Verity Reads Books (lots of them)
In which our heroine attempts to tame the to-read pile
This is billed as a cross genre hybrid of Agatha Christie and Michael Connelly – with an elderly village lady sleuth and a doesn’t play by the rules LA homicide detective whose worlds collide. I haven’t read any Chris Brookmyre before but I was lucky enough to get an advance of this – and I have got it underway so I’ll report back on whether or not it’s too hard boiled for me!
We may be into July but there are still some summery romances releasing. This week it’s The Next Best Thing, which is Gabriella Gamez’s debut romance with a librarian heroine, an NFl hero and a fake relationship situation. Sounds promising doesn’t it? And I really like the cover too.
The rush of summer releases continues and this week it’s Ashley Poston’s new book A Novel Love Story. The blurb tells me that our heroine is Eileen, a romance novel lover who breaks down on her way to her annual book club retreat and finds herself in Eloraton – a small town which seems too good to be true, which may be because it’s also the setting of her favourite book series. Eileen is sure that she’s been sent to give the town a story book ending – except that there’s one character who doesn’t want her to finish the story – the grumpy bookshop owner who she just can’t place…
She’s done ghosts, last year it was time travel, and it looks like she’s doing magic – well sort of anyway. I would say I’m sceptical about it, but I was sceptical about the last two and I liked them both, so I’m actually optimistic this is going to be right up my street when I get my hands on it.
Now I haven’t read this one and so I can’t tell you if it’s another Tinye Heroine and Giant Hero, but there is a new Ali Hazelwood out this week. It’s another STEM romance – this time it’s a biotech engineer who gets caught up in a hostile takeover. Apparently this is also her spiciest yet as well. I’ll try and remember to let you know when I think when I pick up a copy – which I’m sure won’t be that far in the future knowing me!
After last week’s post with the notable sequels this summer, it seems only fair to also do the other books I’m looking forward to this summer – or expecting to see all over the place – because it’s nearly June and a lot of them are about to appear.
Let’s start with Welcome to Glorious Tuga by Francesca Segal, which is out on June 6, has a tortoise on the cover and is about a zoologist who takes up a fellowship on a remote island ostensibly to study an endangered species, but actually also because she has a secret that connects her to the island. It has blurbs from Marian Keynes, Nick Hornby, Jessie Burton, Naomi Alderman and more so I feel confident in predicting you’ll be seeing this around a lot this summer.
Another book I’m confident to predict is going to be all over the place is the new novel from Kevin Kwan, the author of Crazy Rich Asians. Lies and Weddings follows a former model and future earl with a cash flow problem and on the hunt for a rich woman to seduce at his sister’s wedding to solve it. But nothing goes to plan and the write up promises money, murder, sex and lies in locations like Hawaii, Marrakesh and Beverley Hills. Expect to see this on a lot of sun loungers from late June.
Heading into July, I think Chris Brookmyre’s The Cracked Mirror might be the poolside book for the crime readers. The blurb promises a mashup of Agatha Christie and something more hard boiled as an elderly lady who solves murders in her village crossed paths with an LAPD homicide detective who will do whatever it takes to get to the truth. I’m interested to see this – although given my reading preferences I’ll need it to be closer to the Marple end of the gruesome scale!
In August we have a new Rainbow Rowell novel which is always exciting. Slow Dance is the story of star crossed best friends who everyone thinks should be together except each other. Emma Straub and Gabrielle Zevin have blurbed this one if that helps you figure out where we’re at – but it feels like it’s been a while since a proper Rowell adult novel so I’m excited.
And finally jumping back to the near future and something that I’ve already started, there’s a new novel coming from Kirsty Greenwood in late June. I used to review (occasionally) for Kirsty’s old site Novelicious in the early days of this blog, and she writes romantic novels that are also very funny. The Love of My Afterlife has a heroine who wakes up in the waiting room for the afterlife only to run into the most handsome man she’s ever met – and he seems to be into her. Then whoosh – he’s gone again and Delphie is offered a ten day return to earth to try and get him to fall in love with her and win a second chance at life. I’m about halfway through as I write this and it’s so much fun!
