It's the Brian Lear Show on WNYC. I'm Amina Serna filling in for Brian today.

And joining me now is Gilbert Cruz, editor of The New York Times Book Review, here to walk us through

the 10 Best Books of 2025. Always a big moment for readers. Gilbert, thanks for being here. Welcome

back to WIC. Well, thank you for having me back on. So let's dive right in because we got 10 books

to get through. First on the list is Angel Down by Daniel Krause, which is getting a lot of buzz because

the whole thing is written in one sentence?

It certainly is.

This is a, it's somewhat experimental.

It's sort of a piece of historical fiction set during World War I.

A group of American soldiers are sent into no man's land to suss out the source of a sound, a screaming that they've been hearing.

And they come upon a literal fallen angel.

It is sort of fantasy, sort of horror. It's written in one long

sentence, almost over 300 pages, and it is something that is one of the more memorable

books that we have read in several years. It's certainly not for everyone. It's quite gory. It's quite

gross at points because it is written by Daniel Krauss, who is a writer who writes in the horror

space. But if you think you can sort of bear with that, it is, it's just an amazing experience.

All right. Next up on fiction books, we've got the director by Daniel Kielman.

And actually, let me just throw in the loneliness of Sonia and Sunny by Kieran Desai.

These are two of the next books on the fiction list.

What would you like to say about either one of them?

Sure thing.

So the director by Daniel Kilman is another piece of historical fiction,

...