Great new book recommendations for our Leading Ladies this Spring
Spring isn't over yet! Check out these top books we recommend for you that were released in June.
We've done the work for you by finding the top books for your Bookfinity Reader Type. Be sure to add them to your “Read” list so that you can find them later.
JUNE NEW RELEASES
Banyan Moon
by Thao Thai
A sweeping, evocative debut novel following three generations of Vietnamese American women reeling from the death of their matriarch, revealing the family's inherited burdens, buried secrets, and unlikely love stories.
When Ann Tran gets the call that her fiercely beloved grandmother, Minh, has passed away, her life is already at a crossroads. In the years since she's last seen Minh, Ann has built a seemingly perfect life--a beautiful lake house, a charming professor boyfriend, and invites to elegant parties that bubble over with champagne and good taste--but it all crumbles with one positive pregnancy test. With both her relationship and carefully planned future now in question, Ann returns home to Florida to face her estranged mother, Huơng.
A Perfect Vintage
by Chelsea Fagan
Lea Mortimer has everything under control. As a highly sought-after consultant specializing in transforming dilapidated French country estates into boutique hotels, she relishes her freedom as a single, childfree woman. And her life is full, occupied as much by her impeccable historic renovations as by the aristocratic -- and often exhausting -- French families she works for.
But after the heated divorce of her closest friend and cousin Stephanie Bryce, Lea finds herself taking Stephanie and her college-aged daughter to the Loire Valley in France for the summer. As they tag along for Lea's latest work assignment, despite their best intentions, they threaten to complicate the tightrope act of launching the hotel on time. And when Lea unexpectedly falls for the much-younger son of her boss, she quickly learns the beauty and danger of losing control.
You Can't Stay Here Forever
by Katherine Lin
Desperate to obliterate her past, a young widow flees California for the French Riviera in this compelling debut, a tale of loss, rebirth, modern friendship, and romance that blends Sally Rooney's wryness and psychological insight with Emma Straub's gorgeous scene-setting and rich relationships.
Just days after her young, handsome husband dies in a car accident, Ellie Huang discovers that he had a mistress--one of her own colleagues at a prestigious San Francisco law firm. Acting on impulse--or is it grief? rage? Probably all three--Ellie cashes in Ian's life insurance policy for an extended stay at the luxurious Hotel du Cap-Eden-Roc in Antibes, France. Accompanying her is her free-spirited best friend, Mable Chou.
Palazzo
by Danielle Steel
A stirring novel about the legacies families inherit, create, and carry on, from #1 New York Times bestselling author Danielle Steel.
After her parents perish in a tragic accident, Cosima Saverio assumes leadership of her family's haute couture Italian leather brand. While navigating the challenges of running a company at twenty-three, Cosima must also maintain the four-hundred-year-old family palazzo in Venice and care for her younger siblings: Allegra, who survived the tragedy that killed their parents with scars and a spinal injury, and Luca, who has a penchant for wild parties, pretty women, and poker tables.
The Five-Star Weekend
by Elin Hilderbrand
From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Hotel Nantucket: After tragedy strikes, food blogger Hollis Shaw gathers four friends from different stages in her life to spend an unforgettable weekend on Nantucket.
Hollis Shaw's life seems picture-perfect. She's the creator of the popular food blog Hungry with Hollis and is married to Matthew, a dreamy heart surgeon. But after she and Matthew get into a heated argument one snowy morning, he leaves for the airport and is killed in a car accident. The cracks in Hollis's perfect life--her strained marriage and her complicated relationship with her daughter, Caroline--grow deeper.
So when Hollis hears about something called a "Five-Star Weekend"--one woman organizes a trip for her best friend from each phase of her life: her teenage years, her twenties, her thirties, and midlife--she decides to host her own Five-Star Weekend on Nantucket. But the weekend doesn't turn out to be a joyful Hallmark movie.
When the World Didn't End: A Memoir
by Guinevere Turner
In this immersive, spell-binding memoir, an acclaimed screenwriter tells the story of her childhood growing up with the infamous Lyman Family cult--and the complicated and unexpected pain of leaving the only home she'd ever known
On January 5, 1975, the world was supposed to end. Under strict instructions, six-year-old Guinevere Turner put on her best dress, grabbed her favorite toy, and waited with the rest of her community for salvation--a spaceship that would take them to live on Venus. But the spaceship never came.
MAY NEW RELEASES
Quietly Hostile: Essays
by Irby, Samantha
A MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK OF THE YEAR - A hilarious new essay collection from #1 New York Times bestselling unabashed fan-favorite Samantha Irby invites us to share in the gory particulars of her real life, all that festers behind the glitter and glam.
"Irby is back with a new and hilariously relatable essay collection.... [She] will have you crying and laughing." --TODAY
Samantha Irby's career has taken her to new heights. She dodges calls from Hollywood and flop sweats on the red carpet at premieres (well, one premiere). But nothing is ever as it seems online, where she can crop out all the ugly parts.
