Author: Stephanie

Library Closed for Independence Day / 4th of July

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All three Davenport Public Library locations are closed on Tuesday, July 4th in observance of Independence Day. We will be open for regular hours and services on Wednesday, July 5th.

Even though Independence Day is a largely celebrated holiday, I wanted to focus on some smaller known holidays. I found a list on Holidays and Observances website, but I’m going to focus on a few!

Alice in Wonderland Day – Supposedly this is the day that Lewis Carroll, real name – Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, originally told his story to Alice Liddell for the first time before he wrote it down. This first telling would eventually become Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.

Boom Box Parade Day – In 1986, the local high school of Willimantic, Connecticut had to make budget cuts, which meant there would be no band to play in the July 4th parade. The local radio station 1400 AM WILI volunteered to play music instead. Now hundreds of people march through town with boom boxes tuned to WILI, which plays marching band classics.

Independence from Meat Day – According to sources, this day was created by the Vegetarian Awareness Network in Tennessee with the aim to take a day off from consuming meat. The irony that it takes place on a holiday marked by barbecues is not lost on me.

Sidewalk Egg Frying Day  – Every July 4th, a town in Arizona has an egg frying contest. The catch? You have to fry an egg outside without any electricity or fire! You can use mirrors or magnifying glasses though. Have you ever fried an egg on a sidewalk before?

I hope you’ve enjoyed this dive into unique July 4th traditions and holidays. If you any other favorites, share them in the comments below!

 

 

Online Reading Challenge – July

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Welcome Readers!

This month the Online Reading Challenge travels to suburbia. According to the Cambridge Dictionary, suburbia is ‘the outer parts of a town, where there are houses, but no large stores, places of work, or places of entertainment’. Miriam-Webster defines suburbs as ‘a smaller community adjacent to or within commuting distance of a city OR the residential area on the outskirts of a city or large town’. There are so many suburbia options for you to read, watch, or listen to! I can’t wait!

Our Main title for July is The Dutch House by Ann Patchett. Here’s a quick summary from the publisher.

Ann Patchett, the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Commonwealth, delivers her most powerful novel to date: a richly moving story that explores the indelible bond between two siblings, the house of their childhood, and a past that will not let them go. The Dutch House is the story of a paradise lost, a tour de force that digs deeply into questions of inheritance, love and forgiveness, of how we want to see ourselves and of who we really are.

At the end of the Second World War, Cyril Conroy combines luck and a single canny investment to begin an enormous real estate empire, propelling his family from poverty to enormous wealth. His first order of business is to buy the Dutch House, a lavish estate in the suburbs outside of Philadelphia. Meant as a surprise for his wife, the house sets in motion the undoing of everyone he loves.

The story is told by Cyril’s son Danny, as he and his older sister, the brilliantly acerbic and self-assured Maeve, are exiled from the house where they grew up by their stepmother. The two wealthy siblings are thrown back into the poverty their parents had escaped from and find that all they have to count on is one another. It is this unshakeable bond between them that both saves their lives and thwarts their futures.

Set over the course of five decades, The Dutch House is a dark fairy tale about two smart people who cannot overcome their past. Despite every outward sign of success, Danny and Maeve are only truly comfortable when they’re together. Throughout their lives they return to the well-worn story of what they’ve lost with humor and rage. But when at last they’re forced to confront the people who left them behind, the relationship between an indulged brother and his ever-protective sister is finally tested.

This title is also available as large print, CD audiobook, Playaway audiobook, Libby eBook, and Libby eAudiobook.

As always, check each of our locations for displays with lots more titles to choose from!

Online Reading Challenge – June Wrap-Up

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Hello Fellow Challenge Readers!

How did your reading go this month? Did you read something set in Australia that you enjoyed? Share in the comments!

I read our main title: The Light Between Oceans by M.L. Stedman. This book tore my heart out. The more I read, the more I was invested in what was going on in everyone’s lives. The prose is absolutely beautiful as the author describes the remote island setting (and all the other locations in the book). Honestly, I love any books set in Australia, especially narrators with Australian accents, so this was an almost guaranteed enjoyment for me. Let’s talk about the book!

Tom Sherbourn is a young World War I vet described by others as responsible, upstanding, and stalwart. The war ravaged him emotionally. After the war, Tom finds a job as a light-keeper on isolated Janus Rock off the western coast of Australia. During one of his shore leaves, Tom meets Isabel. Isabel is young and free-spirited. The two are soon married and set up house on Janus Rock to begin their life together as starry-eyed new lovers. Janus Rock is gorgeous. Tom starts to heal amongst the silence, solitude, and rumblings of the sea. The thing that would make their life complete is a baby, something that Isabel longs for intensely. Over several years, Isabel suffers two miscarriages and a devastating stillbirth. The couple are crushed.

