2019 Spring and Summer Books To Read By The Pool or Beach

There are so many good books coming out in 2019. I have been glued to the pages of one book or another since January without missing a single day of reading. Here are some to add to your MUST READ pile!

 

 

Fleishman is in Trouble by Taffy Brodesser-Akner

What appealed to me about this was that it sounded like the kind of quirky novel I absolutely love!

Here’s what you need to know:

Dr. Toby Fleishman wakes up each morning surrounded by women. Women who are self-actualized and independent and know what they want – and, against all odds, what they want is Toby. Who knew what kind of life awaited him once he finally extracted himself from his nightmare of a marriage? Who knew that there were women out there who would actually look at him with softness and desire? But just as the winds of his optimism are beginning to pick up, they’re quickly dampened, and then extinguished, when his ex-wife, Rachel, suddenly disappears.

Toby thought he knew what to expect when he moved out: weekends and every other holiday with the kids, some residual bitterness, tense co-parenting negotiations. He never thought that one day, Rachel would just drop their children off at his place and never come back. As Toby tries to figure out what happened and what it means, all while juggling his patients at the hospital, his never-ending parental duties and his new, app-assisted sexual popularity, his tidy narrative of a spurned husband is his sole consolation. But if Toby ever wants to really understand where Rachel went and what really happened to his marriage, he is going to have to consider that he might not have seen it all that clearly in the first place.

I haven’t finished reading it yet but so far, I like it and the characters have me intrigued.

Due out on July 19.

 

 

I love to travel! If you follow me on Instagram,  you will see that I always take hundreds of photos from where ever I go so I can have fun editing them and looking at them again. I love going to a new place and experiencing life away from home. I love the anticipation of going on a trip, the last few days leading up to an adventure. I look at travel photos from around the world and imagine what each place is like.

Ten Years a Nomad by Matthew Kepnes captured my interest right away because of the topic- travel.  Have you ever wanted to travel around the world? Do you find that you care less about having “things” and more about having experiences? Then this book is for you.

Check it out:

New York Times bestselling author of How to Travel the World on $50 a Day, Matthew Kepnes knows what it feels like to get the travel bug. After meeting some travelers on a trip to Thailand in 2005, he realized that living life meant more than simply meeting society’s traditional milestones, such as buying a car, paying a mortgage, and moving up the career ladder. Inspired by them, he set off for a year-long trip around the world before he started his career. He finally came home after ten years. Over 500,000 miles, 1,000 hostels, and 90 different countries later, Matt has compiled his favorite stories, experiences, and insights into this travel manifesto. Filled with the color and perspective that only hindsight and self-reflection can offer, these stories get to the real questions at the heart of wanderlust. Travel questions that transcend the basic “how-to,” and plumb the depths of what drives us to travel — and what extended travel around the world can teach us about life, ourselves, and our place in the world.

Ten Years a Nomad is for travel junkies, the travel-curious, and anyone interested in what you can learn about the world when you don’t have a cable bill for a decade or spend a month not wearing shoes living on the beach in Thailand.

 

 

 

Ellie and the Harp Maker by Hazel Prior is a sweet story about a woman and yes, a harp maker.  I loved the authors writing style and wanted to walk right into the book, into the barn where the harps are made.

This isn’t full of thrills and suspense but its a beautifully written story. Dan is just a simple harp maker (I think he is on the autism spectrum though the author doesn’t address this) who doesn’t desire money for his harps, rather he is content to give them to people for pure enjoyment. Ellie is tired of her controlling husband and after stumbling upon Dan and his harps, begins to take an interest in learning to play the harp. She might be interested in Dan too… Both Dan and Ellie are different in their own ways but they connect over music.

I really enjoyed the author’s descriptions of the town of Exmoor!

In the rolling hills of beautiful Exmoor, there’s a barn. And in that barn, you’ll find Dan. He’s a maker of exquisite harps – but not a great maker of conversation. He’s content in his own company, quietly working and away from social situations that he doesn’t always get right.

But one day, a cherry-socked woman stumbles across his barn and the conversation flows a little more easily than usual. She says her name’s Ellie, a housewife, alone, out on her daily walk and, though she doesn’t say this, she looks sad. He wants to make her feel better, so he gives her one of his harps, made of cherry wood.

And before they know it, this simple act of kindness puts them on the path to friendship, big secrets, pet pheasants and, most importantly, true love.

 

Due out May 2.

