If there is a better gift to give than books, we don’t want to hear it. Here are thirty books we loved reading this year. They could easily be on a Best of 2016 list, but we think they belong here as gift guide for you. Every last one is just perfect for someone on your Christmas list. This is The Ultimate Book Gift List from us to you with love. So just fire up that Amazon Prime and start crossing people off your list today.
Coming of age stories, while charming and poignant, don’t always make great novels. This novel with its plucky, awkward 14-year-old narrator June avoids the pitfalls of the genre. June feels like she was born in the wrong era and yearns to be a falconer. When her story begins, it’s 1987 New York and her favorite uncle has just died of AIDS. June’s unlikely friendship with her uncle’s boyfriend forms the backbone of the novel. Erin gave up an afternoon to read it in big gulp. This is one you’ll miss when it’s over.
While these fictional stories are not necessarily true, their “truth” is irrefutable. A masterful storyteller, Gyasi weaves these stories of slavery and racism without ever becoming preachy or judgmental. While she structures the novel to bridge two continents and cultures to tell the stories of two African half-sisters and their descendants, she can easily not just tell the poignant details of their lives, but reveal larger truths about mankind’s cruelty to each other.
One of Erin’s friends recommended this one with the caveat, “When it gets hard, that’s when it starts to get good.” This book slammed into Erin’s life. By articulating the class struggle and placing it into historical context, it forces the reader to confront prejudices and an examination of some of the darker truths of the American Dream. A quick read that generates introspection, it will sit with you long after you turn the last page.
Erin’s brother-in-law recommended this one and if you want to be challenged about what you think you know about human history and how you know it, this is the book for you. It’s a delight to read and the ideas inherent in it force you to confront your expectations of mankind and what we have done as a species. As a Social Studies teacher, Erin found it fascinating. As a reader, she found it to be a quick, satisfying read that gave her space to contemplate some larger questions about the world.
Haunting and beautiful with depths that beg to be plumbed, this book brings it and then some. Well-rounded characters and gorgeous imagery set the stage for one killer knock-out of a book. This book is sexy with a capital S. Flawed, lovable Hazel and magnetic Claire will change everything you thought you knew about love, sexual attraction, and chemistry.
A quick moving plot, well-defined characters, and settings that transport the reader to another time and place set the stage for a book that you will not want to put down. A debut novel by an actual architect, this story of the transformation of Bernard, a man caught in historical and moral crossroads, delivers drama and authenticity, a double whammy any reader can appreciate. Riddled with uncertainties, Bernard decides that he can work with both sides, but as the novel unfolds, he discovers where he truly stands. The journey to that self-discovery is the heart of this novel.
As parents of young people just starting to make their way in the world, this is a hopeful book. As women of a certain age, it’s a bit devastating too. On the one hand, Kalanithi and his story is a beautiful tale of a life well-lived. On the other hand, it was one cut tragically short by cancer. A coming of age story as well as the story of his battle with cancer, his tale is populated with poignant and illustrative scenes. But by far the best thing about this book is Kalanithi’s lovely writing. His beautiful mind and spirit come alive in the pages. Our world is better for having had this man and now his book in it.
A riveting account of the crew that captured the gold medal in the 1936 Berlin Olympics. Told through the eyes of Joe Rantz, a remarkable man who overcame much adversity to be one of the “boys in the boat,” this story is not so much about rowing as a sport but the power of sport to change lives. Erin rowed crew in college and Brown gets the details of the sport just right even though he never rowed. Vivid characters and a moving story propel this story to the ranks of “Must Read.”
Our friend Nina described this book as a book lover’s book. She is one of those friends who is usually right, so we just nod and listen to her. We are oh so happy we did. The quirky A.J. Fikry is an unlikely one to root for, but as the story unfolds, you can hardly help yourself. Loss, romance, and even a bit of mystery are peppered throughout and layered with humor. Each chapter doesn’t just advance the narrative but serves as an homage to one of Fikry’s favorite books. If you have ever lost or found yourself between the pages of a book, this is a must read.
We just love Ann Patchett, so it’s always hard when a favorite author has a new book. Will it be the worthy of the same love and devoted following as her other books? The answer here is “Oh, hell yeah!” A novel about two families whose fates are sealed at a Christening party with a large bottle of gin and ripe oranges. Moving back and forth in time and between members of the Cousins and Keating families, Patchett nails family life. The Greek tragedy and comedy of the whole enterprise is alive and well in her telling here. You will nod your head in recognition, laugh out loud, and even mist up. It’s a helluva read and that’s why it has to be one of this year’s best!
This is a hard read, but you just have to do it. “Each of us is more than the worst thing we have ever done.” This right here is the silent whisper in the shadow of each chapter. It’s what compels you to keep reading all the hard things contained in these pages and keep confronting the systemic inequities that cripple our ability as a nation to truly be free. We read this one with a group of friends and were able to laugh, cry, and wrestle with the uncomfortable truths within together. Whether you go it alone or find a buddy or ten to share it with, this book is one that needs to be read in the way that air needs to make it to lungs and water needs to slate thirst. This is not a just a book, so much as force of nature in your life. You will be different from reading it, but that’s the beauty and gift of it.
On the surface this book is nothing special, a familiar story about a SAHM who suddenly has to work full time. But “Danger, Will Robinson”, it’s the quiet ones that will get you. With its light, breezy touch, infinitely likable characters, and easily recognizable tensions, this book will sink its stealthy hooks into you and then spit you out an afternoon later. Erin adored Alice, her kids, and her very believable relationship with her husband. This may not be ground-breaking fiction, but it is a wholly satisfying, utterly delicious piece of literary pie.
We both love every opportunity to worship at the altar of the inimitable Strout and this book illustrates perfectly why. This simple and unassuming story is a powerhouse of story-telling. Lucy is recovering in a hospital bed when her estranged mom comes to visit. However, Lucy is no ordinary protagonist and Strout is no ordinary writer, so the results are literary fireworks. Small but mighty, this slim novel packs a lot of extraordinary into a tight, narrative thread. The perfectly rendered imperfect relationship between Lucy and her mother is a reader’s dream: nuanced, fully realized, and ringing with truth. This one is a keeper.
Every member of Erin’s family devoured this book this summer. The premise: a plane crashes, and there are only 2 survivors, one of them a young child. The promise: a story that unfolds with a few surprises full of characters you care about and a mystery you are interested in solving. You will stay up late to read the backstories of the people on the plane and find out what happened to the ill-fated flight. Fascinating and entirely unputdownable, this is a book that was on everybody’s must read lists this summer. If you haven’t read it, move it to the top of yours.
Any parent who has been through it will tell you: college admissions is an emotional pressure cooker. Nothing quite captures the high highs and the low lows quite like this utterly delectable piece of fiction. The Hawthornes are a family so familiar you feel from the first page like you might be reading about your next door neighbors. As their oldest gets put through the wringer applying to Harvard, dad’s alma mater, so do the rest of them. As the pressure is on, things start to unravel and secrets are revealed. Bottom line: an immensely enjoyable read for you that will make you grateful for your own process in comparison.
