I picked up my reading pace this month, finishing another two hundred pages or so of Ulysses and eleven novels across genres, including literary and historical fiction, thrillers, short stories, and speculative fiction. While I normally try to select a couple of top recommendations each month, each book I read was compelling in its own way, making it hard to pick favorites. So this month I’ll offer you a different categorization based on the mood you want from your next book.

If you want to weigh in on the raging debate about the tradwife influencer novel

Yesteryear

Car0 Claire Burke

There has been a LOT of discourse about Yesteryear, the story of a tradwife influencer who finds herself living on the prairie in 1855 in the real life version of the lifestyle she romanticizes. I picked it up expecting heavy satire and schadenfreude. I got that – and so much more. The book explores the stories that both conservative and liberal women have been fed about their role in society, and how the pressure to live up to these expectations can make a woman crack. I know many readers wanted the author to go more deeply into these themes; I felt that she made her point without having to. I enjoyed the book and its dark humor, and would definitely recommend it. I think any book that generates this much discussion is worth reading just to form your own opinion on it!

If you want emotionally rich literary fiction

Brawler

Lauren Groff

Short stories don’t usually appeal to me so I wasn’t going to read Lauren Groff’s new collection Brawler, but I love her writing so I thought I’d give it a try. And I’m glad I did! She may have convinced me to read short stories more often. Brawler is a collection of nine stories of female characters toeing the line between good intent and bad decisions. Some of them are in brutal life circumstances, so while they may do unthinkable things, she develops her characters in such a way that you can almost forgive them – or at least understand why they make these choices. 

Land

Maggie O’Farrell

Maggie O’Farrell has become one of those authors whose books I’ll always pick up, so I was excited to read her new novel Land. Set on a remote Irish peninsula after the Great Hunger, the novel explores colonialism, family, and memory through the story of Tomás, an Irish mapmaker who has a mind-altering encounter in a mysterious copse of trees while he and his son are mapping the peninsula for the British Army. While the historical setting of the book is fascinating, I was most curious about the mystical happenings in the copse. Characters enter the copse, feel the ghostly presence of the people who came before them, and come out changed. I really wished the book spent more time with the magical realism here, but the book becomes more of a family saga as Tomás’ children grow up and pursue their own lives. Read my full review.

Lightbreakers

Aja Gabel

Aja Gabel’s speculative literary novel Lightbreakers asks: If you could revisit the past, would you? At what cost to the present? Quantum physicist Noah would give anything to revisit the past and prevent his daughter Serena’s sudden death at just three years old. Recruited by an eccentric billionaire to test his corrosive time travel machine, Noah drifts from his artist wife Maya as he repeatedly revisits the grief of losing Serena. Even as Maya begs Noah to look to the future and start a family with her, she also revisits the past with an ex-boyfriend. I didn’t totally understand the quantum physics behind the time travel, but the science in Lightbreakers is less important than why humans are so compelled to revisit the past, and how we can find peace in the present. Read my full review.

A Far Flung Life

M.L. Stedman

A Far-Flung Life tells the tale of a family of mid-century sheep ranchers in Western Australia whose lives are thrown into disarray when a truck accident claims the lives of their patriarch and one of the sons. It’s written with great respect for the land, the animals on it, and the harsh realities of life as a pastoralist, as the ranchers are called. The book explores the terrible domino effects and generational trauma that result from a bad decision. It takes a highly disturbing turn about 100 pages in that I was not expecting. If you can get past it, you will find a book that explores our fallibility as humans and what actions are deserving of redemption. There are no easy answers to the heavy moral questions this book poses, but it will give you a lot to think about.

If you ever wanted to live in the pages of a book

The Astral Library

Kate Quinn

After losing her job, home, and identity, foster care survivor Alix Watson seeks refuge in the Boston Public Library, where she finds a portal into the magical Astral Library, a sanctuary where troubled patrons can find new lives inside books. But something is threatening the Library’s existence, and Alix finds herself at the center of the battle to save it. The Astral Library is written for book lovers: it’s filled with magically replenishing reading snacks, gorgeous library architecture, and books that flutter in the air, seemingly alive. The characters dash in and out of a number of classic books, with fleeting encounters with literary celebrities like Sherlock Holmes and Marianne Dashwood. I’m mixed on this one. The concept and fantasy adventure are fun, but Alix’s romance with her charismatic fashion designer friend seems tacked on, while the political message comes across a bit preachy.

