After reading through publisher notes, sample chapters, and entire books (books that delayed me from writing this post because I couldn’t put them down!!), I am excited to present my summer reading list.
This eclectic list includes several thrillers, some environmental dystopia, a drama about love in Hollywood, new WWII fiction, long-lost stories of F. Scott Fitzgerald, and more. I have covered all my reading personalities and thus included something for everyone. I will update this post with links as I read these books and add my own reviews.
You can click on the titles or pictures for more information or to buy the book from Amazon. Happy summer reading!
Here’s what I’ll be reading this summer and why these particular books caught my attention (the publisher’s notes and testimonials are in block quotes):
This – a cop novel/thriller – is an interesting pick for me but I read a sample chapter about a drug bust and got hooked. Reading about the grit of NYC intrigues me. This person’s recommendation may be more powerful than my own:
“The Force is mesmerizing, a triumph. Think The Godfather, only with cops. It’s that good.”
— Stephen King
“The Force is mesmerizing, a triumph. Think The Godfather, only with cops. It’s that good.” The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo: A Novel
UPDATE: Click here to read my new post/review on this book. 
“…a legendary film actress reflects on her relentless rise to the top and the risks she took, the loves she lost, and the long-held secrets the public could never imagine.”
A friend asked me to read this to see what I thought. It is getting good reviews as homage to Agatha Christie novels. I have not read her novels so I am not sure I will get it but I’m going to try. The structure is apparently a novel inside a novel – and as I have posted about before, I love me some good intertexuality.
UPDATE: Read my post recommending this book.
“Masterful, clever, and relentlessly suspenseful, Magpie Murders is a deviously dark take on vintage English crime fiction in which the reader becomes the detective.”
This is a pick for my fellow Charlotte Bronte fans as this novel is from the perspective of Edward Fairfax Rochester, one of literature’s most romantic, most complex, and most mysterious heroes as the husband of Jane Eyre.
“MR. ROCHESTER is a great, sweeping, classic coming-of-age story, and a stirring tale of adventure, romance, and deceit. Faithful in every particular to Brontë’s original yet full of unexpected twists and riveting behind-the-scenes drama, this novel will completely, deliciously, and forever change how we read and remember Jane Eyre.”
This is another “thriller” – I am moving outside my comfort zone this summer!! I read some sample chapters became intrigued about who these people are hiding from and what does it have to do with the solar eclipse? This is a timely novel with another solar eclipse set for later this summer!
UPDATE: Read my review of he said/she said here.
“A tour de force – a gripping, twisting, furiously clever read that asks all the right questions, and keeps you guessing until the very end. I loved it.” –Ruth Ware, bestselling author of The Woman in Cabin 10
This is a dystopian read abou
“An audacious and powerful debut novel: a second American Civil War, a devastating plague, and one family caught deep in the middle—a story that asks what might happen if America were to turn its most devastating policies and deadly weapons upon itself.”
This is another book set among dystopian environmental devastation. Yes, I am trying to scare people!!
“As London is submerged below flood waters, a woman gives birth to her first child, Z. Days later, she and her baby are forced to leave their home in search of safety. They head north through a newly dangerous country seeking refuge from place to place. The story traces fear and wonder, as the baby grows, thriving and content against all the odds.”
This work of historical fiction will be an addition to my WWII reading list. It addresses our country’s racism during WWII.
“Judy Reene Singer’s newest novel is a masterful story of the American experience. Between the past and present, between love and war, between the burdens of race and hope, a woman returns home to discover her father and a history she had never known…”
If the Creek Don’t Rise: A Novel
This is set in Appalachia, a town filled with “moonshine and rotten husbands.” My recent reading of Hillbilly Elegy put this book on my list.
UPDATE: Read my review/blog tour post on this book here.
I’d Die For You: And Other Lost Stories
Readers of this blog know I am a big fan of F. Scott Fitzgerald and The Great Gatsby, book and most recent movie. So when some “lost stories” emerge of course I need to read them!
“I’d Die For You is a collection of the last remaining unpublished and uncollected short stories by F. Scott Fitzgerald, edited by Anne Margaret Daniel. Fitzgerald did not design the stories in I’d Die For You as a collection. Most were submitted individually to major magazines during the 1930s and accepted for publication during Fitzgerald’s lifetime, but were never printed. Some were written as movie scenarios and sent to studios or producers, but not filmed.”
I first read and loved Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children in a 20th Century British Literature class. (The syllabus for this class was one of my favorite, ever. I need to dig that up and write a post on that syllabus!) Anyway, we’ll see if this book may belong on a graduate English syllabus as well. I’m in the middle of it now and my verdict is still out.
“A modern American epic set against the panorama of contemporary politics and culture—a hurtling, page-turning mystery that is equal parts The Great Gatsby and The Bonfire of the Vanities.“
This memoir about food, weight, and self-image seems so raw and honest.
UPDATE: Click here to read my post/review of this book.
“From the New York Times best-selling author of Bad Feminist, a searingly honest memoir of food, weight, self-image, and learning how to feed your hunger while taking care of yourself.”
Along the lines of the previous book about food and weight, this selection is Young Adult (YA) novel about anorexia, and admittedly not something that would typically be on my list. But I know the author and want to read it so I can recommend to my YA readers, librarians, and those who buy books for teenagers. It chronicles an important issue that I want to support.
Driving Miss Norma: One Family’s Journey Saying “Yes” to Living
This book looks fun and life affirming. It is based on a blog this 90-year-old woman wrote about tacking her bucket list while battling cancer.
Infused with this irrepressible nonagenarian’s wisdom, courage, and generous spirit, Driving Miss Norma is the charming, infectiously joyous chronicle of their experiences on the road. It portrays a transformative journey of living life on your own terms that shows us that it is never too late to begin an adventure, inspire hope, or become a trailblazer.
This is a thriller I already read and wrote about this summer. I picked it up because it is by the author of All The Missing Girls, last summer’s sensation.
The Women in the Castle: A Novel
I already read this book earlier in the summer. It completed my WWII reading list (for the time being.)
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Great recommendations Leslie! I’m looking forward to reading Women in the Castle but it’s always checked out when I’m at the library!
Yes, I think you will like that one. Does your library take requests? I always have several things requested. I have to wait awhile but it sometimes comes available before I’m ready after all or several things come in at once!
Thanks for entering Grace! Good luck!! That was such a good read!!