One day a small boat washes up on Janus Rock. The two are stunned to find a dead body and a very much alive infant in the boat. Tom is required to record and report everything that happens on Janus Rock, but Isabel persuades a very reluctant Tom to not do so in this case. She reasons that the baby is most likely an orphan now. Isabel believes that this is a sign from the universe to reward them after the years of heartbreak the two have suffered in their attempts to have a child. Tom buries the dead man, sets the boat adrift, and tells himself the two are doing the right thing, although his conscience eats at him as time passes.

Tom, Isabel, and the baby have an almost perfect life on Janus Rock. Their trips back to shore to visit Isabel’s family however start to worry even more at Tom’s conscience. He broke the rules and omitted important information from his reports, something that could end his career and lead to him facing formal charges. Tom’s misgivings haunt him and soon enough, his worries actually amount to something. Their idyllic life comes crashing down. The family is forced to deal with the consequences of Tom and Isabel’s actions. Nothing will be the same.

I wasn’t sure what I expected when I started this book, but I was pleasantly surprised. I had never read this before (or seen the movie starring Michael Fassbender, Alicia Vikander, and Rachel Weisz). The depth of emotion presented through written words tore at my heart. As I was reading, I thought I was going to be sympathetic one way, but reading from multiple points of view really had me second-guessing my judgments and feelings. I find myself thinking about this book long after I finished it – wondering what choices I would have made if I had been put in a similar position. This book, to me, was a good reminder that you never know what a person is going through. Everyone has their own reasons for doing something and just because you wouldn’t necessarily behave a certain way doesn’t mean that someone else won’t. All in all, I enjoyed this book and found myself running through a wide range of emotions as I listened.

In July we’re headed to suburbia!

Flung Out of Space by Grace Ellis and Hannah Templer

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This is a story I believe is worth telling. That being said, I want to be clear: The protagonist of this story is not a good person. In fact, Patricia Highsmith was an appalling person. – Grace Ellis, author’s note in the beginning of Flung Out of Space

Flung Out of Space: Inspired by the Indecent Adventures of Patricia Highsmith by Grace Ellis and illustrated by Hannah Templer was a book that had my feelings twisted multiple directions. Patricia Highsmith is problematic. She was a comic book writer and a lesbian during a time when those things were very much frowned upon and seen of as wrong and immoral. Pat’s own feelings towards herself are not positive – she goes through conversion therapy during the book. She is portrayed more as an antihero that readers aren’t sure how they should feel towards. Throughout this book, she is portrayed as bitter, caustic, and lashes out to anyone who gets too close. Pat is deeply flawed. This graphic novel is full of casual sexism, a male-dominated hierarchy, antisemitism, and prejudice against homosexuality. The swirling issues surrounding homosexuality are never really called attention to, but instead are present in Pat’s intense self-loathing of herself amongst other things. Hence my twisty feelings.

This graphic novel begins with Pat working as a writer of low-brow comics. She knows she can do better, but doesn’t do so. She drinks, smokes, and generally goes about life with an immensely surly attitude. As she goes about her day to day, Pat is consumed with thoughts of the novel she should be writing, which will eventually become Strangers on a Train, which will then be adapted into a film by Alfred Hitchcock in 1951.

While she works to write Strangers on a Train, Pat is consumed with self-hatred as she battles the fact that she is a lesbian. She tries conversion therapy, which instead provides her with more women to love and leave. One of those encounters plants the seed of another book in Pat’s head: a story of homosexual love that would give the lesbian protagonists a happy ending – a first! (this would eventually become the book, The Price of Salt).

As I talking about before, this title gave me conflicting emotions. Pat became an unintentional queer icon, but also held incredibly problematic views on multiple topics which made her legacy controversial. It’s a good read, but please read with care.

Sensory: Life on the Spectrum edited by Rebecca Ollerton

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Sensory: Life on the Spectrum: An Autistic Comics Anthology edited by Rebecca Ollerton was organized for autism acceptance month in 2021. It started as a Kickstarter campaign and was eventually traditionally published with Andrews McMeel and circulated around the world. Now that we’ve talked the nitty-gritty, let’s get into how/why this title caught my eye.

First off, I am a sucker for comics anthologies. I love being introduced to new writers’ styles and seeing what they choose to focus on. Thirty autistic creators contributed to this anthology, talking about a wide variety of topics related to autism and their own journeys, such as self-diagnosis, masking, and autistic joy. This isn’t a graphic novel talking JUST about the happy though. Many of the autistic people in this book do share how they love their life or how they have come to accept that autism is an inherent part of who they are. However, there are also stories from artists sharing their discomfort (or at times, their hatred) of being autistic. I appreciated that this story shared stories from a wide variety of experiences. I also loved how there were multiple different autistic perspectives shared and how they didn’t agree on the ‘correct’ autistic terminology. The different experiences, perspectives, and emotions made this book more realistic and authentic to me versus if it had been exclusively positive or negative.

