As you can probably imagine, my “to be read” pile is long. I own a lot of books I haven’t read yet. I try to organize them all by putting them into lists that I set out to complete in a given timeframe. Even after nearly sixteen years of summer readings lists for school, you think I would be sick of them. Only, instead, I’m not.
Here are the top ten books I want (hope) to read this summer 2017:
The Forbidden Wish by Jessica Khoury
A retelling of Aladdin told through the eyes of the genie—who so happens to be a girl—this book screams summer for me. It’s set in the desert, in an exotic kingdom, and it promises to be an exciting adventure with beautiful writing. I’ve owned this book since it came out last year, and now I am absolutely dying to get to it. The Forbidden Wish is likely the book I will read first on this list.
The Valiant by Lesley Livingston
I bought this book off of Amazon on impulse because I saw so many BookTube personalities raving about it. The story is about female gladiators, an untold story in Ancient Roman history. Fallon, a Celtic princess, is kidnapped and sold to a school for female gladiators, operated by Julius Caesar. The same man whose army killed her beloved older sister and destroyed her homeland. Now, her survival depends on him, and the very empire she swore to destroy.
Daughter of the Pirate King by Tricia Levenseller
The ideal book for summer, Daughter of the Pirate King follows a badass lady pirate that intentionally allows herself to be captured by an enemy ship in order to search for a treasure map. Since I recently read a book involving pirates, but unfortunately did not spend enough time on the water, I am eager to pick this one up.
The Upside of Unrequited by Becky Albertalli
An overweight teenaged girl who is an expert in unrequited love? The Upside of Unrequited speaks to me on a certain level. When Molly’s twin sister starts dating a girl that comes with a hipster boy sidekick, it seems like the perfect situation for Molly to get her first real boyfriend. Then, she gets a new job and her co-worker Reid, a chubby Tolkien fan, is not the kind of guy she typically goes for. Or is he?
The Angel’s Game/The Prisoner of Heaven by Carlos Ruiz Zafon
OK, I am cheating with this one, making it two books instead of one. But The Angel’s Game and The Prisoner of Heaven are connected to The Shadow of the Wind, one of my all-time favorite books. The Angel’s Game is a prequel, following a struggling young author connected to a character from the original story. The Prisoner of Heaven is a direct sequel to The Shadow of the Wind, with a plot tied to the one in The Angel’s Game.
I loved The Shadow of the Wind. Carlos Ruiz Zafon has a beautiful writing style and he’s a great storyteller. He has already caused me to set high expectations for these two books.
The Readers of Broken Wheel Recommend by Katarina Bivald
A sweet adult fiction novel all about books and how they bring communities together, The Readers of Broken Wheel Recommend is about Sara, a Swedish woman, who travels all the way to sleepy Broken Wheel, Iowa to meet her pen pal, Amy. Only instead, she is just in time for Amy’s funeral. Amy left behind a house full of books and Sara intends to bring life to Broken Wheel by opening a bookstore. I already know I’m going to love this book, just because I love books.
The Serpent King by Jeff Zentner
The Serpent King is the first book I ever received in an Owlcrate box. It follows the son of a minister in a small Southern town as he faces his impending future after graduating high school. I’ve owned this book for a while now, but for some reason, this summer seems like the perfect time to read it. I figure it is because I graduated college last year, so I might be able to relate to what Dill, the protagonist of The Serpent King, is going through.
The Book of Speculation by Erika Swyler
Another book about a book, The Book of Speculation is a novel about a librarian that receives a mysterious book detailing an unexpected history about his family. Fearing for the safety of his sister, who ran off to join the circus as a “mermaid,” Simon, the protagonist, uses the book to uncover secrets he hope will save them. The Book of Speculation screams magical realism, and I have wanted to read more of those types of books for a while. I am trying not to make my expectations too high, but I am failing miserably in my excitement.
Into the Dim by Janet B. Taylor
After reading Passenger by Alexandra Bracken, I have become fascinated with time travel and pirates. Into the Dim feeds into the former. After her mother is killed in an accident thousands of miles from home, sixteen-year-old Hope goes to live with an aunt she barely knows and discovers she comes from a family of time-travellers. Believing her mom to be alive, she travels back in time to King Henry II and gets swept away in political intrigue and danger that could leave her trapped in medieval England forever.
The Women in the Castle by Jessica Shattuck
After reading Lilac Girls by Martha Hall Kelly, which is about experiments conducted on prisoners at a famous Nazi concentration camp for women, I became fascinated with untold stories left out of the history books about World War II. The Women in the Castle follows one of those stories: three widows whose husbands were involved in a plot to assassinate Hitler on July 20th, 1944. Marianne, one of the widows, leads the other two, as well as their children, to her husband’s family’s ancestral castle, hoping they can start over together. But all of them have secrets from their pasts that could taint their futures. I can’t begin to explain how excited I am to read The Women in the Castle.
Well, I’m excited to read all of these books, really. I’m just having trouble deciding which one I want to start with. What else is new?