74. Summer Reading: Find your perfect 'beach read'

'Beach read', 'holiday read', 'summer read'. This year there’s another term in the mix: the ‘stay-cation read’. But whatever you call it, for us summer reading is all about choice. Reading what you want. Not reading what you should. 

So, what do YOU feel like reading? Well, we’re here to help you decide. Speed read. Comforting classic. Wish fulfillment romance. Genre-bending Whodunnit. Rollicking historical epic. Forgotten 1930s gem. We’ve got you covered. 

Listen in to find your perfect ‘beach read’ – even if you’re nowhere near a beach. 

We’re joined by Emily of the Walking Book Group of Hampstead Heath, Elizabeth Morris of the Crib Notes newsletter, friend and journalist Phil Chaffee – who joins us on upcoming episode devoted to Rodham – and Simon of the Tea and Books podcast.

This show is all about recommendations. Here’s a list of everything we cover:

• Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
• Hotel du Lac by Anita Brookner
• Sea of Poppies by Amitav Gosh
• Highland Fling by Nancy Mitford
• Middlemarch by George Eliot
• Humankind: A Hopeful History by Rutger Bregman
• Business As Usual by Jane Oliver and Ann Stafford
• The Bookshop on the Shore by Jenny Colgan
• The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle by Stuart Turton
• Blonde Roots by Bernadine Evaristo

Also mentioned:

• The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett
• Natives: Race and Class in the Ruins of Empire by Akala 
• The Meaning of Rice by Michael Booth
• Rodham by Curtis Sittenfeld
• Beloved by Toni Morrison
• War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy
• Love in a Cold Climate, The Pursuit of Love and Wigs on the Green by Nancy Mitford
• In an Antique Land by Amitav Ghosh
• Effi Briest by Theodor Fontane
• H is for Hawk by Helen MacDonald
• The Road by Cormac McCarthy
• Lord of the Flies by William Golding
• Girl, Woman, Other by Bernadine Evaristo

You can find out more about Emily’s Walking Book Club, including how to join, here. We’d also encourage you to watch Emily sing the praises of Middlemarch, part of her brilliant lockdown series.

Have a listen to Tea or Books with Simon (Stuck in a Book) and Rachel (Book Snob) as they debate ideas around books. Warning: have your notepad at the ready, as this show will leave you with a ton of recommendations.

For more recommendations, from the back list to the hottest new new releases, sign up for Crib Notes, Elizabeth Morris’s monthly newsletter. Follow her on Instagram @cribnotesbookclub and Twitter @elizabethmoya for more tips and reviews.