By: Saije Rusimovici, Staff Writer
There’s nothing like opening up a good beach read and completely forgetting about real life for a couple hours. This selection features authors who capture the reader and transport them into each story. From a feel-good travelling tale to an edge-of-your-seat thriller set in Italy, these enticing reads are sure to catapult you into your summer reading groove. So sit back, grab yourself a cold drink, and dive into these reads (don’t drop your paperbacks in the pool though)!
Every Summer After by Carley Fortune
I’m not normally a big fan of romance or the friends-to-lovers trope, but the way Fortune writes is captivating and not only feels relatable, but real. Tragedy brings Persephone Fraser back to the small town of Barry’s Bay in Eastern Ontario, where her family used to vacation when she was a teenager. It also brings her back to the place she met and fell in love with her best friend, Sam, whom she hasn’t spoken to in more than a decade. The story carries the reader back and forth through time, the chapters alternating between past and present, through all the stages of Persephone and Sam’s relationship, up until the reason it ended. But the story doesn’t only focus on romantic love; Fortune also explores themes like friendship, family, loss, and mental health.
Content warning: mention of car accidents and death.
Get ready to be transported to the Italian coast and sucked into a thriller that keeps you hooked from the first page to the last. Jill Charron had been looking forward to visiting Italy on a high school trip with her best friend, Simone, for months. Only now, she has no memory of it. After waking up in a hospital bed, Jill is informed that Simone has died in a car accident and she was the one driving. Devastated, Jill attempts to piece together what happened on their trip, while dealing with the allegations that she tried to hurt her best friend on purpose. This is one of those books that keeps you flipping the pages until you realize you’ve finished the whole thing in one sitting. Cook keeps you on the edge of your seat, over dangerous twists and turns that keep you guessing the entire way through.
Eighty Days to Elsewhere by K.C. Dyer
I had the opportunity to meet my mom’s favourite author, K.C. Dyer, at a book signing in Coquitlam last year. This novel is the first book in the ExLibris Adventure series, starring protagonist Ramona “Romy” Keen. Desperate to save her uncles’ bookshop from going out of business due to high rent increases, Romy applies for a job at ExLibris Expeditions, a company that recreates famous literary journeys and creates feasible travel itineraries for prospective clients. Romy is tasked with retracing the steps from Phileas Fogg’s trip in Jules Vern’s Around the World in Eighty Days — and her competitor is none other than the nephew of the landlord trying to run the bookstore out of business. Dyer is witty, comforting, and writes with a flair you can’t help but gravitate towards. The spine is completely creased from how many times this book has been flipped through in my house. Travel with Romy this summer and you might learn a little bit about life, the world, and even yourself!
The Sugar Thief by Nancy Mauro
What first drew me to this book was the pastel-pink cover. As a baker that’s slightly obsessed with cooking tutorials and a sucker for a good mystery, this book grabbed my attention instantly. I have to admit, it was a bit of an impulse purchase. With that being said, I’m so glad I did. Mauro crafts the story of Sabine Rose, YouTuber and baker, masterfully. Just as Sabine is about to launch her own television show, she decides a well-documented trip to her family’s bakery in Thunder Bay is exactly what she needs to get that final push to stardom. However, after learning her father, an acclaimed pastry chef, has recently died, Sabine begins to uncover dark truths about the family bakery and secret recipes. Mauro takes you on a journey from the modern, sometimes cutthroat world of the media industry to the humble beginnings of her father’s legacy in Italy.
