Brilliant reads for Summer

10th June 2023

Brilliant reads for Summer. Summer is a great time to read – either lying on a beach or relaxing in a deckchair in the garden. Many books capture the essence of the season, and they range across many genres, from Romance to Thrillers and everything in between. 

We have selected ten of our absolute favourite titles for you. 

Wish You Were Here by Jodi Picoult – GALÁPAGOS ISLANDS

Diana O’Toole’s life is going perfectly to plan. At twenty-nine, she’s up for promotion to her dream job as an art specialist at Sotheby’s and she’s about to fly to the Galápagos where she’s convinced her surgeon boyfriend, Finn, is going to propose.

But then the virus hits New York City and Finn breaks the news: the hospital needs him, he has to stay. But you should still go, he insists. And reluctantly, she agrees.

Once she’s in the Galápagos, the world shuts down around her, leaving Diana stranded – albeit in paradise. Completely isolated, with only intermittent news from the outside world, Diana finds herself examining everything that has brought her to this point and wondering if there’s a better way to live.

But not everything is as it seems…

The Summer House by Keri Beevis – NORFOLK

Mead House was once our childhood home.
Despite my fears, I always knew we would have to return to face the demons of our past.
Back to the place where it happened, to where, as carefree teenagers, we lost our elder sister in the most brutal of circumstances.
As executors of our grandmother’s will, my twin brother, Ollie, and I needed to empty the house for resale.
What I didn’t expect to discover was my sister’s secret journal that contained her most private thoughts and shocking dark secrets.
Now I am questioning everything that I saw that night. Did I get it wrong, who I saw?
Did my evidence send an innocent man, my then boyfriend’s brother, to jail for the last 17 years?
I know I have no choice. If I want to find answers, I will have to go back to that fateful night my sister died. When she made her last visit to the summer house.

The Summer Wedding in Santorini by Samantha Parks – SANTORINI

Anna has the perfect life on the island of Santorini with her gorgeous vineyard-owning boyfriend Nikos, and she travels the world for work. So why does she feel that something is missing?

When Anna’s best friend Elena gets engaged, she should be celebrating with her, but instead it seems to cause cracks in her own relationship that she never saw coming.

Nikos is thrilled that Anna’s career is going from strength to strength, but being without her so much has left him feeling disconnected in ways that could have devastating consequences for their future.

As celebrations get underway for the wedding of the summer, secrets will be revealed, and ultimatums will be given. In the end, Anna and Nikos must decide whether their love story can have the happy ever after they both desperately want…

Beach House Summer by Sarah Morgan – CALIFORNIA

A marriage in the spotlight
Joanna Whitman’s high-profile marriage held more secrets than she cares to remember, so when her ex-husband dies, she doesn’t know what to feel. But when she discovers that he’s left behind a pregnant young woman, Joanna is forced to act. She knows exactly how brutal the spotlight on them both will be…unless she can find a way for them to disappear.
A beach house hide away
Ashley Blake is amazed when Joanna suggests they lie low at her beach house in her sleepy Californian hometown. Joanna should be hating her, not helping her. But alone and pregnant, Ashley needs all the support she can find.
A summer of new beginnings
Joanna’s only goal for the summer is privacy. All Ashley wants is space to plan for her and her baby’s future. But when an old flame reappears, and secrets spill out under the hot summer sun, this unlikely friendship is put to the test…

Happy Place by Emily Henry – MAINE

A couple who broke up months ago pretend to still be together for their annual weeklong vacation with their best friends in this glittering and wise new novel from #1 New York Times bestselling author Emily Henry.

Harriet and Wyn have been the perfect couple since they met in college—they go together like salt and pepper, honey and tea, lobster and rolls. Except, now—for reasons they’re still not discussing—they don’t.

They broke up five months ago. And still haven’t told their best friends.

Which is how they find themselves sharing a bedroom at the Maine cottage that has been their friend group’s yearly getaway for the last decade. Their annual respite from the world, where for one vibrant, blissful week they leave behind their daily lives; have copious amounts of cheese, wine, and seafood; and soak up the salty coastal air with the people who understand them most.

Only this year, Harriet and Wyn are lying through their teeth while trying not to notice how desperately they still want each other. Because the cottage is for sale and this is the last week they’ll all have together in this place. They can’t stand to break their friends’ hearts, and so they’ll play their parts. Harriet will be the driven surgical resident who never starts a fight, and Wyn will be the laid-back charmer who never lets the cracks show. It’s a flawless plan (if you look at it from a great distance and through a pair of sunscreen-smeared sunglasses). After years of being in love, how hard can it be to fake it for one week…in front of those who know you best?

