Reality TV Books to Scratch That Itch This Summer 2025

If you’re a reality TV fan like me and can’t get enough of all the trashy reality television shows (dating shows or otherwise), you simply must add these books to your 2025 reading list.

I don’t know why it took so long, but it finally dawned on me that I can merge my passions for books and reality television! 😂 I plan to build out my 2025 summer reading list with aaaaalll these books and more TV-centric fiction books. I do love a good “child stardom” or “sitcom star years later” plot.

The other day, I was cracking up to my husband because it seems publishers have pegged me perfectly. I’ve somehow been getting advanced reader copies for a lot of fiction books about reality TV.

That’s either a publishing trend right now in 2025, or they just know I’m absolute trash for a good reality TV setting. Romance, thriller, horror . . . it doesn’t matter. If there’s a reality television theme, I’m in!

And who knows, they might make a great book club book for 2025. There’s always so much interesting commentary that comes from reality shows. They do mirror our society . . . in some ways.

Many of these are backlist books, but I **SOMEHOW** have not gotten to a lot of them, which is bananas. If you’ve read them, find me over on Bookstagram and tell me which one is your favorite! And definitely let me know if I missed any!

Fiction Books for Reality TV Fans to Binge ASAP

The Book of Essie by Meghan MacLean Weir

I always wanted to read this book when it came out, but it was always the wrong book/wrong time (iykyk). But reading the description about fame and religion thrown into the mix sold me right away!

This book is basically about a super religious family that starts a reality TV show (think the Duggars), and I’ve always been fascinating by shows like this . . . in some sick way lol. I’ve heard it’s raw, honest, and impossible to put down. I can’t want to get to this one.

Here’s the publisher’s synopsis:

A debut novel of family, fame, and religion that tells the emotionally stirring, wildly captivating story of the seventeen-year-old daughter of an evangelical preacher, star of the family’s hit reality show, and the secret pregnancy that threatens to blow their entire world apart.

Esther Ann Hicks—Essie—is the youngest child on Six for Hicks, a reality television phenomenon. She’s grown up in the spotlight, both idolized and despised for her family’s fire-and-brimstone brand of faith.

When Essie’s mother, Celia, discovers that Essie is pregnant, she arranges an emergency meeting with the show’s producers: Do they sneak Essie out of the country for an abortion? Do they pass the child off as Celia’s? Or do they try to arrange a marriage—and a ratings-blockbuster wedding?

Meanwhile, Essie is quietly pairing herself up with Roarke Richards, a senior at her school with a secret of his own to protect.

As the newly formed couple attempt to sell their fabricated love story to the media—through exclusive interviews with an infamously conservative reporter named Liberty Bell—Essie finds she has questions of her own: What was the real reason for her older sister leaving home? Who can she trust with the truth about her family? And how much is she willing to sacrifice to win her own freedom?

The Book of Essie was published on June 12, 2018, from Knopf.

The Compound by Aisling Rawle

This isn’t out yet, but y’all, this one was pitched to me as Love Island meets The Hunger Games. ARE WE LISTENING YET?!

But seriously, The Compound looks sooo good. Also, finally—a book about reality tv that also has the dark literary dystopia vibes, because let’s be real, there is a super dark underbelly to reality television.

I’ve heard this book is a bit of a slow burn, but still incredibly addictive. If you’re a psychological thriller fan, you should check this one out. It could be your next dystopian/thriller favorite!

Here’s the publisher’s synopsis:

You wake up in a compound in the middle of the desert, along with nine other women.

All of you are young, all beautiful, all keen to escape the grinding poverty, political unrest and environmental catastrophe of the outside world.

You realise that cameras are tracking your every move, broadcasting to millions of reality TV fans.

Soon, ten men will arrive on foot—if they all survive the journey.

What will you have to do to win?

And what happens to the losers?

Lord of the Flies meets Love Island in this explosive, addictive debut novel, as bingeable as the best reality TV, with dark undercurrents of literary dystopia and consumerist satire.

The Compound will be published on June 24, 2025, from Random House.

The Re-write by Lizzie Damilola Blackburn

This is another new book about reality TV that has all the Love Island vibes. The premise is amazing. I love any fiction books about internet fame and the rise of technology and social media, and I think that’s going to be a big part of this story.

