The 20 books to read this summer
Maybe you're headed on vacation this summer and you have an important decision to make based on the precious real estate in your suitcase: What books do you pack? We've all been there, struggling to haul luggage into an overhead bin because it was so weighed down by all those hardcovers. Or maybe your summer reading isn't limited by storage space but by time. Even if the days are getting longer, there are only so many moments to find your new favorite author. So you must choose wisely, and we're here to help. We've found 20 worthwhile books to please various types of readers, from thriller fans to fiction aficionados and history buffs. How you want to whittle the list is up to you, but narrowing it down may be necessary, if only to save your back.
"America's Reluctant Prince: The Life of John F. Kennedy Jr."
By Steven M. Gillon, Dutton
Biography - The scholar-in-residence at the History Channel approaches his subject not just as a historian but as a longtime friend of JFK Jr.'s. That should yield uncommon insight into a man who continues to fascinate 20 years after his shocking death. (Available July 9)
"The Bride Test"
By Helen Hoang, Berkley
Romance - In "The Kiss Quotient," Hoang described - with plenty of heat - what it's like to fall in love while autistic. She does it again with the story of a man who has a difficult time making romantic connections. Luckily (or not), his mother is a master matchmaker.
"City of Girls"
By Elizabeth Gilbert, Riverhead
Fiction - The "Eat Pray Love" author's identity as a self-help guru has become so entrenched that it's easy to forget she got her start in fiction. She returns to her roots with this story of a sheltered 19-year-old who goes to work in her aunt's New York theater in the 1940s. (Available June 4)
"First: Sandra Day O'Connor"
By Evan Thomas, Random House
Biography - Despite rampant sexism, Sandra Day O'Connor became the first female Supreme Court justice in 1981. Thomas captures what it took to get her there: talent and intelligence, of course, but also the ability to shrug off baseless insults.
"The Five: The Untold Lives of Women Killed by Jack the Ripper"
By Hallie Rubenhold, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Nonfiction - The century-plus obsession with the crimes - and identity - of Jack the Ripper eclipsed the life stories of his often misunderstood victims. Rubenhold offers an overdue corrective with this sympathetic account of the five women's hardscrabble lives.
"Fleishman Is in Trouble"
By Taffy Brodesser-Akner, Random House
Fiction - Sometime between hanging out with Gwyneth Paltrow and Tom Hiddleston, A-list profiler Brodesser-Akner found time to complete her first novel: the tale of a man who is just starting to enjoy the single life when his ex-wife drops off their kids and disappears. (Available June 18)
"Furious Hours: Murder, Fraud, and the Last Trial of Harper Lee"
By Casey Cep, Knopf
Nonfiction - After helping Truman Capote on "In Cold Blood," Harper Lee got to work on her own true crime opus. She never wrote the book, but Cep fills in the gaps, both on the murders that fascinated Lee and her stymied attempt to write about them.
"How to Forget: A Daughter's Memoir"
By Kate Mulgrew, William Morrow
Memoir - Mulgrew, an actress best known for "Star Trek: Voyager" and "Orange Is the New Black," plays her best role: as herself. This is no Hollywood tell-all, but a moving personal story about her family, in particular her aging parents, whom she cared for as they faced terminal illnesses.
"Lady in the Lake"
By Laura Lippman, William Morrow
Thriller - Lippman, a prolific writer of Baltimore detective stories, tells the tale of a 1960s housewife who becomes a reporter and attempts to solve the murder of a woman found in a city park lake. (Available July 23)
"Maybe You Should Talk to Someone: A Therapist, HER Therapist, and Our Lives Revealed"
By Lori Gottlieb, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Memoir - Gottlieb, the Atlantic's Dear Therapist columnist, intersperses reflections from her sessions helping a self-absorbed Hollywood producer, among others, with anecdotes of her own quest to work through a messy breakup.
"Miracle Creek"
By Angie Kim, Sarah Crichton
Fiction - Shortly after an explosion at a medical facility kills a young boy, his mother is charged with murder. Although the case seems open-and-shut, nothing is quite so simple in Kim's compulsively readable debut.
"The Nickel Boys"
By Colson Whitehead, Doubleday
Fiction - After winning the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for 2016's "The Underground Railroad," Whitehead again revisits the ghosts of America's racist past. In the 1960s, an African American boy's plans for college are thwarted when he's sent to a horrifying juvenile reformatory.
"Normal People"
By Sally Rooney, Hogarth
Fiction - With her second book, the Irish 28-year-old continues to be hailed as a voice of her generation. The addictive story about social hierarchies follows a popular athlete and a bookish pariah who start a secret relationship while in high school.
"On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous"
By Ocean Vuong, Penguin Press
Fiction - In this achingly beautiful novel, a young Vietnamese American writes a letter to his abusive mother about his struggle to find love and a sense of identity. In the process, he comes to appreciate the struggles of her life, too. (Available June 4)
"Orange World and Other Stories"
By Karen Russell, Knopf
Short stories - Russell's stories would be terrifying if they weren't so disarmingly funny. In her latest collection, the author unspools eight tales, including one about a new mother who ensures the safety of her infant by agreeing to breast-feed the devil.
"Patsy"
By Nicole Dennis-Benn, Liveright
Fiction - The Jamaican author of "Here Comes the Sun" again explores themes of sexuality and belonging among the working class in her second novel, about a woman who leaves her 5-year-old daughter in Jamaica to track down the woman she loves in the United States. (Available June 4)
"The Right Swipe"
By Alisha Rai, Avon
Romance - The first in a planned series, Rai's novel follows a career-oriented entrepreneur whose hard-and-fast rules about dating go out the window when she encounters a former flame who ghosted her and now works for a rival company. (Available Aug. 6)
"Strangers and Cousins"
By Leah Hager Cohen, Riverhead
Fiction - Cohen puts a timely spin on the wedding dramedy with the story of a small-town family whose joyous celebration is complicated by an elderly aunt's nightmarish memories and a hullabaloo over the ultra-Orthodox Jews who have begun buying up property nearby.
"They Called Us Enemy"
By George Takei, Justin Eisinger, Steven Scott and Harmony Becker, Top Shelf
Graphic memoir - Takei, a "Star Trek" icon and activist, revisits his childhood, which was marked by the years his family spent in an American internment camp during World War II. (Available July 16)
"Three Women"
By Lisa Taddeo, Avid Reader Press
Nonfiction - Taddeo, a journalist and fiction writer, spent years following a trio of women, who agreed to reveal the most intimate details of their sex lives. The result is a riveting page-turner that explores desire, heartbreak and infatuation in all its messy, complicated nuance. (Available July 9)
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