Now, some thirty years later, Shank, retired and widowed, is giving up his large rambling Victorian house to his grandson Matt, whom he helped raise.
Settling back into his childhood home and doing some renovations in the backyard to make the house feel like his own, Matt, a young up-and-coming chef and restaurateur, stumbles upon a locked crate he’s never seen before. Curious, he picks the padlock and makes a discovery so gruesome it will forever haunt him… Faced with this deep dark family secret, Matt must decide whether to keep what he knows buried in the past, go to the police, or take matters into his own hands.
Meanwhile Matt’s girlfriend, Sam, has always suspected that her mother was murdered by the Beacon Hill Butcher—two years after the supposed Butcher was gunned down. As she pursues leads that will prove her right, Sam heads right into the path of Matt’s terrible secret.
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Beloved by Toni Morrison
Beloved is about Sethe, a woman who escaped slavery but is never truly free. She lives in Ohio with her daughter but is haunted by the ghost of her dead baby. The ghost is angry, and the past keeps pulling Sethe back to the pain she tried to leave behind. This story shows how trauma can live on and how hard it is to break free from history. If you are looking for a discussion-worthy classic book to read this fall, you should check out this.
Staring unflinchingly into the abyss of slavery, this spellbinding novel transforms history into a story as powerful as Exodus and as intimate as a lullaby.
Sethe, its protagonist, was born a slave and escaped to Ohio, but eighteen years later she is still not free. She has too many memories of Sweet Home, the beautiful farm where so many hideous things happened. And Sethe’s new home is haunted by the ghost of her baby, who died nameless and whose tombstone is engraved with a single word: Beloved. Filled with bitter poetry and suspense as taut as a rope, Beloved is a towering achievement by Nobel Prize laureate Toni Morrison.
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Prodigal by Melanie Tem
Prodigal is about Lucy Brill, a young woman grieving her brother Ethan after his death from drugs. But Ethan does not stay gone. His ghost visits her, calling her to follow him into the same darkness that destroyed him. Lucy feels lost and angry, and she cannot resist the pull. She is drawn toward the place that claimed Ethan, a place filled with danger and evil. This is a story about grief, family, and the destructive force of addiction.
Her brother Ethan is dead. then why does he visit and why does he leave the doors open for Lucy and her sisters — doors that whisper of the place that claimed Ethan’s body and mind?
“Don’t be afraid, Lucy.”
The world of sleepy houses and glimmering summer lawns is losing its hold on Lucy Brill. Her parents don’t have the answers – they don’t even have the questions. ethan has changed everything. Ethan, whose drug-racked body lies in the morgue…Ethan, who beckons Lucy to follow.
“Welcome, Lucy, Welcome.”
Lucy will follow, blinded by light, her head filled with anger. lucy Brill is going away…to the place that took her brother’s life, where evil waits with open arms.
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Crooked God Machine by Autumn Christian
Crooked God Machine is about Charles, a boy living on a dark and violent planet. Plague machines spread death, rivers run with blood, and God appears on television every night. When Charles meets a woman named Leda, he learns the world is not what it seems. After she disappears, he sets out to find her with help from strange friends, including his ex-girlfriend. His journey leads him to the truth about his world and the voice that calls from the sea. This is a bleak and surreal story about love, loss, and survival.
Charles lives on the black planet, a place where plague machines terrorize citizens with swarms of locusts and rivers of blood, salesmen sell sleep in the form of brain implants, and God appears on the television every night to warn of the upcoming apocalypse. When Charles meets Leda, a woman who claims to have escaped from hell, he begins to suspect that the black planet is not at all what it appears to be. After Leda disappears, Charles sets out to find her with help from his stripper ex-girlfriend, the deadhead Jeanine. Along the way he will uncover the truth of the origins of the black planet, and discover the source of the mysterious voice that calls to Leda from the ocean waves.
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Rust Maidens by Gwendolyn Kiste
The Rust Maidens is about Phoebe Shaw, a teenager in Cleveland in 1980. Her friends start changing in disturbing ways. Their bodies break down, their nails turn to glass, and their skin peels like rusted metal. Soon the whole city is watching, but nobody understands what is happening. Phoebe tries to uncover the truth, even as she feels herself slipping closer to the same fate. This is a haunting story about transformation, fear, and what happens when a community turns on its own.
Something’s happening to the girls on Denton Street.
