The Books You Should Actually Be Reading This Summer, According to ELLE Editors

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For those of us who believe a packed bag is never complete without two (or ten) books, summer is our time. Nothing compares to the euphoria of a wide-open weekend, warm weather, a good book, a good view, and a sweating glass of something close at hand. If you're craving such synergy, perhaps the trickiest question isn't even where to go; it's what to bring with you.
Still, the very definition of 'beach read' is fluid, subject to your taste. With that in mind, ELLE editors have compiled a list of new summer books that run the gamut between realism and fantasy, romance and horror, literary and breezy—with the hopes you'll find a read to fit your itinerary. Without further ado, below are our picks for the best books of summer 2025, as defined by the months of June, July, and August. Don't forget your sunscreen.
With contributions from Kayla Webley Adler, Sara Austin, Moriel Mizrahi Finder, Adrienne Gaffney, and Kathleen Hou.Out now.
'In S.A. Cosby's riveting crime thriller King of Ashes, investment manager Roman Carruthers wakes from a dream of his mother—who went missing when he and his siblings were teenagers—only to discover his father has been in a terrible accident. Roman returns home to the former manufacturing epicenter known as Jefferson Run, Virginia, where his sister, Neveah, is struggling to keep the family crematorium running. But it's their brother, Dante, who's in the worst trouble of their trio. As Roman and Neveah discover that their father's accident was no accident at all, they learn Dante is in debt to a dangerous local gang, and Roman's deep pockets might not be enough to placate them. The criminals want Roman's skills, and soon he's embedded with them, fighting for his family while wrestling with the morality—or lack thereof—of his choices. Cosby drives his readers through the story at full-throttle, and yet little ends up rushed: His characters are deeply crafted, and the issues at the heart of his epic are rightfully complex. This is yet another smash hit from the author of All the Sinners Bleed.'—Lauren Puckett-Pope, culture writer
$23.85 at amazon.comOut now.
''I grew up fully aware that my father was a brilliant man whose expertise I should never ever question. Did I believe that he was a good man? That's another question entirely,' writes Janelle Brown—from the perspective of her protagonist, Jane—in What Kind of Paradise, a perfect sort of immersive, tantalizing, thought-provoking summer read. The novel centers Jane, who grew up idolizing her father and adhering to his isolationism during her off-the-grid upbringing in mid-'90s rural Montana. But when he decides to publish an anti-tech manifesto and she becomes his inadvertent accomplice-in-crime, Jane ultimately makes a run for it. She lands in the tech mecca of San Francisco, where she hopes to learn the truth about her mother's long-ago death whilst immersing herself in the very technology her father condemns. A thriller and a coming-of-age saga, What Kind of Paradise is a gripping reckoning with family, AI, and what we do in the pursuit of progress.'—LPP
$17.76 at amazon.comOut now.'Early in Susan Choi's latest book, 10-year-old Louisa and her father disappear on a beach. Only one of them will eventually be found. What begins as a standard thriller veers in an unexpected direction as Louisa's parents' histories—her mother's estrangement from her American family and her father's from his in North Korea—become an inescapable factor in this story from the National Book Award-winning author of Trust Exercise. '—Adrienne Gaffney, features editor
$26.44 at amazon.comOut now.
'I'll Tell You When I'm Home is not a straightforward story, but neither is Hala Alyan's. Told in hundreds of bite-sized segments that give her memoir the rhythm of her poetry, Alyan threads together 11 chapters, each organized by a month in the growth cycle of a fetus. (For example, 'Month Three: Your baby has fingers and toes,' and 'Month Seven: Your baby is the size of a coconut.') These passages provide entry points for Alyan to organize—and attempt to make sense of—her ancestral history; her frequent displacement throughout childhood; her relationships; her struggles with addiction, disordered eating, and sobriety; and, after multiple miscarriages, her journey to have a child via surrogate. 'I have never not been Palestinian,' she writes in one section. 'That has never not been written upon my body.' And it is in the writing about her body—its history, its travel, its desires, its pains, its othering, its future, its continuation in the tiny form of her child—that Alyan triumphs. This is a beautiful, soul-bearing book.'—LPP
$24.12 at amazon.comOut now.'A recent college graduate, David Smith is torn between two identities—that of a wealthy Stanford grad and of a Black, queer man. When he's arrested for drug possession, he realizes that the world of elite misbehavior that his friends live in is one that he cannot fully join. Author Rob Franklin beautifully illustrates the bubbly excesses of youth coming up against the sobering realities of racism, addiction, and violence.'—AG
$25.99 at amazon.comOut now.
