I for one thought that AI played a great practical joke on us with the summer reading list that caused such a kerfuffle a couple of weeks ago. The fake titles by the real authors were spot-on! But having been laboring away for months on summer reading lists for People, Kirkus, Oprah and Newsday, I can share some more solid recommendations. The links go to Bookshop.org and Libro, both of which support local bookstores. Or you can walk in the door and support them live and in person.
The Listeners, Maggie Stiefvater
Bestselling YA fantasy author Maggie Stiefvater has a hit with her first adult novel, set at a luxury hotel in the West Virginia mountains. Inspired by real events that took place at the start of World War II, when German, Italian and Japanese diplomats stranded in the United States were briefly detained in splendor in hotels like the fictional Avallon, the story has great characters and a streak of magic. (out now)
Murder in the Dollhouse, by Rich Cohen
True crime fans, this one’s for you. Do you remember the name Jennifer Dulos? The disappearance of this mother of five from her New Canaan, Connecticut home in May 2019 made national headlines. Cohen weaves a moving portrait of Jennifer with a grim unfolding of her creepy husband’s outrageous evil and cowardice. (out now)
Next to Heaven, James Frey, Author’s Equity
Perhaps you’d prefer a fictional murder among the Connecticut rich. This wildly trashy novel from the infamous Million Little Pieces memoirist revolves around two bored BFFs who decide to throw a spouse-swapping party. (Didn’t this happen before? Yep, Rick Moody’s The Ice Storm, also a great movie.) Suffice it to say that things go super south. Get a paper bag to paste over the hideous cover. (out 6/17)
How To Lose Your Mother, Molly Jong-Fast
Erica Jong’s daughter tells all in this excellent memoir, sharing a tough story with sharp self-awareness and a sense of humor. In a nutshell, Erica was a lousy mother, much more interested in her career and her love life and her next glass of wine than in her daughter, whose teen years were so rocky that she was in twelve-step by the time she turned 20. Off to assisted living, Ma. (out now)
Atmosphere: A Love Story, Taylor Jenkins Reid
The dab hand who gave us Daisy Jones and the Six and The Seven Husbands of Eleanor Hugo has gone into outer space – literally, with a propulsive novel set at NASA in the 1980s. Combining the drama of a deadly accident on the shuttle with the backstory of the astronauts involved — among them, two women who have fallen in love —Reid’s latest is tense, tender and terrific. (out now)
Run for the Hills, Kevin Wilson
I love all Kevin Wilson’s books, so if you haven’t read him yet, you could have a whole summer of fun ahead of you. Like The Family Fang, Nothing to See Here, and Now Is Not the Time to Panic, this one starts in a little town in Tennessee. Mad is accosted one morning at her organic farmstand by a visitor who’s come all the way from Boston, there to break the news that he is her older half-brother and they need to take a cross-country road trip. Let’s go. (out now)
Claire McCardell: The Designer Who Set Women Free, by Elizabeth Evitts Dickinson
This great biography by Baltimore author Dickinson sheds light on the fashion designer who developed leotards and leggings; popularized hoodies, denim, and leather; ushered the swimsuit into its contemporary form; included pockets in her clothes; and made the wrap dress a wardrobe staple. She basically invented women’s sportswear. If you haven’t read many bios, this engaging and relatively slim book is an ideal gateway drug. (out 6/17)
Culpability, Bruce Holsinger
The Cassidy-Shaw family is speeding down the road in their self-driving minivan when they have a fatal collision with a car coming in the other direction. Behind the wheel is their seventeen-year-old son, a lacrosse star on his way to college. Is he responsible? His mother, an expert on the ethics of artificial intelligence, has some insight into the problem, but so do all the other family members, each of whom has a secret. A pageturner, for sure. (out 7/8)
Vera, or Faith, Gary Shteyngart
This is my favorite Gary Shteyngart novel ever, though I am crazy about Lake Success and love the early books too. Set in a cleverly constructed near future, with self-driving cars and smart chessboards and a proposed constitutional amendment that favors citizens with WASP ancestry, this skinny little dream of a novel centers on ten-year-old Vera Bradford-Shmulkin, half Jewish, half Korean, trying desperately to hold her fraying family together. (7/8)
Great in Audio
Spellbound, Phil Hanley
Phil Hanley is a former Armani runway model and current stand-up comedian with dyslexia so serious he basically can’t read at all, and he has nonetheless managed to write this excellent book and read it aloud himself. The audio includes some of the bloopers and practice reads so you get a sense of what it involved. He’s got an important story to tell about learning disabilities, and tells in the most entertaining way possible. (out now)
Sky Daddy, Kate Folk
OMG, have you heard about this book? Freaking hilarious, deadpan novel with a narrator named Linda who loves planes. I mean, she really loves planes. She saves all her money for her monthly treat, a round-trip flight out of SFO during which she experiences intense sexual pleasure, and she dreams of someday uniting with one of her lovers in a fiery crash. The audiobook narrator Kristen Sieh makes her even more lovable (and relatable!) than she is on the page. (out now)
Careless People, Sarah Wynn Williams
Once you get your jaw off the floor, you’ll have no questions in your mind as to why Meta (formerly Facebook) tried to block the publication of Sarah Wynn-Williams’ memoir of her employment there from 2011 to 2017, actions which inadvertently made it a bestseller, haha. Read by the author in her New Zealand accent, this memoir reveals Facebook for the unbelievably creepy company it is, valuing nothing more than its own market dominance, not even human life. No surprise that Mark and Sheryl do not want you to read this book! (out now)
Bonus Track
My pal the former Baltimorean Jessica Anya Blau has a new book this summer, Shopgirls, the adventures of a nineteen-year-old salesgirl in a high-end San Francisco department store in the 1980s. The audio would be a fun listen for a mother-daughter road trip.