When it comes to advice about college, we listen to our friends Lisa and Mary Dell who write over at Grown and Flown, a great online resource for parenting through this next phase of life. They told us to buy this book, and we are ever so grateful they did. Chock full of great research, stellar examples, and good advice, this book is a gem, but what we felt was most helpful was the overall tone. Damour’s message time and time again is that we, as parents, can do this very hard thing of parenting our girls through this tough phase of development. With the cool confident tone of a priest or a hostage negotiator, Damour emphasizes that there is more than one way to “get this right.” Our harried teen mom hearts wish we could clone her and carry her around in our pockets to talk us down off our ledges when the time comes. In the end, this is one book that will deliver all of you to the other side and get you ready for the big, beautiful things that lie ahead.
This one might make you want to lock up ALL of your college aged kiddos, but you HAVE to read it. You know how we love to talk to kids about everything from sex to drugs to alcohol. Well, Krakauer lays out why we need to talk to our kids about alcohol and campus rape too. YIKES! But why, you ask? WHY?! We get that this is a tough read in many places, but Krakauer’s firm steady journalistic hand makes this one of the best, most important (but still immensely readable) things you can read, especially if you have kids filling out college applications or already cozied up in dorm rooms. It is a book that launched a thousand conversations for us. We are sharing it with you in the hopes that it will do the same in your family. A MUST read!
This, from Julie Lythcott-Haims’ Amazon author page, is one of the reasons we love her and her book:
I am deeply interested in humans – all of us – living lives of meaning and purpose, which requires figuring out what we’re good at and what we love, and being the best version of that self we can be. So I’m interested in what gets in the way of that.
Um, yeah, all of what she said. This is not a book about helicopter parenting, per se, so much as a path through the fears that can interfere with our parenting and foil our relationships with our kids. Lythcott-Haims tells us how we as a society evolved to this style of parenting and how to break the bad habits that threaten the job we are trying to do. Such insight in such a readable form! A book we keep coming back to again and again!
After a lovely party at the lake house, the Edevane family’s 11 month old son Theo goes missing. Morton’s page turner takes this pivotal moment in a family’s history and creates something special and utterly unputdownable. Told from two vantage points–2003 London and 1930s Cornwall–this book will have you ignoring kids just to figure out what is happening and where this story will go. As always, Morton’s gift for managing complicated story lines while simultaneously creating well-developed characters will make you grateful for all that extra time you have to read.
A good friend recommended this book calling it a “sexy beast of a read”. If you are anything like me, that alone might make you want to read this book, but if it doesn’t, try this: this is a novel that won’t be compartmentalized. A virtual smorgasbord of all good things literary, this book has action, suspense, courtroom drama, some literary allusions, and even a tiny sprinkling of horror toward the end. There are no small bites here; you will devour this book. Without a dull moment in sight, this book grips you from the first sentence and keeps you entertained and hungry for more until it delivers one sad reader at the very end. You will miss these characters and this story when it’s gone. Lucky for all of us, this is book one in a five book series. Read on, book warriors!
Don’t read the dust jacket: this book is neither Gone Girl nor The Girl on the Train, both books we really, really liked even with their creepy, psychological suspense. It IS a great read though. In fact, it reminded us more of Leanne Moriarty’s The Husband’s Secret with the marital secrets and the mystery at the heart of it. Sometimes, multiple points of view can be distracting, but in this case, the structure of the novel contributes to some of the magic. Be forewarned: you could easily lose an afternoon falling down this delightful rabbit hole, but the pay-off is worth it!
Our book club read this one this year, and we universally loved and were inspired by it. So much so that those of us who had borrowed it from the library purchased copies to share with our kids. We were mesmerized by Malala’s chilling account of her hometown being taken over and then living under extremist terrorists, moved by her descriptions of the Swat Valley where she grew up, and emboldened by her courage. The book held up for us as a read, not just a recounting. 2016 is The Year for Global Girls. Lose yourself in Malala’ s incredible story and find yourself fired up about getting girls all over the world access to educational opportunities.
We share a huge author crush on Rainbow Rowell. We both LOVED Eleanor & Park and Fangirl, so we had huge expectations for this book, especially because favorite characters from Fangirl show up again in this story. Well, the inimitable Rowell never fails to surprise, entertain, and stun us with her craft and cleverness. She can also give you that rare stomach flip. Even in a book about magic, she is the real deal. Before you start to call this book Harry Potter for big kids, you have to know that this book is its own brand of special. How do we know? Over 500 pages disappear in a flash before your very eyes. This is Rowell at her best. The results? Magical.
Erin gobbled this one right up. She even took it backpacking on the Appalachian Trail. Nothing says “must read” like a willingness to cart those extra ounces up and down a mountain. In any case, the novel opens as stay-at-home mom Allison’s life is about to go off the rails. She goes to her childhood best friend’s book signing one night and has a little too much to drink. Mere hours later, she is involved in a fatal accident in which a child dies. The air you take into your lungs in the big gasp in the beginning takes this whole well-paced novel to be released. This may not be high literature, but it is a captivating read that makes you think. Like we said, you are gonna want to take big bites of this one.
Erin laughed, cried, and ignored her kids for three days to finish this piece of book crack in the big, sloppy gulps it demands. You know from the beginning that there has been a terrible tragedy at the local school’s Trivia Night, because Moriarty leaves little crumbs at the end of each chapter. But that’s not the story here. This is NOT another legal thriller. A big, sprawling character study of modern moms, it may be. An ironic, funny take on modern parenting, it definitely is! It’s also a rollicking good time. You’ll laugh and cringe at just how right Moriarty gets all the characters hanging out in the school parking lot. A great read for fall while still reminiscent of that last joyful moment of summer indulgence.
A book lover’s dream, this first novel has the trifecta for a satisfying read: great well-developed characters, a dynamic and well-paced plot, and some nice curve balls to keep you guessing. Our protagonist Grace looks like a simple girl from Tennessee, but she can’t hide her complex and slippery character for long. You’ll root for her and want to wring her neck in equal measure. There’s a question that hangs over the novel from the beginning that’s begging to be answered and when Scherm finally gets around to it, you are grateful for the care she took in the build-up as well as the payoff itself. This is a debut that leaves you wanting more.
Moms of daughters, beware: this read will make you want to lock your girls up and throw away the key. But despite the dark cloud that hangs over this novel as a teen girl goes missing, there is so much to enjoy as well. Ng is a writer’s writer and she doesn’t so much document this family’s unraveling as their personal hell unfolds as invite you to pull at the fraying threads with her. At once, a novel about family, the mother/daughter dynamic, and cultural divides, this book is also achingly real and familiar. The truth hurts so bad in this one, but the reader is so grateful for every perfect note Ng hits. If the ship is going down, we might as well learn something from the trip. Ng makes sure she plumbs the depths so well that this is one dark corner now revealed.