And that’s your lot – but I’m fairly confident that even if you don’t read them yourself, you’ll spot at least a couple of these four out in the wild over the next few months!
Happy Reading everyone!
Something slightly different for this week’s recommendsday, because it’s a bit of a preview type thing. There are a lot of books coming out this summer that are sequels to books that I’ve really enjoyed, and per my rules, I probably won’t be able to review them, because: spoilers. So today I thought I’d flag them now – while I’m still excited about them and before any of them have the chance to disappoint me)!
First of all, and all ready in the shops, is Displeasure Island by Alice Bell, a follow up to last year’s Grave Expectations. I was hoping for a sequel to that – but for some reason this one had gone completely under my radar until I spotted it in the airport bookshop the other weekend! It came out at the start of May, and sees Claire and her friends off on holiday on a remote Irish island, where the hotel is double booked, there are fighting ghost pirates and – per the blurb – Claire is fighting off “anxious And Then There Were None vibes” even before a murder. This sounds like a lot of fun and I’m probably going to end up picking it up at some point.
Out yesterday in the US and who knows when in the UK is The Guncle Abroad, the sequel to Steven Rowley’s The Guncle, which I loved when I read it and started me off on buying all of Rowley’s books (except Lily and the Octopus because I think that’s going to be way too sad). The sequel finds us rejoining Patrick as he heads to a family wedding in Italy, in a very different place professionally from where he was at the start of the first book. He’s also nearly fifty, and out of favour with the kids, who a struggling to adapt to their new normal.
Next up, and out in a couple of weeks is How to Solve Murders Like a Lady by Hannah Dolby. This is a second book featuring Violet Hamilton, after last summer’s No Life for a Lady. This finds Violet hard at work as a lady detective, but when the body of a woman is found on the beach, her efforts to investigate are thwarted at every turn for some reason. The first in this series has been consistently in Kindle Unlimited for the last few months, so it may be that this one is too at some point in the near future.
And of course there are lots of longer running series that have fresh books out this summer, but I’m sticking to the actual sequels today, so that’s your lot.
Happy Wednesday everyone!
There are a few notable books out this week (like the new Emily Henry) but I wanted to flag the new book from Libby Page, which comes out today and is a follow up to The Lido, which I loved when it came out in 2018 so I’m looking forward to seeing where she’s taking it now.
Well technically only this week if you’re in the US – it was last week for those of us in the UK. Anyway all that really matters is that mid April sees the release the fifth in Anthony Horowitz’s incredibly meta murder mystery series in which a fictionalised version of himself keeps getting mixed up in murders while working with a former police detective. I’ve already started this and I do really like this series, although of his two meta series I do prefer Magpie Murders, but I get that those are much harder to make into more than a couple of books, so I’ll definitely take this!
Yulin Kuang’s debut romance is an enemies to lovers trope about two writers linked by an incident in their past who end up working on the same TV show. I know you know I’m reading this at the moment, so I can’t give it a review yet but it’s a really interesting premise and without giving too much away, I’m really not sure if their shared past is overcome-able (is that even a word?) and any sensible person would have decided not to work together, but hey this is a romance novel and people don’t do sensible things in them always! Kuang is working on the adaptation of a couple of Emily Henry’s novels and I love them so I’m hoping optimistic.
Before you ask, I haven’t read this, but I have started to see this every where which is why I’m mentioning it today. This is a debut novel, with a heroine who realises her attic is creating an endless supply of husbands for her to try out. But how do you decide whether to stick with the one you have or keep going to see if you can find a better option? This has blurbs from Marian Keyes and Gabriele Zevin and is being comped with Really Good, Actually – so if you’re looking for a book at the airport in the near future and liked Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow this could be the one to pick!
Verity Reads Books (lots of them) 