 

 

I am always looking for ways to be better with simplifying and being more of a minimalist. In Zero Waste Home, Bea Johnson helps us figure out how to keep our carbon footprints to a minimum. She offers ways to declutter, making things instead of buying them, what to keep and what to toss etc. It’s not possible for many of us to be extreme and create absolutely zero waste but it is possible to reduce.

Part inspirational story of Bea Johnson (the “Priestess of Waste-Free Living”) and how she transformed her family’s life for the better by reducing their waste to an astonishing one liter per year; part practical, step-by-step guide that gives readers tools and tips to diminish their footprint and simplify their lives.Many of us have the gnawing feeling that we could and should do more to limit our impact on the environment. But where to begin? How? Many of us have taken small steps, but Bea Johnson has taken the big leap. Bea, her husband Scott, and their two young sons produce just one quart of garbage a year.

In Zero Waste Home, Bea Johnson shares her story and lays out the system by which she and her family have reached and maintained their own Zero Waste goals—a lifestyle that has yielded bigger surprises than they ever dreamed possible. They now have more time together as a family, they have cut their annual spending by a remarkable 40%, and they are healthier than they’ve ever been, both emotionally and physically.

This book shares how-to advice and essential secrets and insights based on the author’s own experience. She demystifies the process of going Zero Waste with hundreds of easy tips for sustainable living that even the busiest people can integrate: from making your own mustard, to packing kids’ lunches without plastic, to cancelling your junk mail, to enjoying the holidays without the guilt associated with overconsumption.

Out now.

 

 

 

This is the kind of book I absolutely love in between reading true crime stories and thrillers! Natalie Tan’s Book of Luck and Fortune by Roselle Lim is so charming, fun, and merges magic with reality which worked well to make this book delightful!

Here’s what you need to know:

At the news of her mother’s death, Natalie Tan returns home. The two women hadn’t spoken since Natalie left in anger seven years ago, when her mother refused to support her chosen career as a chef. Natalie is shocked to discover the vibrant neighborhood of San Francisco’s Chinatown that she remembers from her childhood is fading, with businesses failing and families moving out. She’s even more surprised to learn she has inherited her grandmother’s restaurant.

The neighborhood seer reads the restaurant’s fortune in the leaves: Natalie must cook three recipes from her grandmother’s cookbook to aid her struggling neighbors before the restaurant will succeed. Unfortunately, Natalie has no desire to help them try to turn things around–she resents the local shopkeepers for leaving her alone to take care of her agoraphobic mother when she was growing up. But with the support of a surprising new friend and a budding romance, Natalie starts to realize that maybe her neighbors really have been there for her all along.

I love the themes of healing and food, plus the author’s beautiful writing style.

Due June 11.

 

There are a few books coming out which take place during the 70’s and I can’t get enough of them! In Emily, Gone by Bette Lee Crosby, the story starts in 1971 durng a music festival and that’s pretty much all I needed to be hooked on this novel. If you want to spend a whole day curled up on the couch reading, this is an excellent book to have in your hands. Settle in and prepare to read for the entire day.

When a music festival rolls through the sleepy town of Hesterville, Georgia, the Dixon family’s lives are forever changed. On the final night, a storm muffles the sound of the blaring music, and Rachel tucks her baby into bed before falling into a deep sleep. So deep, she doesn’t hear the kitchen door opening. When she and her husband wake up in the morning, the crib is empty. Emily is gone.

Vicki Robart is one of the thousands at the festival, but she’s not feeling the music. She’s feeling the emptiness over the loss of her own baby several months before. When she leaves the festival and is faced with an opportunity to fill that void, she is driven to an act of desperation that will forever bind the lives of three women.

When the truth of what actually happened that fateful night is finally exposed, shattering the lives they’ve built, will they be able to pick up the pieces to put their families back together again?

A little suspense, some emotion, heartbreak, love, and forgiveness…its all here! Don’t miss this one.

April 30.

 

 

I love love love Lucinda Riley’s books and The Royal Secret is on my NEXT pile! I can’t wait to start this one, every book she writes is so good.  If you haven’t read her Seven Sisters books, those are wonderful.

Here is what you need to know about The Royal Secret:

When Sir James Harrison, one the greatest actors of his generation, passes away at the age of ninety-five, he leaves behind not just a heartbroken family but also a secret so shocking, it could rock the English establishment to its core.