Erin always considers it a good thing when she wants to throttle and hug the characters in equal measure. Straub’s story offers up characters that deliver on this front. College bandmates now mellowing in middle age, Elizabeth and Andrew who are married live down the street from old bandmate Zoe and her wife Jane. The band’s fourth member Lydia achieved some success on her own. When a film about Lydia’s life requires them all to touch the past, their present unravels a little at the seams. Straub’s deft hand controls the realistic tensions, steers the careful and realistic examination of midlife, and delivers characters that resonate. A satisfying, well-paced read by a gifted writer.
If you can judge a family by its flaws, the Plumbs are a perfect hot mess of a crew. They also couldn’t be more charming. The novel kicks off with the family inheritance in jeopardy after one of the siblings gets himself into hot water. As the four siblings wrestle with the mess left behind, it would be tempting to dismiss them as shallow or lacking substance. However, Sweeney gives each character multiple dimensions. She exposes their humanity and moves the story along. In doing so, their tale of personal woes, family ties, and thwarted ambitions is reminiscent of challenges we all face. A thoroughly entertaining read.
Marriage isn’t a straight narrative so much as a thousand shimmering moments—beautiful, terrible, and strange—and Offill lays them all out for us in this gripping, lovely book about what it means to take this particular trip. With her unique gift for plucking the extraordinary from the everyday, Offill doesn’t just offer up moments from a marriage but gives us glimpses of the diamonds hidden in the rough patches as well. Offill’s structuring of the story can be the reader’s hard work. Through her careful curation of snippets from the marriage at the heart of this novel, Offill leaves the reader asking on every page—how do these pieces fit together? what does this mean here? Yet it’s these tenuous but important questions that serve the story she is trying to tell and give the reader a satisfying and wonderful read.
We hope these page turners will make it easier to thrill any readers on your list.
Of course, you could just print this list out and hope they end up under your own tree.
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We just reinvest in books, so don’t get too jealous.
Hey! Want to buy our new book? I Just Want to Be Perfect brings together 37 hilarious and relatable essays that showcase the foibles of ordinary women trying to be perfect.
On the list of things we love, books are definitely near the top. With this in mind, we are always either making booklists like this one or this one or finding great booklists. After writing a bunch of booklists, we notice that there are some authors we can count on to bring great writing, killer story-telling, and compelling characters every time. So here is our latest list of great books grouped by authors we love. You can thank us later.
Noah Hawley
Currently writing, showrunning, and producing the series “Fargo” while writing killer novels on the side, Noah Hawley can pace a story like the award-winning TV writer that he is. He also populates his books with relatable real characters and sprinkles some crackling dialogue on top. Crack one of these open and enjoy!
Every member of Erin’s family devoured this book this summer. The premise: a plane crashes, and there are only 2 survivors, one of them a young child. The promise: a story that unfolds with a few surprises full of characters you care about and a mystery you are interested in solving. You will stay up late to read the backstories of the people on the plane and find out what happened to the ill-fated flight. Fascinating and entirely unputdownable, this is a book on everybody’s must read lists this summer so move it to the top of yours.
Erin remembers reading this book and seeing Hawley’s screenwriter roots bubble up through the pages. Check out the premise: A renowned rheumatologist finds out that his son is accused of murdering a presidential candidate. So very made-for-TV, right? Well, look deeper at the promise: a well-developed story that explores the challenges of modern parenthood and a literary rumination on the extent to which our characters and fates are shaped by nature, nurture, and plain old dumb luck. It’s a knock-out of a book.
Elizabeth Strout
We both love every opportunity to worship at the altar of the inimitable Strout and these two books illustrate perfectly why.
This simple and unassuming story is a powerhouse of story-telling. Lucy is recovering in a hospital bed when her estranged mom comes to visit. However, Lucy is no ordinary protagonist and Strout is now ordinary writer, so the results are literary fireworks. Small but mighty, this slim novel packs a lot of extraordinary into a tight, narrative thread. The perfectly rendered imperfect relationship between Lucy and her mother is a reader’s dream: nuanced, fully realized, and ringing with truth. This one is a keeper.
Sometimes an author creates a character that can actually breathe off the page. Olive Kitteridge is that character and the axis upon which the enchanting little world of Crosby, Maine turns. The thirteen personal narratives that come together to create this story are compelling in themselves, but their power comes from the connection to Olive herself. Strout, for her part, can animate the ordinariness of life. We aren’t pulled in because this book is so extraordinary, but because it rings with truth and resonates with beauty.
Rainbow Rowell
We share a huge author crush on Rainbow Rowell. Rowell never fails to surprise, entertain, and stun us with her craft and cleverness. She can also give you that rare stomach flip. Here are two of her books we just love.
Nothing warms the heart faster than a love story, and this one charmed us both. It’s a story of first love peopled with characters so real they could walk right off the page. Eleanor and Park are high schoolers the way we remember them and know them now. Funny, sweet, vulnerable, flawed, and deeply striving for love, acceptance, and independence, they are characters to cheer for, and you will. Erin walked around like a teen in love while reading it and couldn’t stop shoving it into the hands of any unsuspecting reader she could find. Don’t let the Barnes and Noble sales rack fool you: this is not a teen romance in the same way that War and Peace is not a book that concerns Russia. It IS a 24 hour read. Tops.
Following the wonderful Eleanor & Park and Fangirl, there were huge expectations for this book, especially because favorite characters from Fangirl show up again in this story. Even in a book about magic, Rowell proves she is still so very much the literary real deal. Before you start to call this book Harry Potter for big kids, you have to know that this book is its own brand of special. How do we know? Over 500 pages disappear in a flash before your very eyes. This is Rowell at her best. The results? Magical.
In a nutshell, this is a tale of two girls who have both been left alone in the world by fate. Their stories are the backbone of the book: one taking place in the here and now, the other in flashback. While this book more solidly belongs to Vivian and her experience on the orphan train, Molly’s modern day tale of abandonment anchors this historical novel and lets us not forget that we still struggle with how to handle the children left behind.
Erin gobbled this one right up. She even took it backpacking on the Appalachian Trail. Nothing says “must read” like a willingness to cart those extra ounces up and down a mountain. In any case, the novel opens as stay-at-home mom Allison’s life is about to go off the rails. She goes to her childhood best friend’s book signing one night and has a little too much to drink. Mere hours later, she is involved in a fatal accident in which a child dies. The air you take into your lungs in the big gasp in the beginning takes this whole well-paced novel to be released. This may not be high literature, but it is a captivating read that makes you think. Like we said, you are gonna want to take big bites of this one.