It’s the summer of 1980 in Cleveland, Ohio, and Phoebe Shaw and her best friend Jacqueline have just graduated high school, only to confront an ugly, uncertain future. Across the city, abandoned factories populate the skyline; meanwhile at the shore, one strong spark, and the Cuyahoga River might catch fire. But none of that compares to what’s happening in their own west side neighborhood. The girls Phoebe and Jacqueline have grown up with are changing. It starts with footprints of dark water on the sidewalk. Then, one by one, the girls’ bodies wither away, their fingernails turning to broken glass, and their bones exposed like corroded metal beneath their flesh.
As rumors spread about the grotesque transformations, soon everyone from nosy tourists to clinic doctors and government men start arriving on Denton Street, eager to catch sight of “the Rust Maidens” in metamorphosis. But even with all the onlookers, nobody can explain what’s happening or why—except perhaps the Rust Maidens themselves. Whispering in secret, they know more than they’re telling, and Phoebe realizes her former friends are quietly preparing for something that will tear their neighborhood apart.
Alternating between past and present, Phoebe struggles to unravel the mystery of the Rust Maidens—and her own unwitting role in the transformations—before she loses everything she’s held dear: her home, her best friend, and even perhaps her own body.
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The Simple Wild by K.A. Tucker
The Simple Wild is about Calla Fletcher, a city girl who returns to Alaska. She struggles with the remote lifestyle, the cold, and the wildness of the land. At the same time, she meets Jonah, a rugged pilot who runs her father’s plane business. Jonah thinks Calla cannot handle life in Alaska, and she wants to prove him wrong.
City girl Calla Fletcher attempts to reconnect with her estranged father, and unwittingly finds herself torn between her desire to return to the bustle of Toronto and a budding relationship with a rugged Alaskan pilot in this masterful new romance from acclaimed author K.A. Tucker.
Calla Fletcher was two when her mother took her and fled the Alaskan wild, unable to handle the isolation of the extreme, rural lifestyle, leaving behind Calla’s father, Wren Fletcher, in the process. Calla never looked back, and at twenty-six, a busy life in Toronto is all she knows. But when her father reaches out to inform her that his days are numbered, Calla knows that it’s time to make the long trip back to the remote frontier town where she was born.
She braves the roaming wildlife, the odd daylight hours, the exorbitant prices, and even the occasional—dear God—outhouse, all for the chance to connect with her father: a man who, despite his many faults, she can’t help but care for. While she struggles to adjust to this new subarctic environment, Jonah—the quiet, brooding, and proud Alaskan pilot who keeps her father’s charter plane company operational—can’t imagine calling anywhere else home. And he’s clearly waiting with one hand on the throttle to fly this city girl back to where she belongs, convinced that she’s too pampered to handle the wild.
Jonah is probably right, but Calla is determined to prove him wrong. As time passes, she unexpectedly finds herself forming a bond with the burly pilot. As his undercurrent of disapproval dwindles, it’s replaced by friendship—or perhaps something deeper? But Calla is not in Alaska to stay and Jonah will never leave. It would be foolish of her to kindle a romance, to take the same path her parents tried—and failed at—years ago.
It’s a simple truth that turns out to be not so simple after all.
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Weyward by Emilia Hart
Weyward is about three women living in different times. In 1619, Altha is accused of witchcraft after a farmer’s death. In 1942, Violet is trapped in her family’s crumbling estate, wishing for freedom. In 2019, Kate escapes an abusive relationship and hides in a cottage left to her by a relative. Each woman is connected by a hidden legacy of strength and magic. Their stories show how women survive, fight back, and carry their power through generations. This is one of the must-read historical fiction book featuring witches.
I am a Weyward, and wild inside.
2019: Under cover of darkness, Kate flees London for ramshackle Weyward Cottage, inherited from a great aunt she barely remembers. With its tumbling ivy and overgrown garden, the cottage is worlds away from the abusive partner who tormented Kate. But she begins to suspect that her great aunt had a secret. One that lurks in the bones of the cottage, hidden ever since the witch-hunts of the 17th century.
1619: Altha is awaiting trial for the murder of a local farmer who was stampeded to death by his herd. As a girl, Altha’s mother taught her their magic, a kind not rooted in spell casting but in a deep knowledge of the natural world. But unusual women have always been deemed dangerous, and as the evidence for witchcraft is set out against Altha, she knows it will take all of her powers to maintain her freedom.
1942: As World War II rages, Violet is trapped in her family’s grand, crumbling estate. Straitjacketed by societal convention, she longs for the robust education her brother receives––and for her mother, long deceased, who was rumored to have gone mad before her death. The only traces Violet has of her are a locket bearing the initial W and the word weyward scratched into the baseboard of her bedroom.
