A spot on a bestseller list tells you how many people bought a book. It doesn’t tell you whether anyone enjoyed it. Sometimes the gap between sales and reviews is wide enough to be worth noticing.
The six books below are all recent or well known, and each drew sharp or divided reviews. Their commercial records vary, so each section says what is actually documented. Where critics disagreed, I’ve said so.
107 Days by Kamala Harris
Harris’s account of her short lived 2024 White House bid sold 350,000 copies in its first week, according to Simon & Schuster. It was set to debut at number one on the New York Times nonfiction list. Few memoirs in this category start that strongly.
The reviews were far less settled than the sales. The book has been a commercial success, though some have criticized its content. Lit Hub’s Book Marks roundup of 2025 put it among the year’s harshest pans, so the case for skipping it rests on a handful of critics, not a consensus.
Twice by Mitch Albom
Albom doesn’t need an introduction to bookstore shoppers. His books have collectively sold more than forty million copies in forty eight languages. Twice carries the New York Times bestseller label.
One review collected by Book Marks was unusually unkind. The reviewer wrote that it was astonishing an author with such sales could still produce lines that feel synthetic and recycled. The plot has a man travel back in time to change a choice, and the reviewer decided one trip through it was plenty.
American Canto by Olivia Nuzzi
This memoir drew a lot of attention before publication. It explored the journalist’s “love” for Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Reviewers were not kind to it.
One critic called it illegible in ways you can’t imagine. Sales did not follow the publicity either. Forbes reported that Vanity Fair split with Nuzzi while the heavily hyped book seemed a bust. That makes it a skip on two counts, though it never reached bestseller territory.
For One More Day by Mitch Albom
This one is older, but it shows how a book can top the charts and still split critics. It was the most frequent weekly bestseller of 2006, with six weeks at the top of the list. That is a serious run.
Critics gave the book polarised reviews. One magazine profile called it a syrupy concoction and noted that it went on sale a week early in Starbucks. Readers who like sentimental fiction may disagree with the verdict, which is the point of polarised reviews.
Summer of Our Discontent by Thomas Chatterton Williams
This 2025 book about certainty and the decline of public argument got a mixed reception. The Times reviewed it positively, calling it clever and compelling. Kirkus described it as a thoughtfully reasoned contribution to writing on race.
Other critics disagreed. The New York Times gave it a negative review, saying the analysis lacks proportion. I found no sales data showing it as a bestseller, so treat this as a book that divided critics, not one critics agree you can skip.
We Live Here Now by C.D. Rose
This 2025 story collection shows how critics can part ways with prize judges. It consists of fourteen short stories centered on an experimental artist and a mysterious exhibition of hers. The New York Times was negative, calling it too clever by half.
The book did well with another audience. It was awarded the 2025 Goldsmiths Prize. It is not a bestseller either, so it works as a caution: one pan, even from a big outlet, doesn’t settle whether a book is worth your time.
The Takeaway
Of these six, only 107 Days, Twice and For One More Day have clear bestseller records, and critics were split on most of them. Sales and reviews rarely line up neatly, so a single pan isn’t a reliable reason to skip a book.
