2021 Adult Summer Reading List
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2021 Adult Summer Reading List All the Money in the World: What the Happiest People Know about Getting and Spending by Laura Vanderkam How happy would you be if you had all the money in the world? Drawing on the latest happiness research as well as the stories of dozens of real people, Vanderkam offers a contrarian approach that forces us to examine our own beliefs, goals, and values. (Goodreads) American Royals by Katherine McGee When America won the Revolutionary War, its people offered General George Washington a crown. Two and a half centuries later, the House of Washington still sits on the throne. As Princess Beatrice gets closer to becoming America's first queen regnant, the duty she has embraced her entire life suddenly feels stifling. (Goodreads) Aristotle & Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe by Benjamin Allire Sáenz Aristotle is an angry teen with a brother in prison. Dante is a know-it-all who has an unusual way of looking at the world. When the two meet at the swimming pool, they seem to have nothing in common. But as the loners start spending time together, they discover that they share a special friendship—the kind that changes lives and lasts a lifetime. (Amazon) Bad Blood: Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup by John Carreyrou Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes was widely seen as the female Steve Jobs: a brilliant Stanford dropout whose startup "unicorn" promised to revolutionize the medical industry … until a former employee tipped off Carreyrou and he started asking questions. This is the riveting story of the biggest corporate fraud since Enron, a disturbing cautionary tale set amid the bold promises and gold-rush frenzy of Silicon Valley. (adapted from Goodreads) Beach Read by Emily Henry A romance writer who no longer believes in love and a literary writer stuck in a rut engage in a summer-long challenge that may just upend everything they believe about happily ever afters. (From the cover) Cavendon Hall: A Novel by Barbara Taylor Bradford Cavendon Hall is home to two families: the aristocratic Inghams and the Swanns who serve them. Lady Daphne is about to be presented at court when a
devastating event changes her life and threatens the Ingham name. With World War I looming, both families will find themselves tested in ways they never thought possible. (Amazon) Challenger Deep by Neal Shusterman Caden Bosch is in his real world, struggling with school, and on a ship headed towards the Challenger Deep. He is fighting within his own mind to keep a hold on his reality. This book is influenced by Shusterman's son's struggles with schizophrenia. Clap When You Land by Elizabeth Acevedo Sixteen-year-olds Camino Rios, of the Dominican Republic, and Yahaira Rios, of New York City, are devastated to learn of their father's death in a plane crash and stunned to learn of each other's existence. A novel in verse told in two voices. (Follett) Eight Hundred Grapes by Laura Dave Georgia Ford, bride-to-be, hops in her car and drives through the night to her safe haven: her family, and the acclaimed family winery. Georgia craves the company of those who know her best, and whom she truly knows. But when Georgia arrives home, nothing is at all familiar. It seems her fiancé isn’t the only one who’s been keeping secrets. (adapted from Amazon) Finlay Donovan is Killing It: A Mystery by Elle Cosimano Finlay is a stressed-out single-mom of two and struggling novelist. When she is overheard discussing the plot of her new suspense novel with her agent over lunch, she’s mistaken for a contract killer, and inadvertently accepts an offer to dispose of a problem husband in order to make ends meet. (Amazon) Funny in Farsi: A Memoir of Growing Up Iranian in America by Firoozeh Dumas Funny in Farsi chronicles the journey of Dumas's family from Iran to Southern California, and Firoozeh, who as a girl changed her name to Julie, and who encountered a second wave of culture shock when she met and married a Frenchman, becoming part of a one-couple melting pot. (adapted from Goodreads) Glimmer as You Can by Danielle Martin 1962. In the middle of Brooklyn Heights sits the Starlite: boutique dress shop by day, underground women's club by night. Glimmer As You Can captures the heartbeat of an era and the ambitions of a generation of women living in a man's world--a world threatened by a wave of change. (Amazon)
Greenlights by Matthew McConaughey All right, all right, all right: The affable, laconic actor delivers a combination of memoir and self-help book. “This is an approach book,” writes McConaughey, adding that it contains “philosophies that can be objectively understood, and if you choose, subjectively adopted, by either changing your reality, or changing how you see it. This is a playbook, based on adventures in my life.” (Kirkus Reviews) Grown by Tiffany D. Jackson Korey Fields is dead. When Enchanted Jones wakes with blood on her hands and zero memory of the previous night, no one—the police and Korey’s fans included—has more questions than she does. All she really knows is that this isn't how things are supposed to be. Korey was Enchanted’s ticket to stardom. (Goodreads) Happy and You Know It by Laura Hankin A dark, witty page-turner about a struggling young musician who takes a job singing for a playgroup of overprivileged babies and their effortlessly cool moms, only to find herself pulled into their glamorous lives and dangerous secrets. (From the cover) In This Grave Hour: A Maisie Dobbs Novel #13 by Jacqueline Winspear Francesca Thomas has an urgent assignment for Maisie: to find the killer of a man who escaped occupied Belgium as a boy twenty-three years earlier during the Great War. In a London shadowed by barrage balloons, bomb shelters and the threat of invasion, within days another former Belgian refugee is found murdered. (Goodreads) Know My Name: A Memoir by Chanel Miller She was known to the world as Emily Doe when she stunned millions with a letter. Brock Turner had been sentenced to just six months in county jail after he was found sexually assaulting her on Stanford’s campus. Viewed by eleven million people within four days, her victim impact statement inspired changes in California law and the recall of the judge in the case. (Goodreads) Oona Out of Order by Margarita Montimore It’s New Year’s Eve 1982, and Oona Lockhart has her whole life before her. As the countdown to the New Year begins, Oona faints and awakens thirty-two years in the future in her fifty-one-year-old body. Greeted by a friendly stranger,