If you want to stay up all night reading

The Last Flight

Julie Clark

Claire lives a picture perfect life as the wife of political royalty Rory Cook, but behind the scenes, she’s in a violent and abusive marriage. She crafts an elaborate plot to leave him and start over with a new identity in Puerto Rico, but spontaneously changes plans and switches boarding passes with Eva, a stranger she meets at the airport. When Eva’s Puerto Rico-bound plane crashes, Claire’s plans fall apart. She takes over Eva’s identity in Berkeley, along with the secrets that Eva was trying desperately to escape. The Last Flight is a compelling and twisty book about two very different women trying to get some agency over lives that have spun out of their control. While some of the thriller elements fell flat for me, it was still a page turner and I loved the Berkeley setting and theme of women helping each other.

If you want to add to your fall TBR

Untamed Coast

Kevin C. Morris

Untamed Coast is a triple timeline mystery set on the wild coastline of Alaska, combining magnificent nature writing with strong characters and a quest for hidden gold. In 1938, a radio operator ferries messages to a remote mining operation while finding creative ways to make extra money. In 1982, a fisherwoman stuck in an abusive marriage makes a choice that alters the trajectory of her life. In 2017, a grieving widower and boating enthusiast develops an inexplicable obsession with a woman sending a distress signal off the coast, leading him down a dangerous path. The book is packed with vivid imagery of the sea life, bears, and birds inhabiting the icy waters, glaciers, and rugged mountains of the Alaskan coastline. The story unfurls slowly but the setting is so immersive and the characters so vivid that I felt fully drawn in to the mystery. Exploring themes of domestic violence, Depression-era poverty, grief, and ambition, Untamed Coast is a successful and compelling debut novel that will be published in September – come back then for my full review. Thank you to NetGalley and Ballantine for the ARC.

Fallow

Sarah Anderson

Twenty three year old Natalie is disillusioned with capitalism. With no insurance and in desperate need of oral surgery, she becomes the first ever corporate surrogate for a tech giant. Billed as a revolutionary feminist benefit, the program allows high powered women to avoid the physical and professional cost of pregnancy and maternity leave by farming out Natalie’s womb for seven surrogate pregnancies over a decade. When the surrogate job is no longer an option for her, she has to give birth to herself, as one of the characters puts it, in order to figure out what she wants in life. There is a lot to unpack in this book with themes of gender equality, labor and work, capitalism, and bodily autonomy. An impressive debut novel that I suspect will generate a lot of buzz, Fallow will be published in September – come back then for my full review. Thank you to NetGalley and Farrar, Straus and Giroux for the ARC.

The Many Private Lives of Missy Cooke

Jane Green

Missy Cooke is desperate for the attention, affection, and respect of her demigod tech founder father Marty Cooke, a Steve Jobs type. She gets her opportunity when he develops cancer and names her interim CEO of his global tech privacy juggernaut at just age 29. There are some strong female friendships supporting Missy as she fights to step out of her father’s shadow and come into her own power as a leader, but the corporate scenes and storyline seem like a caricature of real life corporate drama. I really wanted to root for Missy but I wish her story had been set in a more believable corporate setting. Readers who have spent less time in tech company conference rooms than me may not take issue with this though. The Many Private Lives of Missy Cooke will be published in September – come back then for my full review. Thank you to Edelweiss and HarperCollins for the ARC.

Sleepers in the Snow

Joanne Harris

Sleepers in the Snow is an atmospheric psychological thriller set atop a windswept moor next to an ominous electrical pylon. When the unnamed narrator moves into a remote cabin sight unseen, he’s looking forward to isolating himself after a bad divorce. But then he hears voices resonating from the buzzing of the electrical pylon, fresh tennis balls start showing up at his door, and small occurrences in the ghostly house start to take on a sinister meaning. Joanne Harris nails the sense of creepiness and dread, showcasing her magnificent range (she also wrote Chocolat!). As soon as I was done I wanted to read it again. Sleepers in the Snow will be published in October – come back then for my full review. Thank you to Megan Beattie Communications and Pegasus for the ARC.