Weaving together the stories of three extraordinary women across five centuries, Emilia Hart’s Weyward is an enthralling novel of female resilience and the transformative power of the natural world.
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A Fellowship of Bakers & Magic J. Penner
A Fellowship of Bakers and Magic is about Arleta Starstone, a human baker who mixes herbs with her recipes. When her orc neighbor secretly enters her pastries into a famous baking contest, Arleta is forced to compete against elves, dwarves, and magic users. She feels out of place because she has no magic. But with the help of friends and a charming elf, she learns to believe in herself. This is a cozy fantasy filled with food and love.
A human, a dwarf and an elf walk into a bake-off…
In the heart of Adenashire, where elvish enchantments and dwarven delights rule, human baker Arleta Starstone works twice as hard at perfecting her unique blend of baking with apothecary herbs. So, when her orc neighbor (and biggest fan) secretly enters her creations into the prestigious Langheim Baking Battle, Arleta faces a dilemma. Being magicless, her participation in the competition could draw more scowls than smiles. And if Arleta wants to prove her talent and establish her culinary reputation, she’ll need more than just her pastry craft to sweeten the odds.
Though Arleta may not yet believe in herself, she makes her way to Langheim―with the help of a very attractive woodland elf―and competes. While on a journey of mouthwatering pastries, self-discovery, heartwarming friendships, and potential romance, Arleta will have to decide whether winning the Baking Battle is the true prize after all. But win or lose, her adventure is only beginning…
Although this book is part of a series it can only be read as a standalone. Escape to Adenashire for a delightful cozy fantasy where every twist is a treat and every turn a step closer to home.
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The God of the Woods by Liz Moore
The God of the Woods is about a girl named Barbara who goes missing from her summer camp in 1975. She is the daughter of the wealthy Van Laar family, who own the camp. Fourteen years earlier, her brother also disappeared and was never found. As the search begins, secrets about the family and the community rise to the surface.
When a teenager vanishes from her Adirondack summer camp, two worlds collide
Early morning, August 1975: a camp counselor discovers an empty bunk. Its occupant, Barbara Van Laar, has gone missing. Barbara isn’t just any thirteen-year-old: she’s the daughter of the family that owns the summer camp and employs most of the region’s residents. And this isn’t the first time a Van Laar child has disappeared. Barbara’s older brother similarly vanished fourteen years ago, never to be found.
As a panicked search begins, a thrilling drama unfolds. Chasing down the layered secrets of the Van Laar family and the blue-collar community working in its shadow, Moore’s multi-threaded story invites readers into a rich and gripping dynasty of secrets and second chances. It is Liz Moore’s most ambitious and wide-reaching novel yet.
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Hidden Pictures by Jason Rekulak
Hidden Pictures is about Mallory Quinn, a young woman fresh out of rehab who takes a job as a nanny. She cares for Teddy, a sweet boy who loves to draw. At first his pictures are normal, but soon he starts sketching disturbing images of a man dragging a body. His drawings grow more lifelike and sinister, and Mallory suspects they may be connected to an old murder.
A wildly inventive spin on the supernatural thriller, about a woman working as a nanny for a young boy with strange and disturbing secrets.
Mallory Quinn is fresh out of rehab when she takes a job as a babysitter for Ted and Caroline Maxwell. She is to look after their five-year-old son, Teddy.
Mallory immediately loves it. She has her own living space, goes out for nightly runs, and has the stability she craves. And she sincerely bonds with Teddy, a sweet, shy boy who is never without his sketchbook and pencil. His drawings are the usual fare: trees, rabbits, balloons. But one day, he draws something different: a man in a forest, dragging a woman’s lifeless body.
Then, Teddy’s artwork becomes increasingly sinister, and his stick figures quickly evolve into lifelike sketches well beyond the ability of any five-year-old. Mallory begins to wonder if these are glimpses of a long-unsolved murder, perhaps relayed by a supernatural force.
Knowing just how crazy it all sounds, Mallory nevertheless sets out to decipher the images and save Teddy before it’s too late.
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Home Before Dark by Riley Sager
Home Before Dark is about Maggie Holt, who grew up in a house her father made famous in a bestselling ghost story. Maggie does not believe his book, but when she inherits the house years later, strange things start happening. The townspeople still whisper about her family, and Maggie finds clues that her father may have been telling the truth. If you are a fan of books featuring haunted house, this is for you.