Erin laughed, cried, and ignored her kids for three days to finish this piece of book crack in the big, sloppy gulps it demands. You know from the beginning that there has been a terrible tragedy at the local school’s Trivia Night, because Moriarty leaves little crumbs at the end of each chapter. But that’s not the story here. This is NOT another legal thriller. A big, sprawling character study of modern moms, it may be. An ironic, funny take on modern parenting, it definitely is! It’s also a rollicking good time. You’ll laugh and cringe at just how right Moriarty gets all the characters hanging out in the school parking lot. A great read for fall while still reminiscent of that last joyful moment of summer indulgence.
Poor Alice is having a hell of a day: when she comes to on the floor of a gym and is whisked off to the hospital, she discovers that she is not in fact 29, crazy in love with her husband and expecting her child, but actually 39 with three kids in the midst of a divorce. The chasm between where she is and where she was is the story itself. Moriarty asks the question: what happened to our lives while we we were busy living it? Then she lets Alice navigate through the world that attempts to answer it. The journey is a great read that gets you thinking about the nature of marriage and finding one’s own way. Written with humor and warmth, this is a satisfying and enjoyable read.
Barbara Kingsolver
Oh, Barbara Kingsolver, you complete us! We kind of love everything she writes, but these books delight our book-loving hearts while also giving us thoughtful reads that keep us thinking long after we turn the last pages.
There are other stories like this one about eating locally, about families trying to live on their land, about treating the environment well, but Kingsolver’s gifted narrative skills elevate this book to the next level. Not just a memoir of her family’s year of eating locally, this book is a deeply entertaining and obsessively readable gem full of delectable recipes and equally delicious sidebars. Our science-loving hearts appreciate the sound and deep research that anchors the book, but even more precious and appreciated is the very tone and tenor of this book. Never once does it devolve into smugness or snobbery, a pitfall of the genre.
This one will get your pulse racing and the thermostat moving in the right direction.Three interwoven love stories fill out the deeply moving and wildly beating heart at the center of this novel. As always, Kingsolver draws you into the natural world framing the events taking place during this hot, hot summer. As you might expect, the result is less natural history course and more, well, prodigal. Bring a tall glass of cool tea to sip while reading just to bring the temperature down.
Sue Miller
Oh, Sue Miller. We just love her. She brings us stories that don’t just entertain but make us think.
This book about two women on opposite sides of the marital timeline but facing similar issues within them is no exception. Miller can craft a conversation like nobody’s business, but its her adept pacing and characterization that make her novels little living, breathing things. In this case, she has breathed life into the very concept of marriage itself and in turn created a fascinating, fun read. No small feat, but one we will gladly take.
Sue Miller is so good at creating characters that you forget you’re reading and feel yourself looking around for your new friends. Anyway, this is a story in a story too, and this approach gives you just the distance you need to see these characters clearly. Billy, the playwright, is grieving the loss of her lover who was killed in the attacks of 9/11, and she works out her feelings in her play about a man waiting to hear if his wife has been killed in a terrorist attack on the famed train, The Lake Shore Limited. These characters will drag you into their world no matter where you may be sipping your drink.
Tana French
We are just gonna come right out and say it: Tana French never disappoints. If you haven’t fallen in love with her books yet, then you are in for a treat. Not only can this Irish writer pace a novel to keep you begging for more, but she is THE master of language. Her beautiful storytelling will keep you mesmerized for hours.
Dang, this book has a killer set-up. In 1984, three kids don’t make it home for dinner. One of them is found clinging to a tree with blood-soaked sneakers. Fast-forward to present day and that found child is the lead detective in a copycat crime. French writes the hell out of this story, so there are rich characters, stunning complexity, and likable characters. The best part? There are three more great novels (with familiar characters) to read right after you finish this one (and you will want to, believe me!) Lose yourself in her fabulous characters and richly imagined worlds and get ready to buy us a drink for introducing the two of you!
You will not be disappointed in this detective tale of a teen boy murdered at a prestigious boarding school. But there is a caveat: if you are a true fan (one that has read all her novels and waits with baited breath for each new book), this one won’t take top billing in the special brand of mystery detective thrillers she has created. But that’s not to say that you shouldn’t read it: there is still much to love in this novel. First of all, familiar characters are back in Frank Mackey, his daughter Holly, and detective Stephen Moran. Second, like always, French is the master of this genre in so many ways. She paces her stories so well and her characterizations and her plots are memorable and special.
Curtis Sittenfeld
Right off the bat, Erin has to disclose that she is a huge Sittenfeld fan. Prep , American Wife, The Man of My Dreams —liked ’em all, but this is an author that you love or hate, so read these recommendations with that in mind.
“It would in retrospect appear to be a stop on a narrative path that was inevitable, but this is only because most events, most paths, feel inevitable in retrospect.” This story of a president’s wife, based on the biography of Laura Bush, is a gem of writing and story-telling. It also feels like something important to read right now in this political climate. The questions asked, the curtains pulled back, the psyches laid bare, the story told—it all fits just right and Sittenfeld is a master wordsmith as well as killer storyteller. You will not be disappointed.
In this novel, Kate (AKA Daisy) and her twin sister Violet have the gift of sight, ESP. It’s a gift that Violet celebrates and Daisy (now known as Kate) hides under a bushel basket. The story centers around Violet’s premonition that an earthquake is coming that is going to devastate the region and the fallout of her announcement for both the media and their relationship. Sittenfeld peppers all of her novels with pop culture references, and this book is no exception. It makes reading a little like finding gems in the sand: a delightful surprise in an already pleasurable experience. Also, CS nails the complexities of the family bond. Her characterization has always been a strong suit, and she reveals in the Violet/Daisy bond why family can not only be great but also grating as well.
So there you have it, a booklist for book and author lovers alike.
Our book club pals who vetted most of these pics and keep us honest about our reviews
With 37 hilarious and relatable essays that showcase the foibles of ordinary women trying to be perfect, it is just as great whether you are hanging our poolside, by the beach, or even just the doctor’s office.
Short of a personal trainer, an industrial strength leash, a never empty coffee pot, and an ironclad agreement with the relatives to babysit every weekend, you know what would make this whole parenting thing a whole lot easier? A book or better yet a whole library to tell you what was coming and what to do once you got there. Motherhood doesn’t just change your pants size, your shoe size, and your selection at Victoria’s Secret, Motherhood changes EVERYTHING. And then it keeps on changing. ALL. THE. TIME. You will just get your parenting stride at a stage, and your little darling is sprinting on to the next one. So we took some inspiration from classic books and children’s books to mark some milestones of childhood for you. Think of this as the Cliff’s Notes Reader’s Guide to Parenting. Some fanfare, please . . .
1. War and Peace
The First Year
Now Erin has never actually read this book, but we heard that it concerns Russia. The title conjures what it feels like in the trenches of your first year with a new baby. It’s either bliss. . . or bombs raining down on you. Prepare to be delighted, completely decimated, and so deprived of sleep you could put on your husband’s underwear and think it’s your own or fall asleep mid-sentence. Not that either of these things has ever happened to either of us.
