Hitting the sand this summer? Make sure these breezy reads are in your beach bag.
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As another summer approaches, so does the perfect time to get some great reading done – and our library wants to help with some great Adult Summer Reads recommendations!
There’s something about the warm weather that makes my reading list a little bit less ambitious. Winter seems to beckon epics – books that keep you in the same, comfortable spot under the blanket for hours. But summer time? I’m reading outside, in the park, on the beach, on the move. You might be trying to finally finish Anna Karenina this summer, but I’m happy with my paperback romances at the beach. With that in mind, I’ve created a list of 15 compulsively readable ‘beach reads’ – light and breezy, full of relationship drama, often taking place in tropical destinations for you to live vicariously through if you can’t get away.
In the novel One True Loves, Emma is torn between two men – the husband that she thought died at sea years ago, and her new fiance, Sam. Emma married her high school love, Jesse, after years of travelling the world and writing. Unfortunately, Jesse disappeared on a trip to Alaska, and was presumed dead. Emma was devastated for years, but reunited with a former friend and thought she was ready to move on… until Jesse was found, alive. How do you decide what the right thing to do is in this kind of situation, to hurt the least amount of people? There’s no easy answer here. I loved reading the romance between Emma and Jesse, was devastated when he died, and cheered again when she met Sam… all the while waiting for the other shoe to drop. This was the kind of book that I couldn’t put down, but apart from the major events that I mentioned, it’s mostly about… feelings. How are you impacted by the relationship you’re in? How do you change as a person, how can you grow together? And while the characters in this book certainly went through some traumatic and life changing events, it still felt light enough that you can spend a few hours reading it at the beach.
Of course, that’s not to say that all books about romance and relationships are necessarily light and breezy. In the book The Mothers by Brit Bennett, we start in what feels like the middle of the story – Nadia Turner is 17, her mom just committed suicide, and she is in a relationship with the son of the pastor at her church. In fact, she’s just found out that she’s pregnant and they begin to end their relationship. Like I said, it feels like you start in the middle of the story, and you expect to go backwards from there – explore Luke and Nadia’s relationship, and Nadia’s relationship with her mother. But you don’t. These events change the direction of Luke’s and Nadia’s life, and you see what kind of effect it’s had on them later. Most of the story takes place in the Southern California town where they grew up and met, and part of what makes this a beach read is the setting, and the impact it has on the story. I could just feel the heat coming at me from all sides, making you a bit sleepier, impacting your judgment and decision-making. If you enjoyed last year’s Adult Summer Reads pick My Brilliant Friend (and the rest of the Neapolitan series), I think you would like this book too – just like in My Brilliant Friend, even the smallest characters felt well developed.
Stars of Fortune by Nora Roberts might just be the ultimate beach read. It checks all the things I said I was looking for in a breezy summer read. There’s the tropical destination – most of the book takes place on the Greek Island of Corfu, starting off in a beautiful hotel before moving to an insanely luxurious ‘cottage’ with a kitchen that sounds like it belongs in a Nancy Meyers’ movie. Lots of scuba diving, as well. And there’s the romance! The first book in a fantasy trilogy, six strangers (three men and three women, of course) are brought together to save the world by finding the ‘stars of fortune’. They each have some sort of power that will help them on their quest. And they will each find their true love while on this important mission… of course Nora Roberts isn’t sparing with the details, either. I read this book in an evening, wishing I could join them at their cottage (although I would probably avoid the life-threatening events they found themselves in every few chapters).
So – three novels, each very different, but perfect for you to bring to the beach and read while you enjoy the heat. Also check out the full list of recommended Beach Reads!
Discussion questions:
- How does your reading change throughout the year? Is it different in the summer than in the winter?
- In the novel One True Loves, Emma has a very difficult decision to make, and will probably end up hurting one of the men that she loves. Do you look for happy endings when reading? Would you be disappointed with a sad ending in a romance book?
- One common criticism of romance novels is the ‘insta-love’ phenomenon, or love at first sight. How do you feel about this trope in romance novels? Do you prefer a more realistic story?
I love sad endings! I’m actually vaguely disappointed whenever there’s a happy ending in a book. (Maybe not every single time, but often enough.) I really hope that doesn’t say anything about me that I don’t want to live forever on the internet, but there are so many times that I have wanted to see a – not necessarily sad, but – not-happy ending, especially when it comes to romance books & movies. Even endings that might strike readers as unfinished, that don’t necessarily tie up all the loose ends, I would love to see more of. Not in a sloppy way, mind! Just unfinished as a state of completion, because that way the characters and all their foibles live on past the end of the book. And as for what I read, I don’t think it changes too much, but I am finding that I’m trying harder to clear up the piles of books I’ve brought home now that it’s summer, whereas in the winter, I just put all those books on hold and bring them all home. Which is not to say I don’t read in the winter – I do! – but it’s a more concerted effort to see the floor now that summer is here!
Love this post! Also that link to the Nancy Meyers houses–amazing. Kitchen goals forever. I’m with you in that my reading tends to get lighter and fluffier in the summer, it just matches the vibe (imagine the sunglasses emoji here). I tend to pick up romance heavy books and young adult stuff in the summer. In the winter is when I do my more “intellectual”/emotionally draining reading. It just feels right to curl up with those kinds of books with a blanket and a cup of tea.
I mostly agree with Karen about the happy vs. sad endings thing. I do love a good happy ending (if it’s not cheesy and makes sense in the story), but I love a good sad ending as well. I’m a sucker for angst in romance, so all of my favourite love stories are angsty, although some have happy endings (e.g. Persuasion), some are bittersweet (e.g. A Little Life), and some are just flat out tragic (SPOILER: Atonement).
About insta-love….I HATE it. I can buy characters being immediately into each other, since that happens in real life, but I find insta-love to be boring and lazy. Half the fun is reading the build up! I actually stopped reading a book recently because of this exact trope. Maybe it’s because of my love of angst, but I want characters to work for it!
Clearly I have a lot of feelings about this.