What was it like? Living in that house.
Maggie Holt is used to such questions. Twenty-five years ago, she and her parents, Ewan and Jess, moved into Baneberry Hall, a rambling Victorian estate in the Vermont woods. They spent three weeks there before fleeing in the dead of night, an ordeal Ewan later recounted in a nonfiction book called House of Horrors. His tale of ghostly happenings and encounters with malevolent spirits became a worldwide phenomenon, rivaling The Amityville Horror in popularity—and skepticism.
Today, Maggie is a restorer of old homes and too young to remember any of the events mentioned in her father’s book. But she also doesn’t believe a word of it. Ghosts, after all, don’t exist. When Maggie inherits Baneberry Hall after her father’s death, she returns to renovate the place to prepare it for sale. But her homecoming is anything but warm. People from the past, chronicled in House of Horrors, lurk in the shadows. And locals aren’t thrilled that their small town has been made infamous thanks to Maggie’s father. Even more unnerving is Baneberry Hall itself—a place filled with relics from another era that hint at a history of dark deeds. As Maggie experiences strange occurrences straight out of her father’s book, she starts to believe that what he wrote was more fact than fiction.
In the latest thriller from New York Times bestseller Riley Sager, a woman returns to the house made famous by her father’s bestselling horror memoir. Is the place really haunted by evil forces, as her father claimed? Or are there more earthbound—and dangerous—secrets hidden within its walls?
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Gray After Dark by Noelle W. Ihli
Gray After Dark is about Miley, a former athlete working at a mountain lodge. During a morning run, she is abducted and held in a remote cabin in the wilderness. She has to use her strength and courage to survive while planning a dangerous escape. The wilderness is harsh, her captors are ruthless, and every choice could mean life or death.
A merciless wilderness. A harrowing attack. A desperate escape.
When a tragic accident sidelines Miley’s dreams of Olympic gold, she takes a summer job at a mountain guest lodge.
The Frank Church Wilderness is remote, but it’s the perfect place to train and recover. Local lore about a staffer who died years ago doesn’t scare her. But it should.
Miley’s plans take a terrifying detour when she’s abducted during a morning run. Held captive in a desolate off-grid cabin, she’ll have to use her athletic prowess, cunning mind, and courage to survive. But as the nightmare at the cabin escalates, Miley is forced to form an unlikely alliance and attempt a risky escape.
Can she outwit her captors and survive the wilderness before it’s too late?
Inspired by true events, Gray After Dark is a pulse-pounding psychological thriller with a finale that will leave you breathless.
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The Last Party A.R. Torre
The Last Party is about Perla Wultz, a mother with a perfect life on the outside. But she hides a dark secret tied to a crime from twenty years ago. A man confessed to murdering two girls at a birthday party, but Perla believes the truth is more complicated. As a student begins digging into the case, old lies come to light. If you are looking for a good thriller books from 2024 for this fall, choose this book.
A loving mother. A notorious murderer. They both have reasons to hide their secrets in a novel of escalating shock and suspense by New York Times bestselling author A. R. Torre.
Perla Wultz lives with her husband, Grant, and their precious daughter, Sophie, in a gated Pasadena community. Affluent, sociable, and accomplished, Perla plays the part of loving wife and mother to perfection. It seems an ideal life, if not for a decades-old crime that has become Perla’s dark and consuming secret obsession.
Twenty-three years ago, Leewood Folcrum confessed to murdering two young girls during a birthday party. Though he’s been condemned to a life sentence, his crime is not forgotten. Not by Perla, nor by an inquisitive doctoral student interviewing Folcrum for his dissertation. He’s getting the killer to open up—about his motives, his confession, and the truth of what really happened on that horrible night.
As the past and the present entwine, the deceptions behind the infamous murder begin to surface. But who’s deceiving who now? And why? And as an ingeniously twisted plan is set in motion, who will be the next to die?
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Intermezzo by Sally Rooney
Intermezzo is about two brothers dealing with grief after their father’s death. Peter is a lawyer who looks successful but is falling apart inside. Ivan is a young chess player who feels lost and alone. Both of them fall into complicated relationships as they struggle to cope with loss. This is a story about love, family, and how grief changes people.
An exquisitely moving story about grief, love, and family—but especially love—from the global phenomenon Sally Rooney.
Aside from the fact that they are brothers, Peter and Ivan Koubek seem to have little in common.