'A quick read—the kind you can definitely finish in a couple summer afternoons—Jess Walter's latest crackles with the author's wit, even whilst immersing itself in the thick of modern American woes. So Far Gone's protagonist is Rhys Kinnick, a former environmental journalist who opts for an off-the-grid lifestyle after a seismic clash with his son-in-law, a conspiracy theorist whose repeated tirades about 'secular globalists' and the 'lame-stream media' ultimately push Kinnick over the edge. But when, years later, his grandchildren show up outside Kinnick's door, their mother inexplicably missing, Kinnick is pulled into a zany adventure (with an equally entertaining ensemble cast) as he attempts to bring his family back together.'—LPP
$14.87 at amazon.comOut now.
'In this superb speculative tale from the author of Lakewood, seven strange and inexplicable portals appear in random locations around the planet. These portals inspire fear and awe and, in some, faith. Years after the doors' appearance, twin daughters Ayanna and Olivia live separately, each with a different parent: Ayanna with their father, who grew up in a religious group devoted to one of the portals, and Olivia with their mother, a traditional Roman Catholic. When Ayanna comes of age and is called to step through the portal, Olivia decides to join her—but then Olivia goes missing. Meet Me at the Crossroads is a stirring, meditative story of spirituality, family, and the desire to love deeply in a difficult world.'—LPP
$23.19 at amazon.comOut now.
''How do we not lose ourselves in love? How do we hold on to our beliefs and our ethics in the face of great feeling?' Melissa Febos proposed these questions to me during our ELLE interview last October, during which she announced her next book: The Dry Season, a memoir about her year abstaining from sex. As Febos put it, she spent that year 'trying to let go of this lineage that I think I had belonged to, involuntarily, of these overemotional, romantic people who were thrown around by love and romance and very obsessive and out of control. I spent this time looking for people who had big, self-actualized, beautiful, art-oriented lives that didn't necessarily exclude love, but weren't ruled by it—or at least by this romantic fantasy of it.' Her resulting memoir is indeed 'self-actualized, beautiful, and art-oriented,' weaving literary, cultural, and historical touchstones with her own experience. As Febos showed us with her previous books, including Girlhood and Body Work, it is always a privilege to ponder the big questions through her distinct lens.'—LPP
$24.45 at amazon.comOut now.
'After V. E. Schwab's 2020 bestseller The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue blew up during the pandemic, fans have eagerly awaited the next stand-alone adult novel from the author known for her grounded fantasy stories. In Bury Our Bones, which Schwab calls her 'toxic lesbian vampires' book, three women navigate centuries of blood lust in this portrait of queer identity, feminine resilience, and unrelenting thirst. This is without a doubt one of my favorite fantasies of the year.'—LPP
$20.98 at amazon.comOut now.''Few things have I been surer of: the woman at the front at the top row of my double decker is my mother.' And so Yrsa Daley-Ward introduces us to the central conceit at the heart of her debut novel, in which Clara, a high-profile author, sees her long-missing mother in the middle of London—and she looks far younger than her would-be 60-odd years. Who, then, is this woman? Clara's twin sister, Dempsey, thinks she is a con artist. Clara is less convinced. But the story only grows stranger when we learn this version of their mother is childless; she never gave birth to Clara or Dempsey. On top of that, Daley-Ward incorporates a book-within-a-book approach that plants pieces of Clara's blockbuster novel, Evidence, alongside her mother's writing. The results are strange, kaleidoscopic, smart—difficult to describe but hypnotic in their pull. The Catch is a mind-bending feat.'—LPP
$25.99 at amazon.comOut now.'I'll devour just about anything written by or about Toni Morrison, whose incomparable works of literature—including Beloved, The Bluest Eye, Sula, and so many others—continue to inspire readers decades after their publication. But I, along with many others, have understood Morrison mainly in this context: as an author. So it's a gift to peek behind the curtain of Morrison's indeed 'legendary' editorship at Random House (from 1965 through 1983) in Dana A. Williams's Toni at Random. This biography, of course, is intriguing for those of us obsessed with the ins and outs of publishing, but even readers less inclined to weigh the industry's merits will find material to appreciate in Williams's account. Although the book skews occasionally academic, Toni at Random is also a balanced and fascinatingly well-researched account of Morrison's editorial vision—and how it still impacts what we read today.'—LPP
$24.53 at amazon.comOut now.