The Guest by Emma Cline – LONG ISLAND

Summer is coming to a close on Long Island, and Alex is no longer welcome…

One misstep at a dinner party and the older man she’s been staying with dismisses her with a ride to the train station and a ticket back to the city. With few resources, but a gift for navigating the desires of others, Alex stays on the island. She drifts like a ghost through the gated driveways and sun-blasted dunes of a rarefied world, trailing destruction in her wake.

Taut, sensual and impossible to look away from, The Guest captures the latent heat and potential danger of a summer that could go either way for a young woman teetering on the edge.

Bad Summer People by Emma Rosenblum – FIRE ISLAND

The families on the island have been vacationing here for years; the Weinsteins, the Metzners, the Grobels –
and unlucky in love Rachel Woolf.

Outsiders aren’t welcome. That is except for Robert, the handsome new tennis coach, who some people are going out of their way to make very welcome . . .

But the problem when everyone knows everyone is that secrets can’t stay secret forever.

And when a body is found face-down beneath the boardwalk, they realise that maybe one of them is worse than they thought . . .

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 . . .

A Perfect Vintage by Chelsea Fagan – LOIRE VALLE

Lea Mortimer has everything under control. As a highly sought-after consultant specializing in transforming dilapidated French country estates into boutique hotels, she relishes her freedom as a single, childfree woman. And her life is full, occupied as much by her impeccable historic renovations as by the aristocratic — and often exhausting — French families she works for.

But after the heated divorce of her closest friend and cousin Stephanie Bryce, Lea finds herself taking Stephanie and her college-aged daughter to the Loire Valley in France for the summer. As they tag along for Lea’s latest work assignment, despite their best intentions, they threaten to complicate the tightrope act of launching the hotel on time. And when Lea unexpectedly falls for the much-younger son of her boss, she quickly learns the beauty and danger of losing control.

As affairs bloom in the idyllic chateau, wars of inheritance play out between the family, and betrayals threaten even the most solid relationships. Lea realizes that it’s not just a broken heart she’s risking, but her entire, meticulously-constructed life blowing up in her face.

The Five-Star Weekend by Elin Hilderbrand – NANTUCKET

Hollis Shaw, creator of the popular food blog Hungry with Hollis, finds her life turned upside down when her heart-surgeon husband is killed in a car accident on a snowy February morning. As Hollis searches for comfort, she discovers the idea of the ‘Five Star Weekend’: a gathering of the best friends from each stage of your life. But when Hollis decides to host her own version on Nantucket, the weekend isn’t exactly a Hallmark movie…

First, there’s Tatum, Hollis’s best friend growing up on Nantucket – and her husband’s best friend, Jack, who just happens to be Hollis’s first love.

Then there’s Dru-ann, her best friend from college, now a prominent Black female sports agent in Chicago, whose Twitter comments have just landed her – and her marriage – in hot water.

Brooke is the best friend who helped raise her kids with Hollis during their thirties, until she was ousted from the local mum’s group by Electra, self-appointed queen bee. But Brooke and Electra are finally meeting up to make amends this weekend . . .

And lastly, Gigi, who reached out to Hollis on her food blog to become ‘internet besties’, but has never met her in real life.

All the weekend needs is Hollis’s daughter Caroline, a documentary student, who wants to film the entire party… What could possibly go wrong?

Filled with the emotional depth and trademark cast-of-characters perspective of Hilderbrand’s novels, The Five-Star Weekendpromises a story of a remarkable weekend between friends-old and new-like no other.

Run to the Blue by P N Johnson – GREEK ISLANDS

“Breaking News! Top TV reporter Tess Anderson is missing…she was last seen in the Greek Islands with a mysterious American yachtsman…more follows!”

It was supposed to be the best day of her career, the day when she was the hero, the reporter whose story put a deadly gangster behind bars.

But as crime boss Ken Lean is sentenced, ace reporter Tess Anderson instead finds herself in the headlines: her husband is exposed as having an affair with a top government minister, and Tess herself faces death threats from the Lean crime family.

With her life collapsing around her, Tess runs to her friend’s villa on the Greek island of Paxos, but soon finds she’s been tracked down by killers and spies. Her only hope of escape is a mysterious, glamorous, and somehow familiar American yachtsman.

Can Tess stay alive long enough to see her pursuers behind bars?

Who can she trust as her enemies close in?

And what is the secret that her husband and his lover are so keen to ensure remains buried?

The latest novel from P N Johnson, the author of Killer in the Crowd, Run to the Blue is a fast-moving action thriller set in the world of television news in London, and in the beautiful Greek islands.

Enjoy your Summer reading!

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