I also love romance books that have to do with writers or the publishing world, and this definitely checks to boxes. Looks like it will be a really fun exes-to-lovers second-chance romance!

Here’s the publisher’s synopsis:

In this lovers-to-enemies-to-lovers rom-com, two exes are faced with one deadline. Will they make it to the end?

Temi and Wale meet in London. They flirt, date, meet each other’s friends. . . . then Wale dumps Temi to go on Love Villa.

Instead of giving in to heartbreak, Temi throws herself into her writing. She’s within touching distance of a book deal that would solve all her problems. But publishers keep passing on her novel and bills still have to be paid. So, when the opportunity to ghost-write a celebrity autobiography arises, Temi finds herself accepting.

And, of course, the celebrity turns out to be Wale . . .

Has too much time passed, or just enough to spark a whole new kind of relationship?

The Re-Write will be published on August 12, 2025, from Penguin Books.

One to Watch by Kate Stayman-London

It’s actually shocking I haven’t read this romance book yet, given my obsession with The Bachelor. Maybe because it came out in the height of covid? Not sure. This just looks sooo good.

The fact that it’s about a plus-sized fashion blogger who becomes a contestant on a reality dating show is really interesting given the body diversity initiatives fans of The Bachelor have been trying to get off the ground for years.

Side note: The show is in desperate need of diversity in many, many forms. But anyway, I’ve heard the characters are so lovable, the spice is there 🔥 , and the banter is perfection. All buzz words for me when I’m building out my romance books to read in 2025 list.

Here’s the publisher’s synopsis:

Bea Schumacher is a devastatingly stylish plus-size fashion blogger who has amazing friends, a devoted family, legions of Insta followers—and a massively broken heart. Like the rest of America, Bea indulges in her weekly obsession: the hit reality show Main Squeeze.

The fantasy dates! The kiss-off rejections! The surprising amount of guys named Chad! But Bea is sick and tired of the lack of body diversity on the show. Since when is being a size zero a prerequisite for getting engaged on television?

Just when Bea has sworn off dating altogether, she gets an intriguing call: Main Squeeze wants her to be its next star, surrounded by men vying for her affections. Bea agrees, on one condition—under no circumstances will she actually fall in love.

She’s in this to supercharge her career, subvert harmful anti-fat beauty standards, inspire women across America, and get a free hot air balloon ride. That’s it.

But when the cameras start rolling, Bea realizes things are more complicated than she anticipated. She’s in a whirlwind of sumptuous couture, Internet culture wars, sexy suitors, and an opportunity (or two, or five) to find messy, real-life love in the midst of a made-for-TV fairy tale.

One to Watch was published on July 2020 by Dial Press.

Not Here to Make Friends by Jodi McAlister

This is book #3 in the series, and it can be read as a standalone, but I’ll probably want to read the first two first. I’m excited to dive into this one! A “full-on villain romance” is all I needed to hear, really.

I love the idea of a reality dating show setting where a contestant falls for the showrunner instead of the lead. That just sounds like the perfect rom-com.

Not Here to Make Friends sounds juicy, and I can’t wait to take in all the drama and secrets. This is a dual POV, friends-to-lovers romance, and it looks like it’s a super honest, eye-opening look at reality dating shows, which definitely intrigues me as someone who’s obsessed with how shows are produced. 😂

Here’s the publisher’s synopsis:

In this “full-on villain romance” (The New York Times) a group of women on a reality dating show should be vying for the love of their Romeo, but it turns out one of them only has eyes for the showrunner.

Murray O’Connell is standing on the greatest precipice of his career. As showrunner of the reality dating show Marry Me, Juliet, Murray is determined to make this season a success.

Nothing and nobody will stand in his way.

Except perhaps Lily Fireball, the network’s choice for this season’s villain. Lily has classic reality TV appeal: She’s feisty, dramatic, and never backs down from a fight. She also happens to be Murray’s estranged best friend and former co-showrunner.

What was once a perfectly planned season turns to chaos as the two battle for control. Working in reality television, they’re used to drama, secrets, and romance. But what happens when suddenly they’re at the center of the storyline?