'Despite having no sisters, I love and crave stories of sisterhood. And Kakigori Summer is a tale of sisterhood as delicious and finely textured as the shaved-ice dessert its protagonists relish in, and from which the book draws its title. Bittersweet, nostalgic, and easy to envision, Emily Itami's novel introduces us to three sisters: Rei, a driven finance worker in London; Kiki, a Tokyo-based single mother and retirement home employee; and Ali, a J-pop star whose scandalous kiss with a married man draws the paparazzi a little too close. Rei and Kiki rush in to offer Ali some much-needed insulation, and the three escape to the coastal Japanese town where their grandmother still resides. Over the course of the summer, they reckon with their relationship to one another, as well as the loss of their mother years prior. The coastal setting is itself a character in this book, and perhaps one of the book's biggest selling points—Itami makes the landscape feel as real as the bond between the sisters. A lovely, tender-hearted tale.'—LPP
$24.56 at amazon.comOut now.
'In this whimsical beach read from Ashley Poston, known for her magical love stories, songwriter Joni Lark is suffering from a bout of writer's block. She heads home to North Carolina, where her parents want to close the family-owned music venue. But then Joni realizes she has a telepathic connection with a has-been musician. Can they use their link to write the perfect song—and save the summer?'—LPP
$21.70 at amazon.comOut now.
'Taylor Jenkins Reid's latest heroine is going to space. In 1980, astrophysics professor Joan's unexpected selection for NASA's Space Shuttle program puts her in line to be one of the first female astronauts. Atmosphere tells Joan's gripping, sensitive, and romantic story of finding love in a career where disaster is a constant threat.'—AG
$21.00 at amazon.comOut now.
'A gorgeous queer literary romance, Marie Rutkoski's Ordinary Love depicts the second-chance romance between former teenage girlfriends Emily and Gen. Years have passed since their relationship ended, and Emily is now married with two children, an Upper East Side townhouse, and an abusive hedge-fund-manager husband she met at Harvard. Gen, meanwhile, is a world-renowned Olympic athlete. When Emily and Gen reunite, much has changed about them both—but the chemistry between them remains. As Emily wrestles with a separation from her husband and all that it portends, she must also contend with Gen's reappearance in her life. There is still anger and hurt between them, and Emily isn't sure she can handle any more emotional damage after years of her husband's abuse. But the connection Gen and Emily share is real...and maybe, just maybe, worth fighting to keep.'—LPP
$24.68 at amazon.comOut June 24.
'Within the first few pages of Hal Ebbott's debut novel Among Friends, I knew I needed to go scrounge up a highlighter. There are so many of Ebbott's lines that sing, each of them elegant and insightful in their clarity. (Here's one favorite: 'They were like scars, these talents, like things learned in war: even when they were of use, part of her wished not to know.') The book depicts the seemingly effortless friendship between two families—and particularly between their two patriarchs, Amos and Emerson, who first met in college. Although their backgrounds couldn't be more different, they are drawn together, their trust implicit and undeniable. Decades later, they remain close friends, as are their wives and daughters, and the families reunite for a weekend upstate—a yearly tradition amongst their group. But when one of them chooses to wield their power in a shocking act of abuse, they each are given a choice: Continue as if nothing's happened, or reckon with the rot that's always been present in their lives. Among Friends is utterly engrossing; I'm already begging my friends to read it so we can discuss the ending.'—LPP
$26.48 at amazon.comOut June 24.
'By now Lisa Jewell is well-beloved for the addicting quality of her thrillers, and her latest, Don't Let Him In, is no exception. From the first page, the book feels taut with danger, its characters tangled in a web they can't yet recognize. The plot is shaped like a classic domestic suspense: A man is not who he says he is. (He is, in fact, utterly awful!) But the identity of that man is not initially known to the women in his life, including a widow named Nina, her daughter, Ash, and a local florist named Martha, whose lives unexpectedly intersect when this man's charm proves a horrible facade. I can't reveal much more without spoiling Jewell's twists, but suffice to say, this is one of those gripping beach reads sure to keep you flipping the pages on your next flight.'—LPP
$20.99 at amazon.comOut June 24.