Second, I found this title in our Literacy Collection when I was looking for resources on autism from autistic people. I specifically was looking for input on identity first language(autistic person) vs people first language(person with autism). I had found a resource from the Autistic Not Weird Autism Survey 2022 that talked about how the majority of autistic people prefer identity first language. It’s been an interesting research journey and I wanted to see where this book would take me.

Third, I wanted to see how perspectives were highlighted in the neurodivergent world versus how they perceive the allistic(people not on the autism spectrum) world. Emotions ran high in some of the stories, which is necessary as those emotions can be healing and start new conversations. I also wanted to check my privileges and perceptions as an allistic person and see how I can adjust my actions to be more inclusive. This book was an interesting read as it had something for every different neurotype. Definite recommend if you want to expand your thinking and inclusiveness.

Sensory: Life on the Spectrum can be found in the Literacy Collection at our Main and Fairmount Street locations.

Time Travel Books

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Time travel books are one of my favorite types of fiction to read (Here’s looking at you, Diana Gabaldon’s Outlander series). The real world can only move forward in a straight line, but thankfully there are time travel books where authors play with time as much as they want without worrying about physics. They play with time loops, time slips, and plots similar to Groundhog Day. Below I’ve gathered some of my favorite time travel books, as well as ones that are on my to-read list. Descriptions are provided by the publishers. Share your favorites in the comments below!

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Oona Out of Order by Margarita Montimore

A remarkably inventive novel that explores what it means to live a life fully in the moment, even if those moments are out of order.

It’s New Year’s Eve 1982, and Oona Lockhart has her whole life before her. At the stroke of midnight she will turn nineteen, and the year ahead promises to be one of consequence. Should she go to London to study economics, or remain at home in Brooklyn to pursue her passion for music and be with her boyfriend? As the countdown to the New Year begins, Oona faints and awakens thirty-two years in the future in her fifty-one-year-old body. Greeted by a friendly stranger in a beautiful house she’s told is her own, Oona learns that with each passing year she will leap to another age at random. And so begins Oona Out of Order…

Hopping through decades, pop culture fads, and much-needed stock tips, Oona is still a young woman on the inside but ever changing on the outside. Who will she be next year? Philanthropist? Club Kid? World traveler? Wife to a man she’s never met? Surprising, magical, and heart-wrenching, Margarita Montimore has crafted an unforgettable story about the burdens of time, the endurance of love, and the power of family.

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This is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone

From award-winning authors Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone comes an enthralling, romantic novel spanning time and space about two time-traveling rivals who fall in love and must change the past to ensure their future.

Among the ashes of a dying world, an agent of the Commandment finds a letter. It reads: Burn before reading.

Thus begins an unlikely correspondence between two rival agents hellbent on securing the best possible future for their warring factions. Now, what began as a taunt, a battlefield boast, becomes something more. Something epic. Something romantic. Something that could change the past and the future.

Except the discovery of their bond would mean the death of each of them. There’s still a war going on, after all. And someone has to win. That’s how war works, right?

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The Seven Year Slip by Ashley Poston

An overworked book publicist with a perfectly planned future hits a snag when she falls in love with her temporary roommate…only to discover he lives seven years in the past, in this witty and wise new novel from the New York Times bestselling author of The Dead Romantics.

Sometimes, the worst day of your life happens, and you have to figure out how to live after it.

So Clementine forms a plan to keep her heart safe: work hard, find someone decent to love, and try to remember to chase the moon. The last one is silly and obviously metaphorical, but her aunt always told her that you needed at least one big dream to keep going. And for the last year, that plan has gone off without a hitch. Mostly. The love part is hard because she doesn’t want to get too close to anyone—she isn’t sure her heart can take it.

And then she finds a strange man standing in the kitchen of her late aunt’s apartment. A man with kind eyes and a Southern drawl and a taste for lemon pies. The kind of man that, before it all, she would’ve fallen head-over-heels for. And she might again.

Except, he exists in the past. Seven years ago, to be exact. And she, quite literally, lives seven years in his future.

Her aunt always said the apartment was a pinch in time, a place where moments blended together like watercolors. And Clementine knows that if she lets her heart fall, she’ll be doomed.

After all, love is never a matter of time—but a matter of timing.

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Faye, Faraway by Helen Fisher

Every night, as Faye puts her daughters to bed, she thinks of her own mother, Jeanie, who died when Faye was eight. The pain of that loss has never left her, and that’s why she wants her own girls to know how very much they are loved by her—and always will be, whatever happens.

