Contemporary & Literary Fiction
The Coin - In what world would I not want to read a book about a young Palestinian woman who gets caught up in a scheme reselling Birkin bags?
Enthralling, sensory, and uncanny, The Coin explores materiality, nature and civilization, class, homelessness, sexuality, beauty—and how oppression and inherited trauma manifest in every area of our lives—all while resisting easy moralizing. Provocative and original, humorous and inviting, The Coin marks the arrival of a major new literary voice.
Liars - Ever since I read (and loved) Nightbitch, I’ve been getting more and more into books following the lives of women artists and how family dynamics influence their careers.
A searing novel about being a wife, a mother, and an artist, and how marriage makes liars out of us all. Combining the intensity of Elena Ferrante’s Days of Abandonment and the pithy wisdom of Jenny Offill’s Dept of Speculation, Liars is a tour de force of wit and rage, telling the blistering story of a marriage as it burns to the ground, and of a woman rising inexorably from its ashes.
Where Are You, Echo Blue? - There have been quite a few novels about fictional child/teen stars coming out recently - I’m currently listening to Honey on audio -, but this cover caught my eye.
When Echo Blue, the most famous child star of the nineties, disappears ahead of a highly publicized television appearance on the eve of the millennium, the salacious theories instantly start swirling. (…) But Goldie Klein, an ambitious young journalist who also happens to be Echo's biggest fan, knows there must be more to the story. Why, on the eve of her big comeback, would Echo just go missing without a trace?
Banal Nightmare - This novel follows Moddie as she abruptly ends her long-term relationship and moves back to her Midwestern hometown, throwing herself at the mercy of her old friends as they, all suddenly tipping toward middle age, go to parties, size each other up, obsess over past slights, and dream of wild triumphs and elaborate revenge fantasies.
There is something about this theme of returning to your small hometown and suddenly finding yourself going back in time, hanging out with old friends and feeling simultaneously like nothing has changed and yet everything is completely different that is very appealing to me. Not that I’d want to relive it on a personal level (no thx), but to read about it? Yes please.
The Anthropologists - I have a feeling this will be an incredible, plotless, painfully relatable summer read.
Asya and Manu are looking at apartments, envisioning their future in a foreign city. (…) As the young couple dreams about the possibilities of each new listing, Asya, a documentarian, spends her days gathering footage from the neighborhood park like an anthropologist observing local customs. (…) Life back in Asya and Manu's respective home countries continues - parents age, grandparents get sick, nieces and nephews grow up - all just slightly beyond their reach. But the world they're making in their new city is growing, too, they hope, into something that will be distinctly theirs.
Historical fiction
The Modern Fairies - There are three reasons for this book to be here:
I’m in love with the old school cookbook cover art
The blurb says it’s Lauren Groff’s The Matrix meets Ophelia Field’s The Favourite (!!!)
It follows an elite group of Paris intellectuals who perform fairy tales at a fabulous secret salon. Say less!
They Dream in Gold - A musical historical novel with (what sounds like) an incredible romance at the heart of it all? See, these are the love stories I need in my life this season.
When Bonnie and Mansour meet in New York in 1968, their connection is undeniable. Both from fractured homes, with childhoods spent crossing the Atlantic, they quickly find peace with each other. (…) Then Mansour goes missing. (…) In his absence, Bonnie reckons with her memories of him, and comes to understand that the hopes of so many women―her mother and grandmother; his mother, aunt, childhood friend―rest on her perseverance. Stirred by the life growing inside her, Bonnie puts a plan in action to find him.
Spanning two decades and moving through the hotbeds of the African diaspora, They Dream in Gold is an epic yet intimate exploration of the migrant hunger for belonging and a powerful, intergenerational testament to our shared humanity.
Teddy - Another 60s novel, this time set in “glamorous Rome” and following the free-spirited wife of an American diplomat as she desperately tries to contain a scandal of her own making. I don’t love the covers, to be completely honest, but I’m here for this juicy summer novel.
Long Island Compromise - I don’t know why, but this book is kind of giving me The Sopranos vibes.
In 1980 a wealthy businessman named Carl Fletcher is kidnapped from his driveway in a cloistered town on the nicest part of Long Island, brutalized, and held for ransom. He is returned to his wife and kids less than a week later, only slightly worse for wear, and the family begins the hard work of moving on with their lives. (…) But nearly forty years later, when Carl’s mother dies and the family comes home to mourn her, it becomes clear that perhaps nobody ever got over anything.
Thriller & Mystery
The God of the Woods - Ah, summer camp! Never been. If it’s anything like the one in The God of the Woods, it sounds thrilling (or maybe just downright terrifying).
Early morning, August 1975: a camp counselor discovers an empty bunk. Its occupant, Barbara Van Laar, has gone missing. Barbara isn’t just any thirteen-year-old: she’s the daughter of the family that owns the summer camp and employs most of the region’s residents. And this isn’t the first time a Van Laar child has disappeared. Barbara’s older brother similarly vanished fourteen years ago, never to be found.