'Adela's parents are furious when she becomes pregnant at 16, and they quickly send her to live with her grandmother in Florida. But what was intended as a punishment turns into something beautiful. What she finds in her new home is an incredible community of teenage moms, girls who have been looked down on by their community but who have created a family together. Mottley shows that while young mothers face incredible challenges, their lives can still be full of extraordinary love and joy.'—AG
$28.00 at amazon.comOut June 24.'Leesa Cross-Smith—the author behind Half-Blown Rose and This Close to Okay, among others—turns her eye for intimate connection toward three Americans adrift in Seoul in As You Wish. Lydia, Jenny, and Selene have arrived as au pairs hoping to rewrite their own scripts: Lydia longs for a main-character life, Jenny is determined to put romance firmly in the rear view, and Selene believes South Korea holds the key to finding the birth mother she's never met. Their paths—and secret wishes—intertwine on a weekend trip to a mythic waterfall said to grant desires. When one of them circles back for a do-over, the ripple effect forces all three to reckon with what they truly want and what they're willing to risk for it, turning a fizzy drama into something richer: a meditation on friendship as the greatest magic of all. The result is a cozy escape that reminds us every wish carries its own shadow—and that sometimes the happiest ending is finding the people who understand yours.'—Moriel Mizrahi Finder, editorial assistant
$17.67 at amazon.comOut June 24.
'Pitched as Love Island meets Lord of the Flies—which, woof, that's enough of a heady concoction to draw in readers already—Aisling Rawle's debut is an intoxicating literary suspense. It takes place on the set of a reality dating competition—filmed in a desert compound sometime in a dystopian future—in which an uneven number of male and female contestants must compete to spend each night with someone of the opposite sex. Along the way, they must complete tasks and competitions for rewards. Some are relatively harmless ('Wear another girl's clothes without asking'), while others ('Banish a couple from the compound') veer darker. At the center of this game is Lily, who is young, beautiful, and content to do whatever it takes to win. A slow-burning but scathing assessment of consumerism, vanity, and our deep-rooted desires to perform.'—LPP
$20.30 at amazon.comOut July 1.
'I'm a long-time reader of Maris Kreizman's work at Literary Hub and beyond, so it was a pleasure to get her takes on issues that have less to do with publishing in particular and more to do with America writ large. I zipped through I Want to Burn This Place Down, her new book of essays, impressed by how much ground Kreizman manages to cover in such a slim volume. Although these pieces are far from comprehensive—nor do they claim to be—they effectively critique many of the liberal beliefs she once accepted without challenge. (These beliefs included, among others, that labor organizing is 'impractical' and that cops are uniformly heroic.) Kreizman chronicles her own identity shift from 'good Democrat' to a more enlightened one, doing so with humor and a righteous anger that feels present on the page. Charged yet earnest, I Want to Burn This Place Down makes the reader feel Kreizman's rightful frustrations as their own.'—LPP
$25.10 at amazon.comOut July 1.
'A mixed-media satire told with style and verve, Hot Girls with Balls has a lot going for it beyond its instantly iconic title. The narrative will inevitably draw comparisons to Luca Guadagnino's Challengers, but with volleyballs instead of tennis rackets, a much heavier dose of internet culture, and two Asian American trans women at its heart. Six and Green are twenty-something volleyball players and influencers; they're also dating. Their social media fame grows with every Instagraph Live they broadcast during the COVIS pandemic, and as they compete in an indoor men's volleyball competition (thanks to transphobia), they're keen to capitalize on the attention. But when they speak up on behalf of the trans community, the results online are fickle at best—and hateful at worst. Benedict Nguyễn's sharp, funny-yet-serious debut explores the constant pressure to present identity 'correctly,' especially when that identity is under equally constant threat.'—LPP
$25.11 at amazon.comOut July 8.
'When I read Library Journal describe Sarah MacLean's These Summer Storms as 'the steamy love-child of Succession and Elin Hilderbrand,' I knew I needed to bump it to the top of my pile of beach reads. And, indeed, These Summer Storms fits that description well, particularly as the Storm family reunites on a private island off the coast of Rhode Island in the wake of their patriarch's death. There, they discover technology tycoon Franklin Storm has left his widow and children 'a game, of sorts': Remain on the island together for a full week, complete the challenges he has assigned to them, or forfeit their inheritance. This conundrum is further exacerbated by the presence of Jack Dean, Franklin's right-hand man, with whom protagonist Alice Storm has recently shared a one-night stand. Simmering tensions, sibling rivalries, and undeniable attraction fuel McLean's excellent foray into contemporary romance-slash-drama. This one's a treat.'—LPP
$30.00 at amazon.comOut July 8.