2. What Do People Do All Day?
The Second Year
Hope you like naming aloud everything you own, see, think, hear, feel, smell, flush down the toilet, etc. because that’s what baby likes. Oh, that’s not for me, you say, my kid’s just chillin’. Well, we say that clearly you have never been at the mercy of a newly mobile but vocabulary-limited tot. YET. They jonez for this stuff like miniature meth addicts cut off from their supplier. Buy every oversized, ridiculously detailed book you can find now to assuage the tiny beasts. Richard Scarry knows. He’s the toddler-whisperer.
Oh, and they run. A lot. This is when they start the sprinting.
3. Where the Wild Things Are
The Third and Fourth Year AKA The Terrible/Terrific Twos and Threes
These kids are adorable but nuts with a little extra nutty on top. Every time we think back to when our houses were ruled by these fickle tyrants, there is a little catch in our throats. We do miss our ladies who dressed as princesses or ladybugs every day and our lads bedecked in boots and capes. But it’s a dog-eat-dog world in the Land of Tod and we’ll give you three guesses who’s their favorite meal. Come to think of it, Lord of the Flies works for this stage too.
4. Interrupting Chicken
The Funny Fabulous Fact-Filled Four Year Old
Erin is 100% convinced that she did not have her attention issues until she had to parent a 4 year old—FIVE TIMES! No sentences are finished, no thoughts completed, no work is done. The four year old runs the place like a miniature Napoleon or Attila the Hun and the only consistent thing he or she is serving up is questions. Note: When the 4 year old inevitably asks you where babies come from or why you and Daddy like to wrestle, deflect, defer, and lie your pants off. You have plenty of time to pay for future counseling.
This stage marks the end of an era and the beginning of a new one, so all that sniffling and carrying on you’re going to do is totally justified. Your baby belongs to the great big world now. And it’s a beautiful, terrible, amazing, nauseating, wondrous sight to see.
6. The Call of the Wild
Early Elementary School
Seriously, kids at this age are powered by sheer force of will and their wily, wily ways. If we could harness it, we would solve the world’s energy needs. Oh, yeah, and they are full throttle without the benefit of forethought or reason. Invest in Band-Aids and mecurochrome and wine.
7. The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyl and Mr. Hyde
Late Elementary School
As a pre-cursor to the full-blown hormonal onslaught headed your way, Mother Nature gives you a little tapas of what’s to come. Honestly, a lot of the angst comes from having one foot in the Land of the Little Kid and the other in the Acreage of Adolescence, but that doesn’t mean that this stage isn’t sometimes going to keep you up at night or wrangling with each other during the day.
8. Something Wicked This Way Comes
Middle School
Too dramatic? Maybe, especially when we both actually enjoy our Middle Schoolers and Erin loves teaching this age group. But storms are a-comin’, so you need to be ready to ride them out when they come AND to enjoy the calm seas in between the blow-ups.
9. Catch-22
Early Teen
Your tongue might actually hurt from all the times you will hold it. Happy, successful parenting with teens is all about choosing your battles, so often times you may get caught in senseless, absurd situations. We’ll take those over the scary stuff that also sometimes comes with the teen years, but none of it is easy. And <sniff>, you do sense your time together is shortening.
10. Great Expectations
Late Teen
Your baby’s getting ready to spread his or her wings, so there is great talk about the future and plans and what happens next. It’s all exciting and scary and nothing at all like what you imagined when you started this journey, oh so many moons ago.
Looking for something perfect to put under the Christmas tree? Nothing warms our hearts and de-grinchifies us faster than a stack of great books. We crowd-sourced our in-real-life Sisterhood to put together this stellar booklist. Some books we have loved, others we are wishing to see under our own trees this Christmas. In any case, they all come stamped with a Sisterhood Seal of Approval, so you can feel confident that your favorite reader will move you to the top of their list after receiving any of these.
A book club pick, we devoured this book individually and as a group. In a nutshell, a young woman loses her job and then goes to work for a young quadriplegic, but that’s just on the book jacket. There is so much meat to this tale. The relationship that develops between Louisa and Will doesn’t just touch the reader, it makes you reevaluate the line between ordinary and extraordinary and the paths we take to get where we need to go. It also launched a great book club discussion which is, of course, the very best endorsement.
A cautionary tale for our hyper-connected world, this riveting tale of Joe and his obsession with the lovely, unsuspecting Beck will heighten your pulse and take your breath away. A creeper tale of the highest order, this story watches Joe watching Beck and then making his move from stalker to boyfriend. Read this one with all the lights on and feel to check your heart rate often during this compulsively readable and thrilling book.
A book club pick from another book club, we were thrilled by Hatmaker’s honest, funny take on parenting, marriage, and modern womanhood. A Christian blogger cum HGTV star, Hatmaker is the best girlfriend you wish you had. This book means you can carry her wisdom and wit with you all the way through the carpool line and beyond.
Wickedly funny, this book starts with relatively unlikeable characters, adds some loose connections to the story “The Necklace” by Guy de Maupassant, throws in a road trip, and somehow ends up with a satisfying read. The three young people at the heart of this one–Kezia, Victor, and Nathaniel–were best friends in college who crash back in to each other’s lives at a wedding. Their intricate dance throughout the novel holds all the moving pieces here together, but Crosley’s wry funny observations and humor are the real stars. Erin quoted this book out loud to her husband many times. Be prepared to laugh and cry.
Erin is a Freakonomics podcast enthusiast and found this recommendation in an episode. Funny as well as fascinating, this book takes on the idea that is transforming behavioral economics: small changes can produce great results. Finding a book to stimulate your mind and your funny bone at the same time is like finding a bathing suit in January, but this is one magical unicorn of a book. Not just appropriate for non-fiction lovers, this book will thrill anyone curious about why people do what they do. It might make you reevaluate how funny college professors really can be. A fun, fascinating read.
Full disclosure: we really liked Gone Girl so this book which has hints of that same dark heart beating beneath the shiny surface of the marriage between these two new beautiful people thrills us. But this is not Gone Girl Lite. Groff is a beautiful writer and the power of her prose combined with the structure she imposes here give this book new heights to reach and new depths to plumb. With the two points of view explored fully and exposed honestly, this book could also have been titled TheRise and Fall of a 20 Year Marriage, but even that falls short of the literary magic happening here. Love her or hate her, Groff of Arcadia fame is a reader’s writer and this story moves, breathes, and completely blows away what you ever thought about long term relationships.
Another wife gone missing book with an important difference: Pitlor’s gifted hand. She draws everyday married life in all it unexceptional uniqueness. When Hannah disappears after an argument with her husband Lovell, the story of their marriage unfolds as the mystery begs to be resolved. Pitlor deftly explores the special country that each love story spawns with exquisite and realistic detail. You have seen those blind turns, you have navigated these back roads. A page turner with heart and humor.