Then one day, Faye gets her heart’s desire when she’s whisked back into the past and is reunited not just with her mother but with her own younger self.

Jeanie doesn’t recognize grown-up Faye as her daughter, even though there is something eerily familiar about her. But the two women become close friends and share all kinds of secrets—except for the deepest secret of all, the secret of who Faye really is. Faye worries that telling the truth may prevent her from being able to return to the present day, to her dear husband and beloved daughters. Eventually she’ll have to choose between those she loved in the past and those she loves in the here and now, and that knowledge presents her with an impossible choice.

If only she didn’t have to make it….

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Maybe Next Time by Cesca Major

It is an ordinary Monday and harried London literary agent Emma is flying out of the door as usual. Preoccupied with work and her ever growing to-do list, she fails to notice her lovely husband Dan seems bereft, her son can barely meet her eye, and her daughter won’t go near her. Even the dog seems sad.

She is far too busy, buried deep in her phone; social media alerts pinging; clients messaging with “emergencies”; keeping track of a dozen WhatsApp groups about the kids’ sports, school, playdates, all of it. Her whole day is frantic—what else is new—and as she rushes back through the door for dinner, Dan is still upset. They fight, and he walks out, desolate, dragging their poor dog around the block. Just as she realizes it is their anniversary and she has forgotten, again, she hears the screech of brakes.

Dan is dead.

The next day Emma wakes up… and Dan is alive. And it’s Monday again.

And again.

And again.

Emma tries desperately to change the course of fate by doing different things each time she wakes up: leaving WhatsApp, telling her boss where to get off, writing to Dan, listening to her kids, reaching out to forgotten friends, getting drunk and buying out Prada. But will Emma have the chance to find herself again, remember what she likes about her job, reconnect with her children, love her husband? Will this be enough to change the fate they seem destined for?

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Five First Chances by Sarah Jost

What would you do if you had one more chance for the life of your dreams?

Lou feels like she is stuck on the wrong path: alone, in a city far from home, watching other people be happy. When the man she’s in love with announces his engagement to someone else, Lou is consumed by ‘what ifs’.

That’s when she finds herself slipping back in time to a night two years ago, where one small decision changed everything…

Suddenly, Lou has a chance to fix her mistakes. But as her choices lead her down roads she never could have imagined, she finds herself stuck in a time loop of her own making. And with each slip, Lou notices her life intersecting with one person again and again. A friend of a friend who once lived on the periphery, who is slowly becoming the one person who makes her feel like she might finally be on the right track.

Lou is about to realize that our greatest love stories aren’t always the ones we expected, but are the ones we choose to fight for.

For anyone who has ever felt stuck on the wrong path comes a stunning, time-bending love story that challenges what it means to get things “right,” the kind of book that will pull at your heartstrings and make you realize that if you just open yourself up to the possibilities, our world is full of inspiring people poised to change everything…and you might just be one of them.

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What the Wind Knows by Amy Harmon

In an unforgettable love story, a woman’s impossible journey through the ages could change everything . . .

Anne Gallagher grew up enchanted by her grandfather’s stories of Ireland. Heartbroken at his death, she travels to his childhood home to spread his ashes. There, overcome with memories of the man she adored and consumed by a history she never knew, she is pulled into another time.

The Ireland of 1921, teetering on the edge of war, is a dangerous place in which to awaken. But there Anne finds herself, hurt, disoriented, and under the care of Dr. Thomas Smith, guardian to a young boy who is oddly familiar. Mistaken for the boy’s long-missing mother, Anne adopts her identity, convinced the woman’s disappearance is connected to her own.

​As tensions rise, Thomas joins the struggle for Ireland’s independence and Anne is drawn into the conflict beside him. Caught between history and her heart, she must decide whether she’s willing to let go of the life she knew for a love she never thought she’d find. But in the end, is the choice actually hers to make?

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Here and Now and Then by Mike Chen

To save his daughter, he’ll go anywhere—and any-when…

Kin Stewart is an everyday family man: working in I.T., trying to keep the spark in his marriage, struggling to connect with his teenage daughter, Miranda. But his current life is a far cry from his previous career…as a time-traveling secret agent from 2142.

Stranded in suburban San Francisco since the 1990s after a botched mission, Kin has kept his past hidden from everyone around him, despite the increasing blackouts and memory loss affecting his time-traveler’s brain. Until one afternoon, his “rescue” team arrives—eighteen years too late.

Their mission: return Kin to 2142 where he’s only been gone weeks, not years, and where another family is waiting for him. A family he can’t remember.