'A Marriage at Sea was such an emotionally vivid portrait of a couple in isolation that I was shocked it wasn't fiction. How could a writer get so deeply into the minds of two real people in such extraordinary circumstances? Elmhirst's incredible account traces the story of Maurice and Maralyn Bailey, a 1960s couple who set off from Britain for an around-the-world sail to New Zealand but become stranded after a whale hits their boat. Their harrowing period lost at sea is so brilliantly depicted that it's almost too painful to read.'—AG
$28.00 at amazon.comOut July 8.'When Sophie, a newspaper writer, goes to the Edinburgh Festival Fringe for work, she sees it as a nice break from the tedium of parenthood and home. Instead, she gets a front-row seat to her celebrated male colleague's complete implosion. After he gives a scathing review to the show of a woman he had just slept with, he inspires a wildly popular one-woman show that exposes years of terrible behavior and drags Sophie into the middle of the mayhem. Bring the House Down considers what role theater can have in a community with more humor that you'd think was possible.'—AG
$28.00 at amazon.comOut July 8.
'This romantasy-comedy made me laugh out loud on almost every single page. A deadly assassin is forced to seek help from a brilliant female healer, and, of course—in a classic enemies-to-lovers story—they hate each other at first glance. The humor is delightfully ridiculous, and the banter is so good, it will have you whipping your head back and forth between the two main characters as if you're watching a tennis match. Technically, Brigitte Knightley is a first-time author. (But fanfiction readers will recognize, 'Tell your cat I said pspspspsps.') I can't wait to read more of her books.'—Kathleen Hou, beauty director
$21.00 at amazon.comOut July 8.
'Giuseppina 'Jess' Capodimonte Baratta lives in Lake Como—but probably not the one you're thinking of. Adriana Trigiani's heroine is stuck in Lake Como, New Jersey, her childhood home, where she's fled after a recent divorce. When her uncle unexpectedly dies, she inherits his marble business—Jess herself is a skilled draftswoman—and, along with it, a heap of legal and financial troubles. She flies to Carrara, Italy, to uncover the family secrets and ancestral skills she'll need to face this new, uncertain future. But with each day spent in Carrara, in Milan, and, of course, along Lake Como, Italy pulls Jess deeper into its magic, and she starts to find herself wanting something, wanting more. Effervescent and big-hearted, The View from Lake Como is an ideal vacation read.'—LPP
$26.00 at amazon.comOut July 15.
'My first Silvia Moreno-Garcia read was 2015's Signal to Noise, and since then I've paid close attention to her genre-mixing body of work. The Mexican Gothic author's latest is the horror-fantasy The Bewitching, a book that's both eerie and entrancing in equal measure. Set across three timelines—1990s Massachusetts, 1930s Massachusetts, and 1900s Mexico—the story joins three women whose lives are touched by sorcery. While studying the work of 20th-century horror novelist Beatrice Tremblay, grad student Minerva starts to experience strange happenings around her college campus. Her great-grandmother, Alba, used to tell tales of witches, and Minerva begins to wonder if witchcraft is responsible for these events. As the three women's stories join together, Moreno-Garcia builds a compellingly rich saga of history, folklore, and hauntings.'—LPP
$26.97 at amazon.comOut July 15.'Hana's happy life as a Kentucky professor with a loving boyfriend is disturbed when she learns her ex-husband is publishing a fictionalized account of their marriage. If You Love It, Let It Kill You itself seems to be referencing the book that Pittard's own ex-husband wrote about the breakup of their marriage, but you'll sense little anger in what is ultimately a moving and very, very funny story.'—AG
$26.09 at amazon.comOut July 22.
'In Danica Nava's delightful sophomore romance novel, Love Is a War Song, Muscogee pop star Avery Fox has made an unfortunate stumble: After appearing on the cover of Rolling Stone in a feathered warbonnet (and not much else), she's earned the internet's ire and vitriol. The scandal sends her running to Oklahoma to stay with her estranged grandmother until the noise dies down. There, she meets Lucas Iron Eyes, the man who looks after her grandmother's horse ranch, and despite his disdain for her career, neither he nor Avery can deny their attraction. And as they're forced to work together, that attraction becomes harder and harder to ignore. I was a fan of Nava's The Truth According to Ember last year, and it's a joy to see her next rom-com picking up buzz.'—LPP
$17.67 at amazon.comOut July 22.