Joanna Haslam, an up-and-coming reporter, is assigned to cover the legendary actor’s funeral, attended by glitzy celebrities of every background. But Joanna stumbles on something dark beneath the glamour: the mention of a letter James Harrison has left behind–the contents of which many have been desperate to keep concealed for over seventy years. As she peels back the veil of lies that has shrouded the secret, she realizes that she’s close to uncovering something deadly serious–and the royal family may be implicated. Before long, someone is on her tracks, attempting to prevent her from discovering the truth. And they’ll stop at nothing to reach the letter before she does.

This historical novel caught my eye thanks to the author plus the genre of historical fiction. I also love when a book has elements of suspense and deception.

 

 

I am very excited to share Swimming for Sunlight by Allie Larkin. This author writes great stories and this one is getting rave reviews, well deserved! It takes a special talent to write a novel that flows well, stirs up just the right amount of emotion, has a main character the reader cares about AND features dogs. This is the perfect novel to bring on vacation and read while you are relaxing!

When recently divorced Katie Ellis and her rescue dog Bark move back in with Katie’s grandmother in Florida, she becomes swept up in a reunion of her grandmother’s troupe of underwater performers—finding hope and renewal in unexpected places, in this sweet novel perfect for fans of Kristan Higgins and Claire Cook.

Aspiring costume designer Katie gave up everything in her divorce to gain custody of her fearful, faithful rescue dog, Barkimedes. While she figures out what to do next, she heads back to Florida to live with her grandmother, Nan.

But Katie quickly learns there’s a lot she doesn’t know about Nan—like the fact that in her youth Nan was a mermaid performer in a roadside attraction show, swimming and dancing underwater with a close-knit cast of talented women. Although most of the mermaids have since lost touch, Katie helps Nan search for her old friends on Facebook, sparking hopes for a reunion show. Katie is up for making some fabulous costumes, but first, she has to contend with her crippling fear of water.

As Katie’s college love Luca, a documentary filmmaker, enters the fray, Katie struggles to balance her hopes with her anxiety, and begins to realize just how much Bark’s fears are connected to her own, in this thoughtful, charming novel about hope after loss and friendships that span generations.

You can read this on April 23!

 

 

I loved The Last List of Miss Judith Kratt by Andrea Bobotis.  I am a sucker for good southern fiction, I really enjoy books that take place in South Carolina, Georgia and so on. This one takes place in the 1920s, such an interesting time in history!  As 75 year old Judith begins to inventory family heirlooms before her estranged sister returns, she recalls stories and the significance of each valuable.

‘Memory and history are bound up with one another. Where does one end and the other begin?’

Judith Kratt inherited all the Kratt family had to offer—the pie safe, the copper clock, the murder no one talks about. She knows it’s high time to make an inventory of her household and its valuables, but she finds that cataloging the family belongings—as well as their misfortunes—won’t contain her family’s secrets, not when her wayward sister suddenly returns, determined to expose skeletons the Kratts had hoped to take to their graves.

Interweaving the present with chilling flashbacks from one fateful evening in 1929, Judith pieces together the influence of her family on their small South Carolina cotton town, learning that the devastating effects of dark family secrets can last a lifetime and beyond.

The book is both a mystery and historical fiction. As the pages turn, more secrets are revealed and I think the book got better and better as I turned the pages. Add this to your MUST READ list.

Due July 9.

 

 

ANOTHER GREAT BOOK! When I say that 2019 has been an amazing year for books, I am not exaggerating.  I have been able to read so many books because every one of them is so darn good and I cannot stop reading. I have never read so much or stayed up so late with a book in my hands.

You will adore The Wisdom of Sally Red Shoes by Ruth Hogan. And just look at the beautiful cover.

Life has a habit of throwing you a curve ball every once in a while, and there’s nothing you can do about that, but you can always choose how you deal with it. You can lie down and roll over, or you can stand up and fight. But you don’t need do it on your own: there are people who can help. All you need is the wisdom and courage to let them. 

Masha is drowning. Once a spirited, independent woman with a rebellious streak, her life has been forever changed by a tragic event twelve years ago. Unable to let go of her grief, she finds solace in the silent company of the souls of her local Victorian cemetery and at the town’s lido, where she seeks refuge underwater – safe from the noise and the pain.

But a chance encounter with two extraordinary women – the fabulous and wise Kitty Muriel, a convent girl-turned-magician’s wife-turned-seventy-something-roller-disco-fanatic, and the mysterious Sally Red Shoes, a bag lady with a prodigious voice – opens up a new world of possibilities, and the chance to start living again.

Until the fateful day when the past comes roaring back.

Though the subject matter is heavy, the writing is not. It’s beautifully written with quirky characters and a little bit of dark humor.

Due out May 3.