Oona learns that with each passing year she will leap to another age at random. (adapted from Amazon) Outlawed by Anna North On the day of her wedding, Ada's life looks good; she loves her husband, and she loves working as an apprentice to her mother, a midwife. But after a year of marriage and no pregnancy, in a town where barren women are routinely hanged as witches, her survival depends on leaving behind everything she knows. The Crucible meets True Grit in this riveting adventure story of a fugitive girl, a mysterious gang of robbers, and their dangerous mission to transform the Wild West. (Amazon) Stamped: Racism, Antiracism & You by Ibram X. Kendi & Jason Reynolds Framed through the ideologies and thoughts of segregationists, assimilationists, and anti-racists throughout history, Stamped demonstrates that the “construct of race has always been used to gain and keep power, whether financially or politically,” and that this power has been used to systemically and systematically oppress Black people in the United States for more than four hundred years. (Goodreads) The Beekeeper of Aleppo by Christy Lefteri Nuri is a beekeeper; his wife, Afra, an artist. When all they care for is destroyed by war, they are forced to escape. But what Afra has seen is so terrible she has gone blind, and so they must embark on a perilous journey towards an uncertain future in Britain. (Goodreads) The Calculating Stars: A Lady Astronaut Novel by Mary Robinette Kowal It’s 1952 and a meteorite has destroyed Washington DC, triggering extinction-level global warming. To save humanity, the world unites to form the International Aerospace Coalition with the mission to colonize the Moon, then Mars. Elma York, WWII pilot and mathematician, dreams of becoming an astronaut – but prejudice has kept her grounded. Now nothing will stop her from reaching for the stars. (adapted from the publisher) The Chicken Sisters by K.J. Dell'Antonia Chicken Mimi's and Chicken Frannie's have spent a century vying to serve up the best fried chicken in Kansas--and the legendary feud between their owners has lasted just as long. Amanda grew up working for her mom at Mimi's before scandalously marrying Frank and changing sides to work at Frannie's. Tired of being caught in the middle, Amanda sends an SOS to Food Wars, a reality TV restaurant competition. But in doing so, she launches both families out of the
frying pan and directly into the fire. (adapted from Amazon) The Flatshare by Beth O'Leary Tiffy and Leon share an apartment, but have never met. One takes the apartment during the daytime, while the other takes it on nights and weekends. Despite being opposites, they soon become friends - and maybe more. (adapted from Amazon) The Flight Girls by Noelle Salazar Based on historical events, this book follows female pilot Audrey from 1941, when she volunteers to teach male military pilots in Hawaii. After witnessing the attack on Pearl Harbor from the air, she joins with the Women's Air Service Pilots to fill pilot positions left behind by the all-male military pilot corps. Warning: keep a box of tissues nearby throughout the book. The Four Winds by Kristin Hannah 1934: Millions are out of work and a drought has broken the Great Plains. Farmers are fighting to keep their land and their livelihoods as the crops are failing, the water is drying up, and dust threatens to bury them all. Elsa, like so many of her neighbors, must make an agonizing choice: fight for the land she loves or go west to California in search of a better life. (From the cover) The Guest List by Lucy Foley On an island off the coast of Ireland, guests gather to celebrate two people joining their lives together as one. The cell phone service may be spotty and the waves may be rough, but every detail has been expertly planned and will be expertly executed. And then someone turns up dead. Who didn’t wish the happy couple well? And perhaps more important, why? (Goodreads) The Haunting of Hill House by Shirley Jackson Four people are stuck in a notoriously spooky, evil home called Hill House, where a nightmare ensues. The perfect short, spooky read for summertime. The Holdout by Graham Moore Young juror Maya Seale is convinced that African American high school teacher Bobby Nock is innocent of killing the wealthy white female student with whom he appears to have been involved and persuades her fellow jurors likewise. Ten years later, a true-crime docuseries reassembles the jurors, and Maya, now a defense attorney, must prove her own innocence when one of them is found dead in Maya's room. (Goodreads)