Peter is a Dublin lawyer in his thirties—successful, competent, and apparently unassailable. But in the wake of their father’s death, he’s medicating himself to sleep and struggling to manage his relationships with two very different women—his enduring first love, Sylvia, and Naomi, a college student for whom life is one long joke.
Ivan is a twenty-two-year-old competitive chess player. He has always seen himself as socially awkward, a loner, the antithesis of his glib elder brother. Now, in the early weeks of his bereavement, Ivan meets Margaret, an older woman emerging from her own turbulent past, and their lives become rapidly and intensely intertwined.
For two grieving brothers and the people they love, this is a new interlude—a period of desire, despair, and possibility; a chance to find out how much one life might hold inside itself without breaking.
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The Dutch House by Ann Patchett
At the end of World War II, Cyril Conroy buys the Dutch House, propelling his family to wealth and eventually causing their downfall. Narrated by his son Danny, this story covers five decades of loss, family bonds, and the siblings’ unshakable connection. It’s a great autumn book club pick. The Dutch House has deep themes and rich character studies, leading to heated discussions about family, wealth, and forgiveness.
At the end of the Second World War, Cyril Conroy combines luck and a single canny investment to begin an enormous real estate empire, propelling his family from poverty to enormous wealth. His first order of business is to buy the Dutch House, a lavish estate in the suburbs outside of Philadelphia. Meant as a surprise for his wife, the house sets in motion the undoing of everyone he loves.
The story is told by Cyril’s son Danny, as he and his older sister, the brilliantly acerbic and self-assured Maeve, are exiled from the house where they grew up by their stepmother. The two wealthy siblings are thrown back into the poverty their parents had escaped from and find that all they have to count on is one another. It is this unshakable bond between them that both saves their lives and thwarts their futures.
Set over the course of five decades, The Dutch House is a dark fairy tale about two smart people who cannot overcome their past. Despite every outward sign of success, Danny and Maeve are only truly comfortable when they’re together. Throughout their lives, they return to the well-worn story of what they’ve lost with humor and rage. But when at last they’re forced to confront the people who left them behind, the relationship between an indulged brother and his ever-protective sister is finally tested.
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The Secret History Donna Tartt
In The Secret History, a group of eccentric college students fall under the spell of their charismatic professor and slowly descend into corruption and betrayal. This dark, gripping tale is perfect for book clubs that enjoy deep psychological analysis and moral dilemmas.
Under the influence of their charismatic classics professor, a group of clever, eccentric misfits at an elite New England college discover a way of thinking and living that is a world away from the humdrum existence of their contemporaries. But when they go beyond the boundaries of normal morality they slip gradually from obsession to corruption and betrayal, and at last—inexorably—into evil.
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Verity by Colleen Hoover
Lowen Ashleigh is a struggling writer who uncovers a chilling manuscript while completing the books of a famous author incapacitated by an accident. Verity is a psychological thriller, filled with shocking twists and moral questions, is perfect for autumn book club discussions, as members will debate the ethics and motivations behind the characters’ actions.
Lowen Ashleigh is a struggling writer on the brink of financial ruin when she accepts the job offer of a lifetime. Jeremy Crawford, husband of bestselling author Verity Crawford, has hired Lowen to complete the remaining books in a successful series his injured wife is unable to finish.
Lowen arrives at the Crawford home, ready to sort through years of Verity’s notes and outlines, hoping to find enough material to get her started. What Lowen doesn’t expect to uncover in the chaotic office is an unfinished autobiography Verity never intended for anyone to read. Page after page of bone-chilling admissions, including Verity’s recollection of what really happened the day her daughter died.
Lowen decides to keep the manuscript hidden from Jeremy, knowing its contents would devastate the already grieving father. But as Lowen’s feelings for Jeremy begin to intensify, she recognizes all the ways she could benefit if he were to read his wife’s words. After all, no matter how devoted Jeremy is to his injured wife, a truth this horrifying would make it impossible for him to continue to love her.
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The Last Thing He Told Me by Laura Dave
Hannah Hall receives a cryptic note from her husband just before he disappears, instructing her to protect his teenage daughter, Bailey. As Hannah and Bailey search for answers, they uncover shocking truths about Owen’s past.
Before Owen Michaels disappears he smuggles a note to his beloved wife of one year: Protect her. Despite her confusion and fear, Hannah Hall knows to whom the note refers—Owen’s sixteen-year-old daughter, Bailey, who lost her mother tragically as a child and wants nothing to do with her new stepmother.