'A lot can be learned from even the smallest fragments of feathers—and we have Roxie Laybourne to thank for that. In 1960, Laybourne, a then unknown bird researcher working at the Smithsonian, was tapped to help investigate an airplane crash caused by a bird strike. With that assignment begins Laybourne's legacy as the world's first forensic ornithologist. She would go on to conduct instrumental work that would advance aircraft safety and help catch murderers, poachers, and even white supremacists, who tarred and feathered a Civil Rights activist. In The Feather Detective, award-winning journalist Chris Sweeney tells Laybourne's story in-depth, and in so doing, gives this tough, pioneering woman the credit and spotlight she deserves.'—Kayla Webley Adler, deputy editor and features director
$30.00 at amazon.comOut July 22.
'The titular walk into a bar ends badly. The unnamed narrator's husband is leaving her for a woman named Maggie. Only weeks later, she gets a diagnosis of breast cancer. The two heartbreaks are so linked that she names her tumor Maggie. Katie Yee's debut is filled with eerily real accounts of the crazy things we obsess on after a breakup, humor in disaster, and the salvation found in true friendships.'—AG
$25.10 at amazon.comOut July 29.'Emma Rosenblum has a knack for writing about the rich and catty. Her buzzy debut Bad Summer People is set in an exclusive beach community, while her sophomore novel, Very Bad Company, takes place at an executive retreat. In her third title, Mean Moms, Rosenblum once again takes readers inside a dishy, insular scene—this time, that of Manhattan private school moms. The plot centers on a trio of mothers—Frost, Morgan, and Belle—whose children all attend the same top-ranked private school. There's a gripping mystery that kicks off when a new mom infiltrates their clique, but as with all of Rosenblum's books, my favorite aspect is the smart, biting, and often hilarious, social commentary she weaves in throughout the suspenseful tale. With Mean Moms, Rosenblum once again proves she is a master of skewering the worlds she inhabits.'—KWA
$28.99 at amazon.comOut August 5.'Another juicy read from the author of Before We Were Innocent, this one is set in the drug-and-bubbly fueled world of Laurel Canyon of the early '70s. When Los Angeles newcomer Lane Warren, a journalist working on her first novel, meets Hollywood native Gala Margolis at a party, they forge a complicated bond. Wild child Gala helps make Lane a social star, while coolheaded Lane urges Gala to pursue her own writing talents—to a point. In a time when few creative women reach the top of their field, friendship perhaps inevitably turns to rivalry. Touching on themes of ambition, ambivalent motherhood, and life in the L.A. fishbowl, Berman's novel is ultimately about the importance of owning your own story—and the possibility of rewriting it.'—Sara Austin, executive editor
$30.00 at amazon.comOut August 5.
'Be warned: Moderation is far from your typical effortless beach read. Elaine Castillo's novel is as expansive as the VR landscape her protagonist, Girlie Delmundo, must navigate after she's hired for a new content moderator position. As a social media moderator capable of stomaching the alarmingly graphic material thrust in her face each day, Girlie soon adapts to Playground, her company's latest VR acquisition. But her feelings for her new boss, William Cheung, as well as the mysteries surrounding Playground itself, threaten to eat away at Girlie's careful boundaries. A love story for those who love Severance (both Ling Ma's book and the unaffiliated Apple TV+ series), Moderation is ambitious, challenging, and brilliant.'—LPP
$29.00 at amazon.comOut August 12.
'Neruda on the Park author Cleyvis Natera returns later this summer with the searing The Grand Paloma Resort, a novel set amongst the staff of a luxury hotel in the Dominican Republic. When a looming category-five hurricane, the case of two missing girls, and the ever-present inequalities of race and class collide over the course of one seven-day stay, the guests and the staff—including sisters Laura and Elena—can no longer maintain their unsteady equilibrium. The White Lotus ought to look to Natera's clear-eyed literary thriller for inspiration.'—LPP
$30.00 at amazon.comOut August 26.
'One of my most-anticipated reads at the start of 2025, Katabasis is R.F. Kuang's triumphant return to fantasy after her 2023 publishing satire Yellowface. The author of The Poppy War trilogy and Babel, Kuang is of course no stranger to fantasy, and Katabasis features perhaps her most unorthodox approach to magic yet. On its surface, the book's setup seems straightforward: A Cambridge student and her rival must journey to the underworld to save their professor. But the challenges they encounter throughout their romp through Hell have as much to do with their feelings for each other, their insecurities about themselves, and their mislaid trust in Cambridge as they do with the dangers of Hell itself. Laced with Kuang's signature critiques of colonialism and academia, Katabasis is also a love story, and an ultimately stunning one at that.'—LPP
$24.50 at amazon.com
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