Entertainment
The Book Report: Ron Charles’ picks from 2025
By Washington Post book critic Ron Charles
2025 offered a feast of great books. To help build your never-ending reading list, here are five titles we particularly enjoyed over the past 12 months:
Simon & Schuster
Lucas Schaefer’s debut novel, “The Slip” (Simon & Schuster), won this year’s Kirkus Prize for Fiction. The story takes place in and around a boxing gym in Austin, Texas, where two lonely teenagers are eager to remake their identities wherever that might lead them.
This sweaty comic masterpiece tackles our most pressing social debates, and delivers a knockout.
Read an excerpt: “The Slip” by Lucas Schaefer
“The Slip” by Lucas Schaefer (Simon & Schuster), in Hardcover, eBook and Audio formats, available via Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Bookshop.org
Sourcebooks Landmark 
Susie Dent’s debut novel, “Guilty by Definition” (Sourcebooks Landmark), introduces a dictionary editor in Oxford who begins receiving strange messages about her sister’s long-ago disappearance.
As she follows these clues, she is led into literary puzzles and unresolved parts of her past. Readers who savor wordplay as much as suspense should look up this clever mystery.
Read an excerpt: “Guilty by Definition” by Susie Dent
“Guilty by Definition” by Susie Dent (Sourcebooks Landmark), in Hardcover, eBook and Audio formats, available via Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Bookshop.org
Riverhead Books 
“Black Moses: A Saga of Ambition and the Fight for a Black State” (Riverhead Books), by Caleb Gayle, traces the rise of Edward McCabe through Kansas and the Oklahoma Territory as Black migrants pursued land, safety and power in the Jim Crow era.
Confronting hostile politics and violent resistance, McCabe fought for community and self-determination, and Gayle lays out this charged landscape to reveal a crucial but long-obscured chapter in the struggle for freedom.
Read an excerpt: “Black Moses” by Caleb Gayle
“Black Moses: A Saga of Ambition and the Fight for a Black State” by Caleb Gayle (Riverhead Books), in Hardcover, eBook and Audio formats, available via Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Bookshop.org
calebgayle.com (Official site)
Knopf 
Karen Russell’s “The Antidote” (Knopf) is a dazzlingly original novel that hovers between fable and history.
This wild tempest of a tale set in Depression-era Nebraska follows a prairie witch and a high school girl swept up into a tumultuous western epic about the tragedies and ambitions of Manifest Destiny.
Read an excerpt: “The Antidote” by Karen Russell
“The Antidote” by Karen Russell (Knopf), in Hardcover, eBook and Audio formats, available via Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Bookshop.org
Crown 
Rick Atkinson’s “The Fate of the Day: The War for America, Fort Ticonderoga to Charleston, 1777-1780” (Crown), the second book in his planned trilogy, delivers a chronicle of the American Revolution with irresistible narrative drive.
Moving between battles and diplomacy, he brings Washington, Franklin and their rivals to life while tracing the nation’s fight for independence. The result is an immersive work of history just in time for America’s 250th anniversary.
Read an excerpt: “The Fate of the Day” by Rick Atkinson
“The Fate of the Day: The War for America, Fort Ticonderoga to Charleston, 1777-1780 (Volume Two of the Revolution Trilogy)” by Rick Atkinson (Crown), in Hardcover, eBook and Audio formats, available via Amazon, Barnes & Noble and Bookshop.org
Historian Rick Atkinson (Official site)
Rick Atkinson on how the U.S. Army was born – and a free nation realized (“Sunday Morning”)
That’s it for the Book Report. It’s been great fun to talk to you about good books over the past year. Here’s to many more in 2026.
I’m Ron Charles. Until next time, read on!
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For more reading recommendations, check out our library of previous Book Report features from Ron Charles:
Zendaya will forever be grateful to the Spider-Man franchise for introducing her to her “love” and “best friend,” Tom Holland.
During an appearance on The Drew Barrymore Show on Monday, April 6, the Euphoria star took a walk down memory lane to her past projects, including Disney’s Shake it Up, The Greatest Showman, and, of course, Spider-Man: Homecoming.
“Lots comes to mind,” Zendaya said with a grin as a picture of her in Spider-Man’s arms appeared on the screen.
The Drama actress noted how “crazy” it is to be a part of the franchise she grew up watching. “To be a part of them, and the joy that it brings to people…” said Zendaya, before reflecting on what it brought to her own life.
“It brought into my life love and my best friend,” she gushed as she stole another glance at the picture from their early days.
Zendaya, 29, and Holland, also 29, famously met while filming the 2017 Marvel hit. After years of romance rumours, the pair confirmed their relationship in 2020. They got engaged in late 2024, and it was rumoured they secretly wed earlier this year.
Though the couple is choosing not to confirm or deny the rumours for their privacy’s sake, fans will get to see them share the screen once more as Spider-Man: Brand New Day hits theatres on July 31.
“I’m excited for you to see the next one,” Zendaya told Barrymore. “I am already so proud of the work, and I’m so proud of Tom. This next one — I’m blown away,”
Blake Lively and Justin Baldoni have reportedly rejected settlement talks over their civil case and are now moving forward to trial.
Last week, Judge Lewis J. Liman dismissed 10 of 13 claims in Lively’s lawsuit, including allegations of harassment and defamation, against her It Ends With Us co-star and director.
Baldoni denied all those allegations which were made against him and his film studio, Wayfarer.
Editors at MailOnline reported that both Lively and Baldoni remain at their different ways, even though Judge Liman asked them to update the court on any settlement.
No agreement was reached in pre-trial hearings and the trial is scheduled to start on 18 May.
The judge, however, ruled that Lively could not file a sexual harassment claim under federal law because she was an independent contractor on the film and she also could not bring a harassment claim under California law because the filming took place in New Jersey.
Only three claims are going forward and that are “breach of contract, retaliation and aiding and abetting in retaliation.”
A Simple Favor actress posted a long statement on Instagram saying that she will continue to fight to expose people and systems that harm, shame, silence or retaliate against victims.
Blake also added that she will not waste the privilege of being able to stand up and thanked supporters for keeping her going.
American hedge fund Pershing Square, led by the activist investor Bill Ackman, announced Tuesday that it had offered to buy Universal Music Group in a merger, saying it believed the world’s biggest music label was undervalued by stock markets.
Pershing Square said its offer to Universal shareholders included 9.4 billion euros ($10.9 billion) in cash plus 0.77 shares in the new entity for each UMG share. After a merger with Pershing Square SPARC Holdings, an acquisition company, the new entity would be listed on the New York Stock Exchange. Universal currently trades on the Amsterdam Stock Exchange.
The Reuters news agency says Pershing Square’s cash-and-shares offer values Universal Music at around 30.40 euros ($35) per share, 78% over its last closing price of 17.10 euros and making the deal worth 55.75 billion euros ($64.31 billion).
The merged company would boast a stable of top artists including Taylor Swift, The Weeknd, Lady Gaga, Billie Eilish and Drake.
Pershing Square hopes to close the deal by the end of 2026.
“UMG’s stock price has languished due to a combination of issues that are unrelated to the performance of its music business,” Ackman said in a statement.
The company pointed to uncertainty about French conglomerate Bollore’s plans for its 18 percent stake in Universal, delay in listing on the U.S. stock market, and “underutilization of UMG’s balance sheet” among concerns that have held back the shares’ performance.
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