Off the Books - Love a good road trip? Picture this: a recent Dartmouth dropout starts driving a limo to make ends meet, and all of a sudden finds herself working as a routine chauffeur for sex workers. Then she meets new client Henry, who carries a sus black suitcase wherever he goes and seems to be keeping a secret.
An original take on the great American road trip, Off the Books is a beautifully crafted coming of age story that showcases the resilience of the human spirit and the power of doing the right thing.
Look in the Mirror - I love books about mysterious inheritances! When is it my turn to find out that a great-aunt I never met left me a fortune and a box full of mysterious love letters? I guess that’d be a different book. Anyway.
When Nina’s father dies, she is left something in his will: a gleaming dream vacation home in a balmy tropical paradise. (…) The house is extraordinary: state-of-the-art, all glass and marble. How did her sensible father come into enough money for this? Why did he keep it from her? And what else was he hiding?
Fantasy
Masquerade - All I needed to know is that this is set in a wonderfully reimagined 15th century West Africa (and loosely based on the myth of Persephone) and I was sold. If you’re into adult fantasy with political tension, this one might be for you.
Òdòdó’s hometown of Timbuktu has been conquered by the the warrior king of Yorùbáland. (…) Then Òdòdó is abducted. She is whisked across the Sahara to the capital city of Ṣàngótẹ̀, where she is shocked to discover that her kidnapper is none other than the vagrant who had visited her guild just days prior. But now that he is swathed in riches rather than rags, Òdòdó realizes he is not a vagrant at all; he is the warrior king, and he has chosen her to be his wife.
(…) As tensions with rival states grow, revealing elaborate schemes and enemies hidden in plain sight, Òdòdó must defy the cruel king she has been forced to wed by re-forging the shaky loyalties of the court in her favor, or risk losing everything—including her life.
The Spellshop - I’m not one for romantasy (at all), but I’m a sucker for cozy witchy books, so here we are.
Kiela has always had trouble dealing with people. Thankfully, as a librarian at the Great Library of Alyssium, she and her assistant, Caz—a magically sentient spider plant—have spent the last decade sequestered among the empire’s most precious spellbooks, preserving their magic for the city’s elite.
When a revolution begins and the library goes up in flames, she and Caz flee with all the spellbooks they can carry and head to a remote island Kiela never thought she’d see again: her childhood home. Taking refuge there, Kiela discovers, much to her dismay, a nosy—and very handsome—neighbor who can’t take a hint and keeps showing up day after day to make sure she’s fed and to help fix up her new home.
Like a Hallmark rom-com full of mythical creatures and fueled by cinnamon rolls and magic, The Spellshop will heal your heart and feed your soul.
Horror & Sci-Fi
Bury Your Gays - Hollywood horror!!!!
Misha is a jaded scriptwriter who has been working in Hollywood for years, and has just been nominated for his first Oscar. But when he's pressured by his producers to kill off a gay character in the upcoming season finale―"for the algorithm"―Misha discovers that it's not that simple. As he is haunted by his past, and past mistakes, Misha must risk everything to find a way to do what's right―before it's too late.
Whoever You Are, Honey - Looking for a book that sounds like an episode of Black Mirror? Picture this: Sebastian (renowned tech founder) and Lena (his spellbinding girlfriend) move to the quiet outskirts of Silicon Valley. They live a luxurious life, but Lena feels uneasy about her oddly spotty memory, and is growing increasingly wary of the way Sebastian closely controls their life together…
A kind of Stepford Wives meets Grey Gardens for the age of artificial intelligence, Whoever You Are, Honey is gripping, seductive, and prescient as it dissects relationships between women, unpacks perfection and desirability, and explodes the intersection of passion, technology, and power.
State of Paradise - This book just sounds wonderfully tense and unsettling and uncanny, three of the very best things any book could ever be.
Along with her husband, a ghostwriter for a famous thriller author returns to her mother's house in the Florida town where she grew up. (…) Her mercurial sister, who lives next door, spends a growing amount of time using MIND’S EYE, a virtual reality device provided to citizens of the town by ELECTRA, a tech company in South Florida, during the doldrums of a recent pandemic. But it’s not just the ominous cats, her mother’s burgeoning cult, or the fact that her belly button has become an increasingly deep cavern―something is off in the town, and it probably has to do with the posters of missing citizens spread throughout the streets.
During a violent rainstorm, the writer’s sister goes missing for several days. When she returns, sprawled on their mother’s lawn and speaking of another dimension, the writer is forced to investigate not only what happened to her sister and the other missing people but also the uncanny connections between ELECTRA, the famous author, and reality itself.
bookmarking! so many good recs here :)
Really want to read the spell shop