The 21 Best Beach Reads to Keep You Occupied All Summer Long

Have you ever gotten screwed over by a man you never cared all that much for to begin with? Join the club. In this delightful and honest novel by Domenica Ruta, Sandy, a woman in her mid 30s who is reeling from the end of her decade-long relationships, meets Justin on a dating app. Justin may not be the man of her dreams, but her life is quickly upended anyway when she falls pregnant. Now a single mother saddled with a deadbeat father, Sandy goes down a cyberstalking rabbit hole, where she accidentally sends a follow request to Stephanie, her baby daddy’s other baby mama. What ensues is a joyful journey about the trials of motherhood and found family.

Music journalist Dean Van Nguyen paints a comprehensive portrait of Tupac Shakur—not just as the legendary rapper, but also as an artist existentially shaped by radical politics. Under the influence of his mother, who was a Black Panther, and his stepfather, a member of the Black Liberation Army, Shakur had an upbringing that was steeped in Marxist thought and revolutionary activism. As this bold biography makes evident, Shakur’s political conscience naturally informed the way he approached his art.

Five years after a chance encounter with a bartender, Jack Felgate runs into CJ out of the blue. But, neither resemble who they used to be. Jack is now one of the most sought-after actors of his generation, while CJ is a single mother raising a four-year-old son. With Jack starring in a new remake of The Great Gatsby and CJ working as the film’s production designer, the two get the second shot at love that they never expected to receive.

Set against the high-speed backdrop of Formula 1, Slipstream takes readers on an intense ride through revenge, redemption, and—of course—romance. Lilah is a documentarian tasked with filming Arthur, a charismatic but cocky racer. After Lilah finds out that her longtime boyfriend not only cheated on her but also screwed her over via their cofounded filmmaking business, she decides to exact revenge. Her scheme coincides with Arthur’s plan to make a career comeback, and the two decide to join forces to achieve their goals.

The best-selling author of Daisy Jones & the Six and The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo returns with another transportive sapphic romance in Atmosphere. In 1980, astronomy and physics professor Joan Goodwin responds to an advertisement about NASA’s Space Shuttle program. She begins training at Houston’s Johnson Space Center, where she and other hopeful astronauts form life-changing bonds and friendships. In particular, Joan’s connection with one fellow astronaut in training sets her on a course she never expected to embark on.

Jane is not like other teenagers living amid the ’90s dot-com bubble. Raised by her father in an off-grid cabin in the woods of Montana, she only experiences the outside world through an occasional trip to a local bookstore. Her family’s past is mysterious—and her father has refused to offer more than a murky detail here and there—but when she discovers a long-held secret that turns her world upside down, she decides to break free on her own terms.

In her debut memoir, the award-winning Palestinian American poet and novelist navigates the inheritance of her family’s legacies of struggle right as she’s on the precipice of becoming a mother. By tracing her ancestors’ past through Palestine, Kuwait, Syria, and Lebanon, Alyan contends with the idea of home and safety, as well as the contradictions of her own Midwestern upbringing.

Amid the civil-rights movement of the 1960s, 17-year-old Doris Steele leaves her small town for Atlanta, where her favorite teacher, Mrs. Lucas, agrees to help her secure an abortion. In the city, Doris finds herself at the center of a changing world—and she’s surprised to find that she wants to change with it. This touching coming-of-age story tackles themes like identity, growth, and power with razor-sharp wit and humor.

The sudden death of the Samuelson family’s golden boy, Ellis, turned their world upside down. Mom Sybil immerses herself in her teaching in order to stave off the grief of the loss. Dad Phil leans on an unexpected source of comfort that he discovered during his time working as an engineer in Saudi Arabia. As middle sister Katie comes home to reconcile with her mother, the youngest Samuelson, Sally, finds herself picking up the pieces of a family that has been splintered beyond recognition.

Sommy moves from her home county of Nigeria to the United States after securing a spot in an American graduate-school program, but her move comes just weeks after her brother, Mezie, attempted suicide. As she navigates the guilt of leaving Mezie behind in order to pursue her dreams, she also begins complicated relationships with Bayo, her Nigerian roommate, and Bryan, a biracial American.

