By Bethan Croft and Giorgia Caso
Beth's Summer Recs
The Summer I Turned Pretty by Jenny Han
Starting off basic, but the Netflix series gives good summer vibes so I'm hoping the books do too.
The message of this story is to live life to its fullest because as Belly discovers, the best summers can also be the worst summers. In the book, everything as Belly has ever known it to be, changes in one summer - but whilst she gets to experience love for the first time, the risk of losing their safe space at the beach house becomes apparent as an even greater loss hits the family.
2. Happy Place by Emily Henry
A book, I personally cannot wait to read this summer. I got recommended this read months ago but wanting to save it for when the good weather started and I was lying on the beach.
The plot follows the storyline of a couple that make a pact to pretend to date despite the fact they broke up months ago (reverse fake-dating?) The yearly getaway cottage that their friend group has rented for the past decade has been put up for sale and this is the last week they will all get to spend together in this place. So to make sure the holiday doesn't get ruined by the awkwardness of a breakup, they fake it.
3. Eat Pray Love by Elizabeth Gilbert
If you haven't seen the film with Julia Roberts, then drop everything else you're doing and watch it right now! Based on the experience of the author herself, Elizabeth Gilbert, the story follows a woman going through an early mid-life crisis despite having all of the material things she may ever need and in order to pursue recovery she takes a yearlong journey across the world. After a divorce, she quits her job, gets rid of her belongings and visits the three places famous for improving the flaws she has identified within herself. First, she visits Rome, where she learns to speak Italian, makes wholesome friends, studies the art of pleasure, and "gains the happiest twenty-three pounds of her life" from eating the best food. In India, she learns from a native guru and embarks upon four months of spiritual exploration as she masters the art of devotion. Bali helps her learn to balance enjoyment with divine transcendence, by becoming the student of an elderly medicine man and falling in love in the best way - unexpectedly.
Goodreads says, "Eat, Pray, Love is about what can happen when you claim responsibility for your own contentment and stop trying to live in imitation of society’s ideals."
4. The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel by Deborah Moggach
Originally, this book was named These Foolish Things but was renamed after an adaptation of the book was released and took off, named The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel.
A retirement home is set up in India which is said to be a recreation of an elegant corner of England but in Bangalore. Upon arrival, the pensioners realise the hotel and their new life may lack luxury but instead, they find it to be plentiful of unexpected love, friendship, adventurous experiences and beauty.
5. Malibu Rising by Taylor Jenkins Reid
Another BookTok classic, but it's Malibu in the 1980s, what more could you want? Ah, that's right, a little bit of drama to spice it up. An annual end-of-summer party is hosted but by midnight the party is completely out of control, secrets that shape this family are all rising to the surface. They must decide which secrets to spill and which to leave behind.
6. The Durrells of Corfu by Michael Haag
If you've seen the TV series 'The Durrells' then you will have heard the story based loosely upon Gerald Durrell's Corfu Trilogy.
Instead, Michael Haag's story covers the background story behind why they moved to Corfu, information about the time they spent in India, encounters with the beloved Corfu locals and what happened when the family moved away.
7. Just For The Summer by Abby Jimenez
Summer is about easy reading and romance, this novel by Jimenez seems like just that.
Justin believes that he has a curse and said curse suddenly starts to trend on Reddit. Every woman that he dates seems to go on and find true love as soon as they break up. When a woman with the same issue slides into his DMs, they decide the best thing to do to cancel before their curses, is to date. It's meant to be a quick fling, but when other factors get involved, so do a whole load of feelings.
8. Everything I Know About Love by Dolly Alderton
And, last but not least Everything I Know About Love, an all-year-round comfort read that hits harder in the summer.
Dolly tells of her reckless youth, tales that have turned into dinner party funny anecdotes and wholesome stories of the lessons she has learned upon the way.
As Goodreads so sweetly puts it, "In her memoir, she vividly recounts falling in love, finding a job, getting drunk, getting dumped, realizing that Ivan from the corner shop might just be the only reliable man in her life, and that absolutely no one can ever compare to her best girlfriends. Everything I Know About Love is about bad dates, good friends and—above all else— realizing that you are enough."
To hear more about Dolly's life and her bestseller, listen to our podcast.
Giorgia's Summer Recs
9. Where The Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens
Set in summer, this book could be a great way to immerse oneself in this season. Yet, it is more about life in general than summer itself as the novel follows the main character Kya. She lives among the wilderness and knows nothing of socialisation as she does live on her own and apart from any human being. Rumours about a 'Marsh girl' circulate in the village nearby. When a murder happens at Barkley Cove, Kya is the first suspect.
Even though she is content with her own world, Kya arrives at a point where she longs for human contact. Attracted by two men from town, she discovers a whole new world that she didn't know existed.
10. Circe by Madeline Miller
After The Song of Achilles, Madeline Miller's second best novel according to most critics is Circe. It isn't specifically a summer book but it draws the attention to another epic character, Circe, daughter of the god Helios and the water-nymph Perse.
As a child, she doesn't appear to have any power so she gets closer to mortals. Growing up though, she realises that she has the power of witchcraft. She is capable of transforming enemies into monsters and threatening the gods too. Her power though brings her to a deserted island after menacing Zeus. On this island, she finds strength in being alone.
11. My Year of Rest and Relaxation by Ottessa Mosfegh
The story of a woman's journey to find help in psychiatrists but meeting the worst ones. The main protagonist has everything she's ever wanted: a good job, she's young and she lives in New York. And yet, she's not happy. Set in 2000, this novel follows her journey to a possible happiness. In this book, we follow her through every step of the journey until she realises that what she needs is alienation.
12. A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini
On a nice sunny day (depending where you live) or not, this book can bring a refreshing yet sad depiction of reality. The main protagonist, Mariam has to marry a stranger, Rasheed, when she is sent to Kabul. Twenty years later, Laila has to fly home and she finds consolation in Mariam's household, and they both find comfort in each other.
Along with Laila having to change home, Afghanistan is slowly ruled by Talibans. Around them, bombs and guns destroy everything but love is the only thing that triumphs in the end.
13. Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami
A metaphysical world in which the main protagonist, Kafka Tamura, has to run away from home. On his way, he meets Nakata who is older than him and is interested by Kafka. They embark on a journey together where events happen even metaphysical ones such as encounters with talking cats. The reasons why all this happens to them are slowly revealed and their fate too.
14. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
An autobiography of the acclaimed writer Maya Angelou in which she confesses and tells the reader about her childhood and her life in the States. When she was a child, she was sent to her grandmother along with her brother in a town in the South. There, they have to deal with abandonment and prejudice people had. At eight years old, she is attacked by a man older than her and had to cope with the consequences her whole life. When she is in San Francisco years later though, she learns self-love and ideas of illustrous writers that will set her free.
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