Torn between two lives, Kin is desperate for a way to stay connected to both. But when his best efforts threaten to destroy the agency and even history itself, his daughter’s very existence is at risk. It’ll take one final trip across time to save Miranda—even if it means breaking all the rules of time travel in the process.

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Sea of Tranquility  by Emily St. John Mandel

Edwin St. Andrew is eighteen years old when he crosses the Atlantic by steamship, exiled from polite society following an ill-conceived diatribe at a dinner party. He enters the forest, spellbound by the beauty of the Canadian wilderness, and suddenly hears the notes of a violin echoing in an airship terminal—an experience that shocks him to his core.

Two centuries later a famous writer named Olive Llewellyn is on a book tour. She’s traveling all over Earth, but her home is the second moon colony, a place of white stone, spired towers, and artificial beauty. Within the text of Olive’s best-selling pandemic novel lies a strange passage: a man plays his violin for change in the echoing corridor of an airship terminal as the trees of a forest rise around him.

When Gaspery-Jacques Roberts, a detective in the black-skied Night City, is hired to investigate an anomaly in the North American wilderness, he uncovers a series of lives upended: The exiled son of an earl driven to madness, a writer trapped far from home as a pandemic ravages Earth, and a childhood friend from the Night City who, like Gaspery himself, has glimpsed the chance to do something extraordinary that will disrupt the timeline of the universe.

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Long Division by Kiese Laymon

Written in a voice that’s alternately humorous, lacerating, and wise, Long Division features two interwoven stories. In the first, it’s 2013: after an on-stage meltdown during a nationally televised quiz contest, fourteen-year-old Citoyen “City” Coldson becomes an overnight YouTube celebrity. The next day, he’s sent to stay with his grandmother in the small coastal community of Melahatchie, where a young girl named Baize Shephard has recently disappeared.

Before leaving, City is given a strange book without an author called Long Division. He learns that one of the book’s main characters is also named City Coldson—but Long Division is set in 1985. This 1985-version of City, along with his friend and love interest, Shalaya Crump, discovers a way to travel into the future, and steals a laptop and cellphone from an orphaned teenage rapper called…Baize Shephard. They ultimately take these items with them all the way back to 1964, to help another time-traveler they meet to protect his family from the Ku Klux Klan. City’s two stories ultimately converge in the work shed behind his grandmother’s house, where he discovers the key to Baize’s disappearance.

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Have you read any of these time travel books? Do you have any favorites? Share in the comments below.

Ronan and the Endless Sea of Stars written by Rick Louis and illustrated by Lara Antal

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Trigger warning for child loss.

It’s seldom that I read a book that leaves me in tears. Ronan and the Endless Sea of Stars written by Rick Louis and illustrated by Lara Antal emotionally devastated me and tore out my heart. This graphic novel memoir tells the story of one parent’s journey caring for his son with a terminal diagnosis. Rick Louis beautifully wrote this story about his life, while Lara Antal illustrated his words with sensitivity. The pallet of blues, whites, and blacks is breathtaking and tenderly adds to the story of the before, during, and after his son’s life.

Rick and Emily were overjoyed when she became pregnant. After their son Ronan was born and as his development progressed, they noticed a slight issue with his vision that necessitated a trip to the doctor. That visit led them down a rabbit hole of other doctors and ended with a devastating diagnosis for Ronan. Ronan has Tay-Sachs, an incurable neurological disorder. Rick and Emily have to deal with the practical issues of raising their son, while also paired with the emotional hurdles of loving their son under the shadow of their inevitable loss and his inevitable death. They are trapped in an impossible situation with very little positives.

This book was heartbreaking, yet told beautifully by a father destroyed by the loss of his young son. I strongly recommend this book (though have the tissues ready). While this story is sad, Rick also lightens his telling with comedy paired with gorgeous artwork. It’s full of warmth and heartbreak, sorrow and joy, as Rick discusses the importance of finding joy no matter how your life is at the moment.

More Than You’ll Ever Know by Katie Gutierrez

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“When we’re shocked someone isn’t who we thought they were, it’s usually not because they hid it so well—more like, the closer we are to a person, the less clearly we see them.”
― Katie Gutierrez, More Than You’ll Ever Know

My latest read was a book that caught my attention because of the cover and then hooked me completely with the synopsis. More Than You’ll Ever Know by Katie Gutierrez tells the story of a woman leading a double life, her exposure after one husband murders the other, and the true-crime writer who stumbles upon the story and becomes obsessed with figuring out the truth. This was a dream book for me.