Not Here to Make Friends was published on June 4, 2024, from Atria Books.

Chain-Gang All-Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah

I still can’t believe I haven’t read this book! It’s definitely been on so many book club books lists because of the social commentary and criticism of the prison system—there’s a lot to unpack.

This is another dystopian fiction book that mirrors reality, and I’ve heard it’s dark but powerful.

I think it will be a lot to digest and definitely requires more energy and attention than some of the rom-coms on this list, but if you like reality TV and you like thinking about the purposes of reality TV and the larger context, you might want to pick this one up.

Here’s the publisher’s synopsis:

Two top women gladiators fight for their freedom within a depraved private prison system not so far-removed from America’s own.

Loretta Thurwar and Hamara “Hurricane Staxxx” Stacker are the stars of Chain-Gang All-Stars, the cornerstone of CAPE, or Criminal Action Penal Entertainment, a highly-popular, highly-controversial, profit-raising program in America’s increasingly dominant private prison industry.

It’s the return of the gladiators and prisoners are competing for the ultimate prize: their freedom.

In CAPE, prisoners travel as Links in Chain-Gangs, competing in death-matches for packed arenas with righteous protestors at the gates.

Thurwar and Staxxx, both teammates and lovers, are the fan favorites. And if all goes well, Thurwar will be free in just a few matches, a fact she carries as heavily as her lethal hammer.

As she prepares to leave her fellow Links, she considers how she might help preserve their humanity, in defiance of these so-called games, but CAPE’s corporate owners will stop at nothing to protect their status quo and the obstacles they lay in Thurwar’s path have devastating consequences.

Moving from the Links in the field to the protestors to the CAPE employees and beyond, Chain-Gang All-Stars is a kaleidoscopic, excoriating look at the American prison system’s unholy alliance of systemic racism, unchecked capitalism, and mass incarceration, and a clear-eyed reckoning with what freedom in this country really means.

Chain-Gang All-Stars was published on May 2, 2023, from Pantheon.

What Happened to Ruthy Ramirez by Claire Jiménez

This book intrigued me when it first came out, but I never got around to it! I’ve heard What Happened to Ruthy Ramirez is incredibly funny and also deeply moving. Just my kind of book!

The POV is told through three sisters and their mother, which sounds right up my alley (if it’s done well). I’ve also heard the ending will break your heart, and maybe that’s why I’ve put it off. 🤣

But the idea of a Puerto Rican family searching for their long-missing sister only to discover her years later on the cast of a reality TV show?! Are you kidding me with that premise?! Sounds sooo good.

Here’s the publisher’s synopsis:

The Ramirez women of Staten Island orbit around absence. When thirteen‑year‑old middle child Ruthy disappeared after track practice without a trace, it left the family scarred and scrambling.

One night, twelve years later, oldest sister Jessica spots a woman on her TV screen in Catfight, a raunchy reality show.

She rushes to tell her younger sister, Nina: This woman’s hair is dyed red, and she calls herself Ruby, but the beauty mark under her left eye is instantly recognizable. Could it be Ruthy, after all this time?

The years since Ruthy’s disappearance haven’t been easy on the Ramirez family.

It’s 2008, and their mother, Dolores, still struggles with the loss, Jessica juggles a newborn baby with her hospital job, and Nina, after four successful years at college, has returned home to medical school rejections and is forced to work in the mall folding tiny bedazzled thongs at the lingerie store.

After seeing maybe‑Ruthy on their screen, Jessica and Nina hatch a plan to drive to where the show is filmed in search of their long‑lost sister. When Dolores catches wind of their scheme, she insists on joining, along with her pot-stirring holy roller best friend, Irene.

What follows is a family road trip and reckoning that will force the Ramirez women to finally face the past and look toward a future—with or without Ruthy in it.

What Happened to Ruthy Ramirez was published on March 7, 2023, from Grand Central Publishing.

Mrs. Quinn’s Rise to Fame by Olivia Ford

Thank you to @PRHAudio for the complimentary book!

This is more of a competition baking show and less reality TV, but I think reality TV fans will still love this book (if you like cozy romance books with a little mystery thrown in). I absolutely loved this book.