Another look at yet another marriage, but this time the focus includes the teens caught in the crossfire. The immensely gifted Pierpont draws the philandering Jack, his wife Deb, and their two children with such clarity that their pain is palpable. An inventive structure to the novel adds layers to this already complex and accurate portrayal of a modern family in distress.
This book is a novelization of the up close and brutal of the adoption process. The complex, often times unlikeable characters of Jesse and Ramone populate this novel with their insecurities and shortcomings, but ultimately this book wins because it has a raw honesty. Though it is at times bitter, this vulnerability and truth is also welcome. Dark humor and real emotion pull this novel along.
This book answers the question: what happens after the torpedo hits the bow? A novel set in New York City, this story follows the Darling family, a family firmly in the 1%, after a financial scandal threatens to sink the whole ship. Rich with details of what it’s really like inside the hearts, minds, homes, and work spaces of the wealthy elite, this book will definitely grab your imagination. The well paced plot and superbly drawn characters will keep it.
So don’t forget: nothing says “I love you” like a stack of books under the tree on Christmas morn.
Didn’t find what you are looking for?
Check out our other booklists from this year here and here and here and here.
It’s here, friends. The end of summer is upon us. We know. We’re sad too. But just because lazy days on the beach are ending, doesn’t mean the reading stops! In fact, just the opposite. No time like the present to lose yourself in a great book to escape the hassles and woes of Back-to-School prep and fuss. There’s some solace to be had by making the most of these last summer days.
To this end, we asked the uber-important question of our blogging buddies: What book would you recommend for a last blast of summer reading?
Actually, our friend, Meredith, from The Mom of the Year asked this question and was nice enough to include us. Every month she and Normal Level of Crazy meet through a virtual book club* to allow moms to come together and chat about fab books while still rocking their pj pants in the cozy comfort of their own homes. It doesn’t get any better, really.
This month, the skies have been blown wide open with an entire book list of great reads that you need to check out! Even better, we are giving one of you a $225 Amazon gift card along with seven of the titles on this list to read! In short, you will be in a reader’s heaven and completely forget that the daily school grind is around the corner. Oops! Did we just remind you? Forget we said anything and focus on the sweet deal instead.
Enter to score the gift card and the hard copies of the books before 8/14/15 at 5:30am ET through the Rafflecopter below. As long as you are resident of the continental U.S. and 18 yrs. or older, you are eligible to win!
What’s on the list of recommended reads?
The Longest Ride by Nicholas Sparks (Jessica of Herd Management)–Possibly the best Sparks’ book I’ve ever read. Two couples in completely different time periods paths cross and the end result is amazing. Tear-jerking romance is enfolded within the pages of the characters’ captivating challenges. Plus, I can’t resist a cowboy. Read this before you see the movie!
Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan (Courtney of Our Small Moments)– How would you feel if the one you loved turned out to be from one of the richest families? Crazy Rich Asians shows the complexity of that situation.
The Liar by Nora Roberts (MamaRabia of The Lieber Family)–What would you do if you found out that your recently deceased husband was not only a liar and a thief, but possibly worse? Shelby Pomeroy decides to take back her life by clearing her name and fighting to make a better life for herself and her young daughter. But her dead husband still has some surprises in store for her!
Orphan Train by Christina Baker Kline (Jennifer of Real Life Parenting)–The primary female characters in this historical fiction are strong, feisty, and full of heart and personality. The way their lives in time are so far apart, their connections are close and poignant. I loved the blending of history with modern day happenings! A quick read because you just don’t want to put it down.
Child, Please, How Mama’s Old-School Lessons Helped Me Check Myself Before I Wrecked Myself by Ylonda Gault Caviness (Stacey of One Funny Motha)–Maybe I like this book because I’m old-school myself. Or it could be the author’s funny, lively, entirely personable voice that makes reading it feel as though you’re talking to a friend. Or it could be that I write about similar issues myself and found much to agree with in the author’s perspective. Whatever the case, this memoir is a throughly enjoyable read of one woman’s straight-talking journey through motherhood and was selected by Ebony as 1 of the top 4 must-reads of the summer.
Big Little Lies by Liane Moriarty (Alyson of The Shitastrophy)–Was the most amazing read for me. After having walked away from reading for pleasure for some time due to work commitments I selected this book to read on an airplane. I couldn’t put the book down and finished it within 2 days. The story winds and weaves through three friends lives together. The ending was something I didn’t see coming and was suiting to see how justice can come to fruition, even when not done judicially. I have gone on to read the rest of her books available and none have disappointed.
Now the Hell Will Start by Brendan I. Koerner (Femme of FemmeFrugality)–Part history, part thriller, all non-fiction. Now the Hell Will Start is the story of Herman Perry, a WWII American soldier on the run in Burma after shooting his commanding officer. Not only does it expose a massive part of WWII history we never learn about in school, it also follows his incredible run from the law, including marrying into a local, headhunting tribe.
The Reluctant Tuscan by Phil Doran (Alicia of Sadler House)–Many writers have extolled the virtues of Italy’s countryside, but no other story of Italian transplants is quite like this one. This witty memoir recounts how an award-winning Hollywood comedy producer finds himself renovating a 300-year-old house in Tuscany, where escapism gives way to real-life hilarity.
The Ocean at The End of The Laneby Neil Gaiman (Janene of More than Mommies)–We all have those reader friends who we want to be like. You know . . . the ones who are always reading WAY cooler books than we are reading? Well, this book came HIGHLY recommended by my reader friend who I have reader envy of, so, I think we should ALL read it and discuss! (I’m planning on reading it in August . . . so if you pick this one to read I’d love to hear your thoughts!)
Secret Lives of Husbands and Wives by Josie Brown (Dani of Cloudy, With a Chance of Wine)–My BFF sent me Secrets of Husbands and Wives by Josie Brown for my birthday in March and I absolutely COULD NOT put it down. I only ever trust her book recommendations, and she was spot on with this one. It’s the perfect late summer / back-to-school read, and will not disappoint!
House of Mirth by Edith Wharton (Norine of Science of Parenthood)–Though it reads like a Downton Abbey-esque drawing room drama, behind the mansions and manners and horse-drawn carriages, Edith Wharton’s House of Mirth is a fierce social commentary on the proscribed roles for American women in the 1880s. Wharton is a social commentator bar none. And Lily Bart, whose story this is, is my favorite tragic heroine. Every time I read this book, I root for Lily to emerge victorious … and am heartbroken all over again when she falters.
On Borrowed Wings by Chandra Prasad (Amy of Funny is Family)–On Borrowed Wings is the story of a girl who disguises herself as a boy to attend Yale University in the 1930s, before women were allowed to enroll. It’s a fantastic read that weaves well-researched historical details and the strong desire of a girl to break away from her predetermined life path.