Cassie Bowman is a true crime writer. She spends her days looking up crimes and writing up articles for a popular blog. One day, she comes across the story of Lore Rivera, a woman who was married to two men at once, until one day in 1986, when one of them found out about the other and murdered him. Lore was living a secret double life that ended in a tragic murder. While the story is fascinating, that wasn’t what caught Cassie’s attention. She wants to know more about Lore. After all, Cassie’s past was full of family tragedy. She wants to know how Lore kept up with the lies, how she balanced two full lives, and most of all, what really happened that disastrous day.

Cassie starts researching, reaching out to family members. When she approaches Lore, she’s surprised to find that Lore is willing to talk. She wants to finally tell her story, to set the record straight about what really happened, to detail her reasons. Lore’s tale begins with a dance which led to an affair, a marriage, and a murder. Lore isn’t telling her secrets for free though. For every question she answers, she demands something in return from Cassie. Soon Cassie is spilling her own deep, dark secrets whether she wants to or not. As her investigation continues, Cassie realizes that Lore may be hiding what actually happened the night of the murder. The truth may end up being messier than she thought, leading both women to have to decide if they can trust the other with the truth.

As Cassie says in the book, it’s usually the men who do the crime and the women who pay for it. This time, Lore was the one who set the crimes in motion. The news usually focuses on men as the perpetrators, so reading about a, albeit fictional, woman who did the crime was a nice break. Seeing the story play out from multiple different viewpoints also let me feel like I might eventually learn the truth, while also seeing the motivations for why people behaved the way that they did.

“History is written by those who have power and want to keep it.”
― Katie Gutierrez, More Than You’ll Ever Know

This title is also available as a Libby eBook and in large print.

Summer Reads 2023

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Let’s celebrate the official first day of summer with some new summer reads! We’ve gathered up a list of adult fiction titles with the word summer in the title that have been released in 2023. The descriptions have been provided by the publishers.

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Bad Summer People by Emma Rosenblum

None of them would claim to be a particularly good person. But who among them is actually capable of murder?

Jen Weinstein and Lauren Parker rule the town of Salcombe, Fire Island every summer. They hold sway on the beach and the tennis court, and are adept at manipulating people to get what they want. Their husbands, Sam and Jason, have summered together on the island since childhood, despite lifelong grudges and numerous secrets. Their one single friend, Rachel Woolf, is looking to meet her match, whether he’s the tennis pro—or someone else’s husband. But even with plenty to gossip about, this season starts out as quietly as any other.

Until a body is discovered, face down, off the side of the boardwalk.

Stylish, subversive, and darkly comedic, this is a story of what’s lurking under the surface of picture-perfect lives in a place where everyone has something to hide.

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Same Time Next Summer by Annabel Monaghan

Beach Rules:
Do take long walks on the sand.
Do put an umbrella in every cocktail.
Do NOT run into your first love.

Sam’s life is on track. She has the perfect doctor fiancé, Jack (his strict routines are a good thing, really), a great job in Manhattan (unless they fire her), and is about to tour a wedding venue near her family’s Long Island beach house. Everything should go to plan, yet the minute she arrives, Sam senses something is off. Wyatt is here. Her Wyatt. But there’s no reason for a thirty-year-old engaged woman to feel panicked around the guy who broke her heart when she was seventeen. Right?

Yet being back at this beach, hearing notes from Wyatt’s guitar float across the night air from next door as if no time has passed—Sam’s memories come flooding back: the feel of Wyatt’s skin on hers, their nights in the treehouse, and the truth behind their split. Sam remembers who she used to be, and as Wyatt reenters her life their connection is as undeniable as it always was. She will have to make a choice.

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All the Days of Summer by Nancy Thayer

Heather Willette has a good life in Concord, Massachusetts. But when her marriage has fizzles out, Heather has to decide what sort of life to live next. Ready to seek out her own happiness and discover herself again, Heather decides to leave her husband and rent a cottage on Nantucket. And her plan is going perfectly—until her son, Ross, announces he’s moving to Nantucket to work at his girlfriend’s family’s construction business instead of going back home to work with his own father, like he’d promised. Worst of all for Heather, this means having to get along with her.

Kailee Essex is thrilled that Ross is willing to move to her hometown. She has big hopes for their happily ever after, especially now that her parents are finally showing interest in her career. She’s less thrilled, however, about his mother living nearby. Kailee has clashed with Heather since the day they met. But anything is possible in the summer sun and sea breezes of Nantucket—even reconciliation. And when change comes sooner than either Heather or Kailee expect, they must learn to overcome their differences to fight for the future they want.

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Summer Stage by Meg Mitchell Moore

Amy Trevino, a former aspiring playwright, has stayed close to her Rhode Island hometown while her famous brother, Timothy Fleming, pursued and achieved his Hollywood dreams. Now a high school English teacher and occasional drama director, Amy takes on the production manager role for her brother’s play in an effort to mend rifting family relationships.