There’s so much heart, and it’s very sweet—I rarely read books with protagonists in their late seventies!

But, oh, you just fall in love with Mrs. Quinn. The baking in this book WILL make you want to eat all the pastries, so make sure you have a snack when you read! 🤣 There’s also some heavier topics introduced, but again, the cozy/comfort vibes are 10/10.

Here’s the publisher’s synopsis:

A huge-hearted, redemptive coming-of-old-age tale, a love story, and an ode to good food!

Nothing could be more out of character, but after fifty-nine years of marriage, as her husband Bernard’s health declines, and her friends’ lives become focused on their grandchildren—which Jenny never had—Jenny decides she wants a little something for herself.

So she secretly applies to be a contestant on the prime-time TV show Britain Bakes.

Whisked into an unfamiliar world of cameras and timed challenges, Jenny delights in a new-found independence. But that independence, and the stress of the competition, starts to unearth memories buried decades ago.

Chocolate teacakes remind her of a furtive errand involving a wedding ring; sugared doughnuts call up a stranger’s kind act; a simple cottage loaf brings back the moment her life changed forever.

With her baking star rising, Jenny struggles to keep a lid on that first secret—a long-concealed deceit that threatens to shatter the very foundations of her marriage.

It’s the only time in six decades that she’s kept something from Bernard. By putting herself in the limelight, has Jenny created a recipe for disaster?

Mrs. Quinn’s Rise to Fame was published on January 30, 2024, from Pamela Dorman Books.

Back After This by Linda Holmes

Thank you to NetGalley for the complimentary book!

This book is on aaaallll my lists this year! It was one of my most anticipated 2025 book releases, and it’s definitely a new rom-com book to run, not walk, to scoop up this year.

It’s not a reality TV show, but it feels like a reality dating show in the form of a viral podcast series! The romance is really sweet, and the main character learns so much about herself in the process.

I love the idea of a podcast producer falling into the role of host for a modern dating podcast show. Just an overall feel-good story!

Here’s the publisher’s synopsis:

From the New York Times bestselling author of Evvie Drake Starts Over and Flying Solo, a podcast producer agrees to host a new series about modern dating—but will the show jeopardize her chance at finding real love?

Cecily Foster loves to make podcasts. She fiercely protects her colleagues, dearly adores her friends, and never misses dinner with her sister. But after a disastrous relationship with a colleague who stole her heart and her ideas, she’s put romantic love on hold.

When the boss who’s disappointed her again and again finally offers her the chance to host her own show, she wants to be thrilled. But there’s a catch—actually, two catches.

First, the show will be about Cecily’s dating life. And second, she has to follow the guidance of influencer and newly minted relationship coach Eliza Cassidy, whose relentlessly upbeat attitude seems ready-made for social media, not real life.

Cecily would rather do anything other than put her singledom on display (ugh) or take advice from the internet (UGH). But when her boss hints that doing the show is the only way to protect a friend’s job, she realizes she has no choice.

To make matters more complicated, once she’s committed to twenty blind dates of Eliza’s choosing, Cecily finds herself unable to stop thinking about Will, a photographer she helped to rescue a very big and very lovable lost dog.

Even though there are sparks between the two, Will’s own path is uncertain, and Eliza’s skeptical comments about Cecily’s decision-making aren’t helping. On the one hand, Will seems great. But on the other hand . . . don’t they all?

As Cecily struggles to balance the life she truly desires and the one Eliza wants to create for her, she finds herself at a crossroads. Can Cecily sort through all the advice and find a way to do what she loves without losing herself in the process?

Back After This was published on February 25, 2025, from Ballantine Books.

The True Love Experiment by Christina Lauren

I kind of can’t believe I haven’t read this book! These authors know how to right an immersive, steamy romance book, and this one has such a fun premise for reality TV lovers.

I just love stories that dive into the nitty gritty, behind-the-scenes gems of Hollywood life. It just looks juicy and ridiculous!

Here’s the publisher’s synopsis:

Sparks fly when a romance novelist and a documentary filmmaker join forces to craft the perfect Hollywood love story and take both of their careers to the next level—but only if they can keep the chemistry between them from taking the whole thing off script.