All Fall Down by Jennifer Weiner (Meredith of Meredith to Mommy)–This book really struck me. Well-off, suburban, mom blogger who is trying to do it all winds up addicted to pain meds. This constant monologue of “I can fix this myself. I have a plan. I don’t REALLY have a problem.” as she falls deeper and deeper into addiction made me choke up at how easy it is to lose control and wind up in a hole that you have no hope of clawing yourself out of alone, while still keeping up a strong facade as someone who has it all. I’ve read it multiple times, and find myself just as drawn in as I was the first.
Stories I Only Tell My Friends by Rob Lowe (Kimberly of Red Shutters)–Did you love Rob Lowe in “The Outsiders” and “St. Elmo’s Fire” as much as I did? Then, you’d love this memoir in which Lowe pulls back the curtain on his life in Hollywood, from 19-year-old heartthrob to award-winning actor, sharing life wisdom along the way. I enjoyed the audio version of this book, which Lowe narrates himself, complete with impressions of Christopher Walken, Francis Ford Coppola, and other film industry luminaries.
The Martianby Andy Weir (Kim of Let Me Start By Saying)–A man gets left on Mars by accident and his personality, smarts, creativity, and sense of humor carve a place in your heart for him as he tries to figure a way to survive–and eventually leave–his new home in space. What is happening back on Earth and in the ship that left him will have you cranking through the pages, itching to know what will happen next, because this book is full of surprises, laughs, details that make you feel right there.
We Need To Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver (Stephanie of When Crazy Meets Exhaustion)–A thought-provoking punch to the gut that, unfortunately, mimics reality a little too closely. I read it before I had kids, then again after I had my three, and I think a parent’s perspective is far more frightening. In the novel, a sociopath “kid” commits the darkest of sins and turns a town–and his family–upside down. *Shivers*
Finding Zoe by Brandi Rarus (Stephanie of Binkies and Briefcases)–the story of a deaf mother and how she came to find herself raising an adopted daughter who is also deaf, as well as her biological children. As an adoptive mom myself, it can be hard to find other stories that relate to my own journey mothering a child with special needs who joined us out of foster care, and this book certainly does that. More than that, Finding Zoe alsogaveme a glimpse intodeaf culture (which was neat for me because before my grandmother passed away she volunteered as a sign language interpreter) and was full of cool trivia, like the author being cast as Marlee Matlin’s understudy in a play, but it was also real and relatable on a human level. I think any mom will be able to relate to this memoir.
What Alice Forgot by Liane Moriarty (Melanie of Not So Super Mom)– I like it for summer reading because it’s not too heavy of a story but it does make us think a bit about our own lives, the expectations we had when we were younger and how changing priorities can set our lives on a different course than we imagined. What a difference a decade makes, right?
Dark Places by Gillian Flynn (Ellen and Erin of Sisterhood of the Sensible Moms)–Stop looking to other authors to give you the next Gone Girl and just read Flynn’s earlier work. Dark Places is told in a captivating flashback format, with Libby–complicated and damaged from a horrific tragedy in her childhood–narrating the present-day chapters in first person, while the flashback chapters, told in third person, describe the actions of several key characters on that one winter’s day in 1985.
The plot is gripping and complex enough to have you guessing how the puzzle really fits together until the very end. I only wish the story had been longer because it was the type of read you just want to binge on, but are sorry when it’s over.
Cutting Teeth by Julia Fierro (Carrie of Normal Level of Crazy and Meredith of The Mom of the Year)–With raw and heartwarming honesty, Fierro’s debut captures the sacrifices we make in order to seek understanding, compassion, and love.
Now that you have this whole list of awesome recommendations, it’s time to get reading, friends! Grab up these titles and make sure to enter in the Rafflecopter below for a super sweet $225 Amazon gift card and seven of these books for your very own!
* Note to Meredith and Carries’s dedicated book club fans: They will be discussing Judy Blume’s In the Unlikely Event as promised, but in the interest of this ginormous giveaway and recommendation list post, they’ve decided to table this discussion until September. Check in on the first Friday of the month, 9/4/15 to catch their thoughts on this book and snag their pick for the next month! It really is a good time!
While chocolates, hearts, and flowers may be the way to some girls’ hearts, books are definitely the way to ours. If books fill you with a warm, happy feeling too, here are five that you might want to check out, download, or purchase for yourself or your sweetie.
And if you are interested in hearing us talk about one of these in real time, just click the podcast at the bottom of this post!
There is a reason this book made it on to nearly every “Best Of” list last year—it’s quite simply a remarkable gem of a book. With her unique gift for plucking the extraordinary from the every day, Offill doesn’t just offer up moments from a marriage but gives us glimpses of the diamonds hidden in the rough patches as well. Offill’s structuring of the story can be the reader’s hard work. Through her careful curation of snippets from the marriage at the heart of this novel, Offill leaves the reader asking on every page—how do these pieces fit together? what does this mean here?—yet these tenuous but important questions serve the story she is trying to tell. Marriage isn’t a straight narrative so much as a thousand shimmering moments—beautiful, terrible, and strange—and she lays them all out for us in this gripping, lovely book about what it means to take this particular trip.
You know how we feel about immunizations. Ellen wrote a great post about herd immunity and its current threat from the anti-vaxxer movement here. But this book doesn’t so much argue for vaccines as wrap itself around the very concept of innoculation itself. Biss’ pace is unhurried as she weaves personal anecdotes in with history, literature, and scientific research. The result is a captivating read on a subject we cannot escape right now. I cannot escape one of her quotes: “We owe each other our bodies.” An unputdownable piece of non-fiction that will keep you thinking long after you have turned the last page.
This book broke my heart a couple of years ago, but it never left me. It’s truly one of my favorites of all time, but it’s not easily summed up or laid out. Krauss, the wife of the literary superstar Jonathan Safran Foer, has a weighty literary talent of her own and she embues all of her gifts on telling this beautiful love story of a boy named Leo who loved a girl named Alma. That she lets this love story travel back and forth in time and be told from many angles is just a gift for the reader. This is a book you will cherish.
For a big, honking tome like this with a beautiful, intricate story to boot, you could totally be spot on in thinking, “Really, Erin? You serious?” Well, those who love the literary heavy hitters are already gonna be on board with this wide open, lyrical book, but even if you are just looking for a great story, trust me when I say that this book is for you. It starts as a father’s love story. Marie-Laure loses her sight at six years old and her father, a talented locksmith in charge of all the locks at the Museum of Natural History, uses his abundant gifts to help her learn to manage her blindness. By the power of Doerr’s narrative gifts, it morphs into something else entirely. There is so much good stuff in these pages and Doerr plays well with every character and theme he introduces. It may not be great literature, but it is a damn fine read and that is enough to keep you warm on a cold winter night.
This is the one book that I am telling everyone to read right now. It’s such a great all-around literary experience from the plot that sucks you in to the characters that pull you through to the questions it keeps asking you. I could go on and on.
In fact, you can hear me (and Ellen) go on and on about this book and other things too in our latest podcast. Just click it below!