Sam, Amy’s daughter, was a Disney child star who continued her pursuit for fame in a Manhattan TikTok house. Now she’s returned home unexpectedly. Her sudden arrival is shrouded in secrets, and Sam refuses to open up to her mother, deciding instead to join her uncle on Block Island for the summer.

Timothy, a successful and well-loved actor, is directing a summer production at a storied Block Island theater—and his famous ex-wife has the lead role.

As they work together to ensure the production is a success, Amy, Sam, and Timothy are forced to grapple with their desires for recognition and fortune, stand up for what they believe art and fame actually mean, and discover what they really want out of life.

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Summer Reading by Jenn McKinlay

For Samantha Gale, a summer on Martha’s Vineyard at her family’s tiny cottage was supposed to be about resurrecting her career as a chef, until she’s tasked with chaperoning her half-brother, Tyler. The teenage brainiac is spending his summer at the local library in a robotics competition, and there’s no place Sam, who has dyslexia, likes less than the library. And because the universe hates her, the library’s interim director turns out to be the hot-reader guy whose book she accidentally destroyed on the ferry ride to the island.

Bennett Reynolds is on a quest to find his father, whose identity he’s never known. He’s taken the temporary job on the island to research the summer his mother spent there when she got pregnant with him. Ben tells himself he isn’t interested in a relationship right now. Yet as soon as Sam knocks his book into the ocean, he can’t stop thinking about her.

An irresistible attraction blossoms when Ben inspires Sam to create the cookbook she’s always dreamed about and she jumps all in on helping him find his father, and soon they realize their summer fling may heat up into a happily ever after.

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The Comeback Summer by Ali Brady

Hannah and Libby need a miracle. The PR agency they inherited from their grandmother is losing clients left and right, and the sisters are devastated at the thought of closing. The situation seems hopeless—until in walks Lou, an eccentric self-help guru who is looking for a new PR agency. Her business could solve all their problems—but there’s a catch. Whoever works with Lou must complete a twelve-week challenge as part of her “Crush Your Comfort Zone” program.

Hannah, whose worst nightmare is making small talk with strangers, is challenged to go on twelve first dates. Libby, who once claimed to have period cramps for four weeks straight to get out of gym class, is challenged to compete in an obstacle course race. The challenges begin with Hannah helping Libby train and Libby managing the dating app on her sister’s behalf. They’re both making good progress—until Hannah’s first love rolls into town, and Libby accidentally falls for a guy she’s supposed to be setting up with her sister.

Things get even more complicated when secrets come to light, making the sisters question the one relationship they’ve always counted on: each other. With their company’s future on the line, they can’t afford to fail. But in trying to make a comeback to honor their grandmother, are they pushing themselves down the wrong path?

 

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That Summer Feeling by Bridget Morrissey

Garland Moore used to believe in magic, the power of optimism, and signs from the universe. Then her husband surprised her with divorce papers over Valentine’s Day dinner. Now Garland isn’t sure what to believe anymore, except that she’s clearly never meant to love again. When new friends invite her to spend a week at their reopened sleepaway camp, she and her sister decide it’s an opportunity to enjoy the kind of summer getaway they never had as kids. If Garland still believed in signs, this would sure seem like one. Summer camp is a chance to let go of her past and start fresh.

Nestled into the picturesque Blue Ridge Mountains, Camp Carl Cove provides the exact escape Garland always dreamed of, until she runs into Mason—the man she had a premonition about after one brief meeting years ago. No matter how she tries to run, the universe appears determined to bring love back into Garland’s life. She even ends up rooming with Mason’s sister Stevie, a vibrant former park ranger who is as charming as she is competitive. The more time Garland spends with Stevie, the more the signs confuse her. The stars are aligning in a way Garland never could have predicted.

Amid camp tournaments and moonlit dances, Garland continues to be pulled toward the beautiful blonde outdoorswoman who makes her laugh and swoon. Summer camp doesn’t last forever, but if Garland can learn to trust her heart, the love she finds there just might.

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My Magnolia Summer by Victoria Benton Frank

In New York City winter never seems to loosen its hold and for South Carolina transplant Maggie (born Magnolia after the fairest summer flower) the balmy beach weather of April back home on Sullivan’s Island feels like a distant memory. Until a phone call from her sister, Violet, changes everything.

Gran, the treasured matriarch, has fallen into a coma after a car accident caused by Maggie’s troubled mother, Lily. But once Maggie returns, she finds that her hometown of Sullivan’s Island holds even more secrets. The Magic Lantern, the restaurant owned and run by generations of women in her family, is now rudderless, and her sister seems headed for a savage breakup.