The Inheritance Games by Jennifer Lynn Barnes This Cinderella story gets its twist when Avery, a teen living out of her car and dreaming of a financially stable future, inherits billionaire Tobias Hawthorne's fortune. Avery is sure she's never met a Hawthorne in her life, but she's just become the star player in Tobias's final puzzle. Forced to move into the rambling Hawthorne House to retain the inheritance, Avery discovers that hidden passageways aren't the only secrets on this estate. (School Library Journal) The Light of Days: The Untold Story of Women Resistance Fighters in Hitler's Ghettos by Judy Batalion One of the most important stories of World War II, already optioned by Steven Spielberg for a major motion picture: a spectacular, searing history that brings to light the extraordinary accomplishments of brave Jewish women who became resistance fighters—a group of unknown heroes whose exploits have never been chronicled in full, until now. (Goodreads) The Midnight Library by Matt Haig Between life and death there is a library, and within that library, the shelves go on forever. Every book provides a chance to try another life you could have lived, to see how things would be if you had made other choices ... Would you have done anything different, if you had the chance to undo your regrets? (Goodreads) The One by John Marrs A simple DNA test is all it takes and soon you’ll be matched with the one you are genetically made for. After five people have received the notification that they’ve been “Matched,” they’re each about to meet their one true love. But “happily ever after” isn’t guaranteed for everyone. Because even soul mates have secrets. And some are more shocking than others. (Goodreads) The Push by Ashley Audrain Blythe Connor is determined that she will be the warm, comforting mother to her new baby Violet that she herself never had. But in the thick of motherhood’s exhausting early days, Blythe becomes convinced that something is wrong with her daughter: she doesn’t behave like most children do. (Goodreads) The Secret, Book, & Scone Society by Ellery Adams Nora, the owner of Miracle Books, forms the Secret, Book, and Scone Society, a group of damaged souls yearning to gain trust and earn redemption by helping others, after a visiting businessman is found dead on the train tracks after he reaches out to Nora for help. (Follett)
The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo by Taylor Jenkins Reid A small-time magazine reporter lands the interview of a lifetime with reclusive Hollywood starlet Evelyn Hugo, who is long retired. Split into seven sections, one for each of her famed seven husbands, Evelyn tells the reporter her life story. The Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller A retelling of Homer's The Iliad, TSOA focuses on Patroclus, Achilles' partner throughout the Trojan War. This is my favorite book of all time, and its prose is beautiful and flowery without being overwhelming. It chronicles their lives from early adolescence to death. The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman In a peaceful retirement village, four unlikely septuagenarian friends meet weekly in the Jigsaw Room to discuss unsolved crimes; together they call themselves the Thursday Murder Club. When a local developer is found dead, the group suddenly find themselves in the middle of their first live case. (adapted from Goodreads) The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett The Vanishing Half follows the lives of light-skinned twins who fled their light-skinned town mysteriously at the age of sixteen. One marries a darker man, while the other crafts a completely different life for herself. The book explores identity, family, and race in a compelling and thought-provoking way. Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You Don't Know by Adam Grant The bestselling author of Give and Take and Originals examines the critical art of rethinking: learning to question your opinions and open other people's minds, which can position you for excellence at work and wisdom in life. (Amazon) Truth Worth Telling: A Reporter's Search for Meaning in the Stories of Our Times by Scott Pelley A former news anchor, Pelley writes as a witness to events that changed our world. In moving, detailed prose, he stands with firefighters on 9/11, advances with troops in Afghanistan and Iraq, and reveals private moments with presidents. Truth Worth Telling offers a resounding defense of free speech and a free press as the rights that guarantee all others. (adapted from Goodreads) Tweet Cute by Emma Lord All’s fair in love and cheese ― that is, until Pepper and Jack’s spat turns into a viral Twitter war. Little do they know, while they’re publicly duking it out with
snarky memes and retweet battles, they’re also falling for each other in real life ― on an anonymous chat app created by Jack. (Goodreads) Uncomfortable Conversations with a Black Man by Emmanuel Acho With the same open-hearted generosity that has made his video series a phenomenon, Acho explains the vital core of such fraught concepts as white privilege, cultural appropriation, and “reverse racism.” He asks only for the reader’s curiosity—but along the way, he will galvanize all of us to join the antiracist fight. (Goodreads) Untamed by Glennon Doyle Soulful and uproarious, forceful and tender, Untamed is both an intimate memoir and a galvanizing wake-up call. It is the story of navigating divorce, forming a new blended family, and discovering that the brokenness or wholeness of a family depends not on its structure but on each member’s ability to bring her full self to the table. (Goodreads) Upstairs at the White House: My LIfe With the First Ladies by J.B. West West offers an absorbing glimpse at America’s first families. Alive with anecdotes ranging from the quotidian (LBJ’s showerheads) to the tragic (the aftermath of Kennedy’s assassination), West’s book is an enlightening and rich account of the American history that took place just behind the Palladian doors of the North Portico. (adapted from Goodreads) We Begin at the End by Chris Whitaker Walk has never left the coastal California town where he grew up. He may have become the chief of police, but he’s still trying to heal the old wound of having given the testimony that sent his best friend, Vincent King, to prison decades before. Now, thirty years later, Vincent is being released. (Goodreads)
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