As Hannah’s increasingly desperate calls to Owen go unanswered, as the FBI arrests Owen’s boss, as a U.S. marshal and federal agents arrive at her Sausalito home unannounced, Hannah quickly realizes her husband isn’t who he said he was. Bailey just may hold the key to figuring out Owen’s true identity—and why he really disappeared.
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The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova
A young woman discovers an ancient book and letters that plunge her into a quest for the truth about Vlad the Impaler, the basis for the Dracula legend. The Historian is a detailed novel spans centuries and continents. The historical intrigue and eerie vibes make the book a must-read fall book club choice.
To you, perceptive reader, I bequeath my history….Late one night, exploring her father’s library, a young woman finds an ancient book and a cache of yellowing letters. The letters are all addressed to “My dear and unfortunate successor,” and they plunge her into a world she never dreamed of, a labyrinth where the secrets of her father’s past and her mother’s mysterious fate connect to an inconceivable evil hidden in the depths of history.
The letters provide links to one of the darkest powers that humanity has ever known and to a centuries-long quest to find the source of that darkness and wipe it out. It is a quest for the truth about Vlad the Impaler, the medieval ruler whose barbarous reign formed the basis of the legend of Dracula. Generations of historians have risked their reputations, their sanity, and even their lives to learn the truth about Vlad the Impaler and Dracula. Now one young woman must decide whether to take up this quest herself–to follow her father in a hunt that nearly brought him to ruin years ago, when he was a vibrant young scholar and her mother was still alive. What does the legend of Vlad the Impaler have to do with the modern world? Is it possible that the Dracula of myth truly existed and that he has lived on, century after century, pursuing his own unknowable ends? The answers to these questions cross time and borders, as first the father and then the daughter search for clues, from dusty Ivy League libraries to Istanbul, Budapest, and the depths of Eastern Europe. In city after city, in monasteries and archives, in letters and in secret conversations, the horrible truth emerges about Vlad the Impaler’s dark reign and about a time-defying pact that may have kept his awful work alive down through the ages.
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Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë
The passionate and tragic love story of Catherine Earnshaw and Heathcliff set on the Yorkshire moors is a timeless classic. Wuthering Height is perfect for autumn reading group with its dark, moody atmosphere and deep emotional intensity.
At the centre of this novel is the passionate love between Catherine Earnshaw and Heathcliff – recounted with such emotional intensity that a plain tale of the Yorkshire moors acquires the depth and simplicity of ancient tragedy.
This best-selling Norton Critical Edition is based on the 1847 first edition of the novel. For the Fourth Edition, the editor has collated the 1847 text with several modern editions and has corrected a number of variants, including accidentals. The text is accompanied by entirely new explanatory annotations.
New to the fourth Edition are twelve of Emily Bronte’s letters regarding the publication of the 1847 edition of Wuthering Heights as well as the evolution of the 1850 edition, prose and poetry selections by the author, four reviews of the novel, and poetry selections by the author, four reviews of the novel, and Edward Chitham’s insightful and informative chronology of the creative process behind the beloved work.
Five major critical interpretations of Wuthering Heights are included, three of them new to the Fourth Edition. A Stuart Daley considers the importance of chronology in the novel. J. Hillis Miller examines Wuthering Heights’s problems of genre and critical reputation. Sandra M. Gilbert assesses the role of Victorian Christianity plays in the novel, while Martha Nussbaum traces the novel’s romanticism. Finally, Lin Haire-Sargeant scrutinizes the role of Heathcliff in film adaptations of Wuthering Heights.
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Practical Magic by Alice Hoffman
The Owens sisters confront the challenges of life and love in a Massachusetts town that blames them for everything that goes wrong. Practical Magic is a bewitching novel blends magic and family drama.
The Owens sisters confront the challenges of life and love in this bewitching novel from New York Times bestselling author Alice Hoffman.
For more than two hundred years, the Owens women have been blamed for everything that has gone wrong in their Massachusetts town. Gillian and Sally have endured that fate as well: as children, the sisters were forever outsiders, taunted, talked about, pointed at. Their elderly aunts almost seemed to encourage the whispers of witchery, with their musty house and their exotic concoctions and their crowd of black cats. But all Gillian and Sally wanted was to escape.