Once she is between the marsh grasses and dunes of South Carolina, she feels herself changing like the Atlantic tides, rediscovering the roots she left behind, and a new and different version of herself—one who can see how a minor crash into the back of a very handsome farmer’s truck may become fortunate. Or perhaps it’s even… fate?

When the three generations of South Carolina women join forces—the family pillar Gran, troubled Lily, impulsive Violet, and redoubtable Maggie—anything is possible.

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The Girls of Summer by Katie Bishop

Rachel has been in love with Alistair for fifteen years. Even though she’s now married to someone else. Even though she was a teenager when they met. Even though he is twenty years older than her.

Rachel and Alistair’s summer love affair on a remote, sun-trapped Greek island has consumed her since she was seventeen, obliterating everything in its wake. But as Rachel becomes increasingly obsessed with reliving the events of so long ago, she reconnects with the other girls who were similarly drawn to life on the island, where the nights were long, the alcohol was free-flowing and everyone acted in ways they never would at home. And as she does so, dark and deeply suppressed secrets about her first love affair begin to rise to the surface, as well as the truth about her time working for an enigmatic and wealthy man, who controlled so much more than she could have ever realized.

Joining a post #MeToo discourse, The Girls of Summer grapples with themes of power, sex, and consent, as it explores the complicated nature of memory and trauma––and what it takes to reframe, and reclaim, your own story.

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The Beach at Summerly by Beatriz Williams

June 1946. As the residents of Winthrop Island prepare for the first summer season after the sacrifice of war, a glamorous new figure moves into the guest cottage at Summerly, the idyllic seaside estate of the wealthy Peabody family. To Emilia Winthrop, daughter of Summerly’s year-round caretaker and a descendant of the island’s settlers, Olive Rainsford opens a window into a world of shining possibility. While Emilia spent the war years caring for her incapacitated mother, Olive traveled the world, married fascinating men, and involved herself in political causes. She’s also the beloved aunt of the two surviving Peabody sons, Amory and Shep, with whom Emilia has a tangled romantic history.

As the summer wears on, Emilia develops a deep rapport with Olive, who urges her to leave the island for a life of adventure, while romance blossoms with the sturdy and honorable Shep. But the heady promise of Peabody patronage is blown apart by the arrival of Sumner Fox, an FBI agent who demands Emilia’s help to capture a Soviet agent who’s transmitting vital intelligence on the West’s atomic weapon program from somewhere inside the Summerly estate.

April 1954. Eight years later, Summerly is boarded up and Emilia has rebuilt her shattered life as a professor at Wellesley College, when shocking news arrives from Washington—the traitor she helped convict is about to be swapped for an American spy imprisoned in the Soviet Union, but with a mysterious condition only Emilia can fulfill. A reluctant Emilia is summoned to CIA headquarters, where she’s forced to confront the harrowing consequences of her actions that fateful summer, and a choice that could destroy the Peabody family—and Emilia’s chance for redemption—all over again.

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Have you read any of these titles? Do you have any favorite summer reads that you don’t see listed? Let us know in the comments below!

Murder Book: A Graphic Memoir of a True Crime Obsession by Hilary Fitzgerald Campbell

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I am a lover of true crime. This isn’t much of a surprise to my family and friends. For years, true crime has taken over the media I consume(podcasts, tv shows, movies, books, etc). When I stumbled upon Murder Book: A Graphic Memoir of a True Crime Obsession by Hilary Fitzgerald Campbell, I knew this was something I needed to read. I wasn’t disappointed.

Hilary Fitzgerald Campbell is obsessed with true crime. Ever since she can remember, true crime has been prevalent in her life. Hilary believes that she inherited her interest in crime from her mother, but has questions about the psychology surrounding why people find true crime to be so entertaining. In her quest to answer that question, Hilary examines her past, does research, and starts combining what she learns into this graphic memoir. Hilary talks about high profile cases(Zodiac, Ted Bundy, etc) that impacted her life and moves onto other not as high profile cases and the often overlooked victims that are also etched into her memory (Anne Marie Fahey for example). For those of us that enjoy true crime, Hilary also lists authors she loves, the crime shows she watches, and the podcasts she listens to. This graphic novel made me feel normal – she outlines her obsession of love and true crime, while also saying that outsiders may see some weirdness in people loving/enjoying true crime. This is definitely an unconventional book/topic, but there is an audience who will appreciate it.

While I enjoyed this graphic novel, it does jump around a lot (the author acknowledges this). It didn’t bother me much as it made sense to me and followed the jumpy way my own brain works. Reading about how the author tries to figure out why she loves true crime and why she started down this path made me think about why I too love true crime. Hilary highlighted some cases that I hadn’t heard about and some that I had already explored. It was validating to read something that talked about my own anxieties, love of true crime, etc.