Pumpkins may be pushing pool noodles from the shelves, but there is still summer to be had! The sun is still blazing, our legs are still sticking to the car seats, and more importantly, there are still some great beach reads to be devoured.
Now when we say “Beach Reads” we are not talking about bare chested studs astride white stallions. We’re talking about novels that are easy to get lost in—the ones that leave you wanting the next page and sad when they are over. They are easy, enjoyable reads with interesting stories and rich character development.
Actually, they’re just good, solid books perfect for any time, but why not use a last hurrah to summer as the perfect excuse to load up your Kindle or pile up your nightstand?
While the intrigue may not be so deep that you are profoundly shocked, this sweeping saga still pulls you through the pages and leaves you deliciously wondering from time to time. But the real charm of this novel lies in its richly sculpted characters and relationships. Williams examines class standing, prejudice, and the complicated nature of female relationships in a truly satisfying way. Set in the socialite scene of the 1930s, this novel is as glamorous as it is gritty as it plunges into the treachery of family secrets and true love.
This is the perfect Hollywood success story with the gilt of perfection delightfully rubbed bare in a number of places. You’ll love the quirky main character, Ruthie, the screenwriter with the tragic back story, whose real heart and soul inspire you to cheer for her from the very first page. How can you not love a character whose grandmother will follow her across the country to help her realize her dream? This book has it all–love, betrayal, and a delightful comeuppance. This peek behind the Hollywood curtain will have you missing 30 Rock a little less.
This is the story of planning a wedding day, a real wedding day rife with disasters, not the stuff of princess dreams. Money is no object, so everything should be falling into place, but everything is actually starting to unravel. At the heart of the story is The Notebook, the instruction manual the bride-to-be’s mother wrote for her before she died. This tale is at times wistful and sometimes heartbreaking, but it is written with a light touch and is always entertaining. At first it seems like each character has his or her own side story going on, but it soon becomes apparent that each tale is part of the messy tapestry woven when two families join through marriage. It is the multiple points of view that make this novel as tasty as a slice of wedding cake.
This book was so popular among Erin’s family and friends LAST summer that it took us a year to track it down.
Totally worth the wait.
A legal thriller that would feel right at home next to your favorite Grishams and Turows, this one will keep you guessing and turning pages until the end. Landay may delve into some of the fears and insecurities of modern parenting and he may write very believable, relatable characters, but ultimately you will devour this one because it’s a good old-fashioned whodunit and that’s always a good read.
Erin laughed, cried, and ignored her kids for three days to finish this one in the big, sloppy gulps it demands. You know from the beginning that there has been a terrible tragedy at the local school’s Trivia Night, because Moriarty leaves little crumbs at the end of each chapter. But that’s not the story here. This is NOT another legal thriller.
A big, sprawling character study of modern moms, it may be. An ironic, funny take on modern parenting, it definitely is! It’s also a rollicking good time. You’ll laugh and cringe at just how right Moriarty gets all the characters hanging out in the school parking lot. A great read to get you ready for back-to-school while still soaking up that last joyful moment of summer indulgence.
Enjoy this summer book list and your last few days of summer!
by Nancy Isenberg
by Yuval Noah Harari
by Yuval Noah Harari
by Kristen Mae
by Kristen Mae
by Paul Kalanithi
by Paul Kalanithi
6 Berlin Olympics
by Daniel James Brown
by Ann Patchett
by Ann Patchett
by Bryan Stevenson
by Bryan Stevenson
by Elisabeth Egan
by Elisabeth Egan
by Meg Mitchell Moore
Untangled: Guiding Teenage Girls Through the Seven Transitions into Adulthood
by Lisa Damour
by John Krakauer 
by Julie Lythcott-Haims
by Kate Morton
by Fiona Barton
by Malala Yousafazi
by Rainbow Rowell
by Rebecca Sherm
by Celeste Ng 
by Emma Straub
by Emma Straub
by Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney
by Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney
by Jenny Offill
Marriage isn’t a straight narrative so much as a thousand shimmering moments—beautiful, terrible, and strange—and Offill lays them all out for us in this gripping, lovely book about what it means to take this particular trip. With her unique gift for plucking the extraordinary from the everyday, Offill doesn’t just offer up moments from a marriage but gives us glimpses of the diamonds hidden in the rough patches as well. Offill’s structuring of the story can be the reader’s hard work. Through her careful curation of snippets from the marriage at the heart of this novel, Offill leaves the reader asking on every page—how do these pieces fit together? what does this mean here? Yet it’s these tenuous but important questions that serve the story she is trying to tell and give the reader a satisfying and wonderful read. 
There are other stories like this one about eating locally, about families trying to live on their land, about treating the environment well, but Kingsolver’s gifted narrative skills elevate this book to the next level. Not just a memoir of her family’s year of eating locally, this book is a deeply entertaining and obsessively readable gem full of delectable recipes and equally delicious sidebars. Our science-loving hearts appreciate the sound and deep research that anchors the book, but even more precious and appreciated is the very tone and tenor of this book. Never once does it devolve into smugness or snobbery, a pitfall of the genre.
This one will get your pulse racing and the thermostat moving in the right direction.Three interwoven love stories fill out the deeply moving and wildly beating heart at the center of this novel. As always, Kingsolver draws you into the natural world framing the events taking place during this hot, hot summer. As you might expect, the result is less natural history course and more, well, prodigal. Bring a tall glass of cool tea to sip while reading just to bring the temperature down.
This book about two women on opposite sides of the marital timeline but facing similar issues within them is no exception. Miller can craft a conversation like nobody’s business, but its her adept pacing and characterization that make her novels little living, breathing things. In this case, she has breathed life into the very concept of marriage itself and in turn created a fascinating, fun read. No small feat, but one we will gladly take.
Sue Miller is so good at creating characters that you forget you’re reading and feel yourself looking around for your new friends. Anyway, this is a story in a story too, and this approach gives you just the distance you need to see these characters clearly. Billy, the playwright, is grieving the loss of her lover who was killed in the attacks of 9/11, and she works out her feelings in her play about a man waiting to hear if his wife has been killed in a terrorist attack on the famed train, The Lake Shore Limited. These characters will drag you into their world no matter where you may be sipping your drink.
, 
—liked ’em all, but this is an author that you love or hate, so read these recommendations with that in mind.
by Jojo Moyes
by Jen Hatmaker
fame is a reader’s writer and this story moves, breathes, and completely blows away what you ever thought about long term relationships.
It’s here, friends. The end of summer is upon us. We know. We’re sad too. But just because lazy days on the beach are ending, doesn’t mean the reading stops! In fact, just the opposite. No time like the present to lose yourself in a great book to escape the hassles and woes of Back-to-School prep and fuss. There’s some solace to be had by making the most of these last summer days.
by Eula Biss
by Nicole Krauss
by Anthony Doerr
by Emily St. John Martel