If you’re anything like me, then you also have a bad habit of turning on the most ridiculous reality dating show in lieu of picking up a book. Luckily, that’s where Aisling Rawle’s The Compound comes in. Pegged as a mix between Love Island and The Hunger Games, The Compound follows Lily, our disillusioned antihero, as she joins the cast of a popular reality TV show that pairs contestants up for the chance to compete for luxury prizes. Filmed in the middle of nowhere, the set may look like paradise, but Lily soon discovers that it’s anything but.

For her debut novel, Claire Jia dives deep into the layers of envy, regret, and longing that pierce through even the strongest of friendships. Ye Lian is content with her life in Beijing—at least, she thought she was until her childhood best friend, Luo Wenyu, reenters the picture. After spending a decade in California, Wenyu returns to Beijing as a famous influencer engaged to a rich tech entrepreneur. The duo’s lives become intertwined with Song Chen, an architect Wenyu hires to build her home.

If you thought Challengers made tennis sexy, just wait and see what Hot Girls With Balls can do for volleyball. Not only do Six and Green, two Asian-American trans girls who are in a relationship, decide to join a men’s pro indoor volleyball league, but they’re also playing for rival teams. As their athletic popularity grows, the couple must now navigate the trenches of social-media fame amid a post-Covid—erm, I mean, post-Covis—world. All in all, the novel is the outrageous, hilarious, and biting social commentary that we need in a time where the government continues to invalidate and target the trans community.

Shortly after his mom kicks him out of the house and subsequently forces him to move in with his dad, 15-year-old Nicholas begins to experience panic attacks. On paper, the attacks could be seen as symptoms of generalized anxiety disorder. But to Nicholas, the awareness of his own consciousness has convinced him that perhaps Pan, the ancient Greek deity who ruled over the wild, has possessed his body. With prose as strange as it is hypnotizing, Pan will leave you breathless and wanting for more.

There’s no good time to find out that you’ve been diagnosed with cancer, but it probably isn’t best to find out right after you discover your husband is having an affair. In this comedic and heartbreaking debut novel, the narrator confronts her grief head-on, from naming the growing tumor inside of her Maggie to developing a user manual guide for her ex’s new woman.

Something isn’t quite right with the Mansfield girls. At least, that’s according to five residents of Little Nettlebed, an intimate 18th-century village that has long been prone to attracting strange and uncanny creatures. Although locals aren’t so quick to profess their belief in witchcraft as they once might have been, they are still wary of anyone who dares to stray from social convention. By spinning the tale of the Mansfield girls, Xenobe Purvis asks a question that is as relevant today as it was centuries ago: Is it better to be a dog than it is to be an extraordinary little girl?

If you happened to pick up Lili Anolik’s Didion & Babitz last year and found yourself wanting more, then L.A. Women just might pique your interest. Set in the heart of Los Angeles during the 1960s, the novel follows Lane Warren and Gala Margolis, two writers who couldn’t be more different from each other. While Lane is a rising literary star known for her reserved nature, Gala is a free spirit who loves nothing more than a good party. The women strike up a tentative friendship, but, in the decades that follow, tensions and jealousies inevitably come between them.

Who says babies can’t be scary? In Tantrum, Rachel Eve Moulton weaves together a horror story that will undoubtedly speak to the fears of anyone who has ever thought long and hard about motherhood. When Thea gives birth to her third child, she knows immediately that something is off. For one thing, baby Lucia is born with a full set of teeth. For another, she is always hungry. As Thea witnesses Lucia’s demonically fast rate of growth, long-forgotten memories from her past begin to bubble up to the surface.

In this stirring family epic, a band of three sisters and their single mother learn how to rebuild in the face of desolation. Decades after twins Emma and Ara produced a critically acclaimed and Grammy-nominated debut album, Emma thinks she’s finally ready for a comeback. Unfortunately for her, Ara has unceremoniously landed herself in jail. Youngest sister Josie, who has acted as the twins’ band manager for years, is moved to action when she hears about Ara’s condition. As the trio confront their shared history, they will also have to learn how to forgive their absentee mother, Bertie, a former lawyer who was always more preoccupied with saving the world than she was with raising her daughters.

Set in modern-day Ukraine, The Sunflower Boys reflects on how abruptly violence and destruction can corrupt the innocence of boyhood. Before the Russian invasion, 12-year-old Artem worked on his grandfather’s sunflower farm; swam in the nearby river with his younger brother, Yuri; and toyed with his confusing feelings for his best friend, Viktor. Now, as the front lines edge closer to his doorstep, Artem is forced to quickly grow up in order to save himself and his family.