Felicity “Fizzy” Chen is lost. Sure, she’s got an incredible career as a beloved romance novelist with a slew of bestsellers under her belt, but when she’s asked to give a commencement address, it hits her: she hasn’t been practicing what she’s preached.

Fizzy hasn’t ever really been in love. Lust? Definitely. But that swoon-worthy, can’t-stop-thinking-about-him, all-encompassing feeling? Nope. Nothing. What happens when the optimism she’s spent her career encouraging in readers starts to feel like a lie?

Connor Prince, documentary filmmaker and single father, loves his work in large part because it allows him to live near his daughter. But when his profit-minded boss orders him to create a reality TV show, putting his job on the line, Connor is out of his element.

Desperate to find his romantic lead, a chance run-in with an exasperated Fizzy offers Connor the perfect solution. What if he could show the queen of romance herself falling head-over-heels for all the world to see?

Fizzy gives him a hard pass—unless he agrees to her list of demands. When he says yes, and production on The True Love Experiment begins, Connor wonders if that perfect match will ever be in the cue cards for him, too.

The True Love Experiment is the book fans have been waiting for ever since Fizzy’s debut in The Soulmate Equation. But when the lights come on and all eyes are on her, it turns out the happily ever after Fizzy had all but given up on might lie just behind the camera.

The True Love Experiment was published on May 16, 2023, from Gallery Books.

One Perfect Couple by Ruth Ware

I love Ruth Ware’s thrillers so much! They’re like catnip to me. I really can’t believe I haven’t read this one! Trash reality TV, trapped on an island getaway, and a good psychological thriller? Yes, please.

It sounds like the perfect summer thriller. I will say, the reviews are quite polarizing, so I’m going to have to lower my expectations a bit.

But I loved The Fury by Alex Michaelides a lot, and this sounds like it could have similar vibes.

Here’s the publisher’s synopsis:

Harkening to Agatha Christie’s classic And Then There Were None, this high-tension and ingenious thriller follows five couples trapped on a storm-swept island as a killer stalks among them.

Lyla is in a bit of a rut. Her post-doctoral research has fizzled out, she’s pretty sure they won’t extend her contract, and things with her boyfriend, Nico, an aspiring actor, aren’t going great.

When the opportunity arises for Nico to join the cast of a new reality TV show, The Perfect Couple, she decides to try out with him.

A whirlwind audition process later, Lyla find herself whisked off to a tropical paradise with Nico, boating through the Indian Ocean towards Ever After Island, where the two of them will compete against four other couples—Bayer and Angel, Dan and Santana, Joel and Romi, and Conor and Zana—in order to win a cash prize.

But not long after they arrive on the deserted island, things start to go wrong. After the first challenge leaves everyone rattled and angry, an overnight storm takes matters from bad to worse.

Cut off from the mainland by miles of ocean, deprived of their phones, and unable to contact the crew that brought them there, the group must band together for survival.

As tensions run high and fresh water runs low, Lyla finds that this game show is all too real—and the stakes are life or death.

A fast-paced, spellbinding thriller rife with intrigue and characters that feel so true to life, this novel proves yet again that Ruth Ware is the queen of psychological suspense.

One Perfect Couple was published on May 21, 2024, from Scout Press.

Other TV Books to Read This Summer

These aren’t technically reality television or competition show books, but they’re definitely TV-focused books on my list.

• It’s a Love Story by Annabel Monaghan
• Mrs. Nash’s Ashes by Sarah Adler
• Mister Magic by Kiersten White

If you like reading books about child actors years later, the dark side of “sitcom” life, or you want a horror/thriller that has to do with a television show, check out these titles.

Mister Magic looks especially creepy. Mrs. Nash’s Ashes was a wonderful surprise; I loved that book so much.

Immersive “Popcorn Read” Books for the Summer

Since finally embracing the “popcorn read” for summer—seriously, who said we had to read highbrow or super literary books all the time?!—I’m excited to read allllll the books about reality TV!

It’s my guilty pleasure, but I’m learning guilty pleasures don’t have to be a thing. Let’s read and watch what we enjoy, right?! 😂 Let me know what you’ve read from this list or if you recommend any others!