It’s been a while since I shared a reading list update, so here’s a quick round up of everything I’ve read this summer and would recommend you to add to your bookshelf too.
Everything I know About Love – Dolly Alderton
I’ve seen this book splashed across Instagram for months and it looked like a great beach read for my holiday to Croatia. It actually turned out to be so much more than I was expecting. The book is a sometimes hilarious/sometimes heartbreaking account of Dolly Alderton’s experiences navigating relationships in her twenties. It’s great to dip into as so much of it is relatable and, in the end, it turns out to be less about romantic love and more about love for friends, which I think we all need more of in our lives.
Freya – Anthony Quinn
Sticking with the theme of female friendship, Freya is the story of two young women, Freya Wyley and Nancy Holdaway, who meet on VE day. It charts their turbulent friendship through first loves, heartbreak and their careers – Freya a journalist and Nancy an author. The pair are competitive in all aspects of their lives and you can’t help but fall in love with both characters.
Everything I Never Told You – Celeste Ng
This is hands down one of the best books I’ve read this year. When Lydia is found drowned in a lake near the Lee family home, each member of the family deals with their grief and tries to piece together exactly what happened in their own way. The story is beautifully written and the plot gradually unravels as we learn through each character what it is that Lydia couldn’t voice while she was alive.
Little Fires Everywhere – Celeste Ng
After I loved Ng’s debut novel so much I wanted to dive straight into her most recent book. I have to confess I didn’t enjoy it as much as the first. At times I felt the story was lacking in pace, however the conflict between the seemingly perfect Richardson family and the outsiders, Mia and Peal Warren, along with the secrets that are unearthed as the town comes to blows over the adoption of a Chinese-American child was compelling enough to keep me reading until the last page. As always, Ng captures the essence of her characters so well that it’s hard not to feel something for each of them.
Call Me By Your Name – Andre Aciman
This is one of those rare occasions where I’d seen the film before I read the book (a bit of a pet peeve of mine, if I’m honest) AND loved both equally. When seventeen-year-old Elio first meets his father’s latest house guest, Oliver, he is disinterested at best. Throughout a summer that seems to stretch forever, those feelings shift and turning into something much more intense. It’s a love story at heart, filled with longing and sexual awakening, set against a backdrop of the Italian Riviera. Read it and then watch the film which is equally beautiful.
What have you been reading this summer? I’m always looking for recommended reads so comment below and, if you fancy, follow me on Goodreads.