One will do so by marrying, the other by running away. But the bonds they share will bring them back—almost as if by magic
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The Bookshop on the Shore by Jenny Colgan
Single mother Zoe moves to the Scottish Highlands for a fresh start and finds herself caring for three challenging children in a tumbledown castle. The Bookshop on the Shore is a warm-hearted novel combines charming characters and picturesque settings, making it a lighthearted book club book. The book also has themes of starting fresh, being resilient, and building community.
A grand baronial house on Loch Ness, a quirky small-town bookseller, and a single mom looking for a fresh start all come together in this witty and warm-hearted novel by New York Times bestselling author Jenny Colgan.
Desperate to escape from London, single mother Zoe wants to build a new life for herself and her son Hari. She can barely afford the crammed studio apartment on a busy street where honking horns and shouting football fans keep them awake all night. If she doesn’t find a way out soon, Zoe knows it’s just a matter of time before she has a complete meltdown. On a whim, she answers an ad for a nanny job in the Scottish Highlands, which is about as far away from the urban crush of London as possible. It sounds heavenly!
The job description asks for someone capable of caring for three “gifted children”, two of which behave like feral wolverines. The children’s widowed father is a wreck, and the kids run wild in a huge tumbledown castle on the heather-strewn banks of Loch Ness. Still, the peaceful, picturesque location is everything London is not—and Zoe rises to the challenges of the job.
With the help of Nina, the friendly local bookseller, Zoe begins to put down roots in the community. Are books, fresh air, and kindness enough to heal this broken family—and her own…?
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Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier
This classic gothic novel about a young bride overshadowed by her husband’s first wife is perfect for the cooler months. With its eerie atmosphere and suspenseful plot, Rebecca will lead to discussions about identity, memory, and the influence of the past.
Ancient, beautiful Manderley, between the rose garden and the sea, is the county’s showpiece. Rebecca made it so – even a year after her death, Rebecca’s influence still rules there. How can Maxim de Winter’s shy new bride ever fill her place or escape her vital shadow?
A shadow that grows longer and darker as the brief summer fades, until, in a moment of climatic revelations, it threatens to eclipse Manderley and its inhabitants completely…
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The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman
Bod, raised by ghosts in a graveyard, faces dangers both supernatural and human. The Graveyard Book is a darkly enchanting novel is perfect for autumn, with its blend of fantasy, adventure, and coming-of-age themes. Your reading group is sure to have a rich material for book club discussions.
Nobody Owens, known to his friends as Bod, is a perfectly normal boy. Well, he would be perfectly normal if he didn’t live in a graveyard, being raised and educated by ghosts, with a solitary guardian who belongs to neither the world of the living nor the world of the dead.
There are dangers and adventures for Bod in the graveyard: the strange and terrible menace of the Sleer; a gravestone entrance to a desert that leads to the city of ghouls; friendship with a witch, and so much more.
But it is in the land of the living that real danger lurks, for it is there that the man Jack lives and he has already killed Bod’s family.
A deliciously dark masterwork by bestselling author Neil Gaiman, with illustrations by award-winning Dave McKean.
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Autumn by Ali Smith
Set in the tumultuous time of Brexit, Autumn is a meditation on aging, love, and time. This contemporary novel is perfect for book clubs with its thought-provoking themes and poetic prose.
Autumn. Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness. That’s what it felt like for Keats in 1819.
How about Autumn 2016?
Daniel is a century old. Elisabeth, born in 1984, has her eye on the future. The United Kingdom is in pieces, divided by a historic once-in-a-generation summer.
Love is won, love is lost. Hope is hand in hand with hopelessness. The seasons roll round, as ever.
Ali Smith’s new novel is a meditation on a world growing ever more bordered and exclusive, on what richness and worth are, on what harvest means. This first in a seasonal quartet casts an eye over our own time. Who are we? What are we made of? Shakespearian jeu d’esprit, Keatsian melancholy, the sheer bright energy of 1960s Pop art: the centuries cast their eyes over our own history-making.
Here’s where we’re living. Here’s time at its most contemporaneous and its most cyclic.
From the imagination of the peerless Ali Smith comes a shape-shifting series, wide-ranging in timescale and light-footed through histories, and a story about ageing and time and love and stories themselves.
Here comes Autumn.
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There There by Tommy Orange
This novel follows twelve Native American characters in Oakland as they prepare for a powwow. There There is a powerful exploration of identity, history, and community, making it a poignant choice for book clubs seeking meaningful discussions.
Tommy Orange’s wondrous and shattering novel follows twelve characters from Native communities: all traveling to the Big Oakland Powwow, all connected to one another in ways they may not yet realize.
Among them is Jacquie Red Feather, newly sober and trying to make it back to the family she left behind. Dene Oxendene, pulling his life together after his uncle’s death and working at the powwow to honor his memory. Fourteen-year-old Orvil, coming to perform traditional dance for the very first time. Together, this chorus of voices tells of the plight of the urban Native American–grappling with a complex and painful history, with an inheritance of beauty and spirituality, with communion and sacrifice and heroism.
Hailed as an instant classic, There There is at once poignant and unflinching, utterly contemporary and truly unforgettable.
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The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson
Four seekers arrive at Hill House to study its supernatural phenomena, only to find themselves caught in its sinister grip. The Haunting of Hill House is a classic horror novel is a perfect spooky autumn read.
It is the story of four seekers who arrive at a notoriously unfriendly pile called Hill House: Dr. Montague, an occult scholar looking for solid evidence of a “haunting”; Theodora, the lighthearted assistant; Eleanor, a friendless, fragile young woman well acquainted with poltergeists; and Luke, the future heir of Hill House. At first, their stay seems destined to be merely a spooky encounter with inexplicable phenomena. But Hill House is gathering its powers—and soon it will choose one of them to make its own.
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A Pumpkin and a Patch by Jennifer Peel
Josie Peterson, known for a torrid story she wrote as a teen, finds herself entangled with the real-life inspiration, Reece Cavanaugh, as they navigate a messy legal battle and budding romance. Set in a pumpkin patch, A Pumpkin and a Patch is a light-hearted and romantic novel is perfect for the season. It’s charming, feel-good vibes will bring so much fun and lively discussions.
Every person has that one thing they’re known for, and it doesn’t matter what you do, that one thing—whether good or bad—follows you around like a bloodhound for the rest of your life. For me it’s a story I wrote when I was fifteen. Forever more I will be known as the Reece the Rogue Pirate girl, instead of Josie Peterson. Why couldn’t I be known for all the cute children’s stories I’ve written about my family’s pumpkin patch?
Tragically, the torrid story I wrote as a teen was based on a real person, Reece Cavanaugh. And guess what? He grew up to be a pirate—okay, lawyer. Same thing. To make matters worse, the man is representing my ex-fiancé who wants to steal my treasure, aka engagement ring. If that wasn’t the icing on the cake, Reece has an adorable daughter who happens to be my new student. That’s right, I must now have actual conversations with him after avoiding him for half my life, even by hiding behind banana displays when needed. But the more I get to know Reece—the real version, not the imaginary one who ravishes me on sandy beaches—I can’t help but wish we could roll around in the sand together. There’s a problem though, the school I work for frowns upon relationships between parents and teachers. And it’s pumpkin season, which means all my free time is spent on the family farm. But when he kisses me, I can’t help wanting to break all the rules and get tangled up in the barn. The burning question is, am I brave enough to make my story a reality or will it be another bad ending?
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Fall-themed Book Club Kit
This is a free PDF printable with fall-themed book club tracker and book review template. Use the review template to write detailed reviews of your book club books. DOWNLOAD NOW
Conclusion:
There you have the best discussion-worthy book club books for fall season.
Frequently Asked Questions
What Makes a Good Book Club Book?
A good book club book leads to great conversations and keeps everyone engaged. Look for books with rich narratives and thought-provoking themes. For example, Educated by Tara Westover provides plenty of discussion points about resilience and self-discovery. Another great pick is The Great Alone by Kristin Hannah, which explores survival and family dynamics. These kinds of books make meetings lively and interesting for everyone.
How Do I Choose a Book for My Book Club?
Think about what your members like to read, how long the book is, and if it has interesting discussion points.
How Can I Make My Book Club Meetings More Engaging?
If you are looking for more engagement ,try using printables like discussion guides, monthly planners, character analysis worksheets, and quote trackers. These can help keep things organized and make sure everyone is ready to dive into the discussion.
What Are Some General Book Club Questions I Can Use?
Here are some go-to questions for any book club meeting:
• What was your favorite part of the book?
• Were there any plot twists that surprised you?
• How did the setting impact the story?
Also check out my blog post: : 15 questions that will work for any book!
How Often Should My Book Club Meet?
Most book clubs meet once a month, which gives everyone enough time to read and prepare. But honestly, it depends on what works best for your group. You can always adjust the frequency based on everyone’s schedules and preferences.
More fall-themed Blog posts
FREE Fall-Themed Printable Bookmarks
24 Cozy Classic Novels You Should Read
Stephy George