Irby got a lot of weird emails about Carrie Bradshaw, and not only is there diarrhea to avoid, but now--anaphylactic shock. She is turned away from restaurants for being inappropriately dressed and looks for the best ways to cope, i.e., reveling in the offerings of QVC and adopting a deranged pandemic dog. Quietly Hostile makes light as Irby takes us on another outrageously funny tour of all the gory details that make up the true portrait of a life behind the screenshotted depression memes. Relatable, poignant, and uproarious, once again, Irby is the tonic we all need to get by.
Did You Hear about Kitty Karr?
by Paul, Crystal Smith
A multigenerational saga that traverses the glamour of old Hollywood and the seductive draw of modern-day showbiz
When Kitty Karr Tate, a White icon of the silver screen, dies and bequeaths her multimillion-dollar estate to the St. John sisters, three young, wealthy Black women, it prompts questions. Lots of questions.
A celebrity in her own right, Elise St. John would rather focus on sorting out Kitty's affairs than deal with the press. But what she discovers in one of Kitty's journals rocks her world harder than any other brewing scandal could--and between a cheating fiancé and the fallout from a controversial social media post, there are plenty.
The truth behind Kitty's ascent to stardom from her beginnings in the segregated South threatens to expose a web of unexpected family ties, debts owed, and debatable crimes that could, with one pull, unravel the all-American fabric of the St. John sisters and those closest to them.
As Elise digs deeper into Kitty's past, she must also turn the lens upon herself, confronting the gifts and burdens of her own choices and the power that the secrets of the dead hold over the living. Did You Hear About Kitty Karr? is a sprawling page-turner set against the backdrop of the Hollywood machine, an insightful and nuanced look at the inheritances of family, race, and gender--and the choices some women make to break free of them.
The Collected Regrets of Clover
by Brammer, Mikki
Mikki Brammer's The Collected Regrets of Clover is a big-hearted and life-affirming debut about a death doula who, in caring for others at the end of their life, has forgotten how to live her own, for readers of The Midnight Library.
What's the point of giving someone a beautiful death if you can't give yourself a beautiful life?
From the day she watched her kindergarten teacher drop dead during a dramatic telling of Peter Rabbit, Clover Brooks has felt a stronger connection with the dying than she has with the living. After the beloved grandfather who raised her dies alone while she is traveling, Clover becomes a death doula in New York City, dedicating her life to ushering people peacefully through their end-of-life process.
Clover spends so much time with the dying that she has no life of her own, until the final wishes of a feisty old woman send Clover on a trip across the country to uncover a forgotten love story--and perhaps, her own happy ending. As she finds herself struggling to navigate the uncharted roads of romance and friendship, Clover is forced to examine what she really wants, and whether she'll have the courage to go after it.
Probing, clever, and hopeful, The Collected Regrets of Clover turns the normally taboo subject of death into a reason to celebrate life.
APRIL NEW RELEASES
The Society of Shame
by Roper, Jane
"If you liked Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus, read The Society of Shame by Jane Roper." --The Washington Post
In this timely and witty combination of So You've Been Publicly Shamed and Where'd You Go, Bernadette? a viral photo of a politician's wife's "feminine hygiene malfunction" catapults her to unwanted fame in a story that's both a satire of social media stardom and internet activism, and a tender mother-daughter tale.
Kathleen Held's life is turned upside down when she arrives home to find her house on fire and her husband on the front lawn in his underwear. But the scandal that emerges is not that Bill, who's running for Senate, is having a painfully cliched affair with one of his young staffers: it's that the eyewitness photographing the scene accidentally captures a period stain on the back of Kathleen's pants.
Overnight, Kathleen finds herself the unwitting figurehead for a social media-centered women's right movement, #YesWeBleed. Humiliated, Kathleen desperately seeks a way to hide from the spotlight. But when she stumbles upon the Society of Shame--led by the infamous author Danica Bellevue--Kathleen finds herself part of a group who are all working to change their lives after their own scandals. Using the teachings of the society, Kathleen channels her newfound fame as a means to reap the benefits of her humiliation and reclaim herself. But as she ascends to celebrity status, Kathleen's growing obsession with maintaining her popularity online threatens her most important relationship IRL: that with her budding activist daughter, Aggie.
Hilarious and heartfelt, The Society of Shame is a pitch-perfect romp through politics and the perils of being "extremely online"--without losing your sanity or your true self.
Life and Other Love Songs
by Gray, Anissa
"Musical in structure--the octaves rise when the music calls for it; truths are revealed by the invisible beats of this gorgeous, rich story" -Ann Napolitano, New York Times bestselling author of Hello Beautiful (Oprah's Book Club Pick)
"Riveting, rhythmic, transcendent...a stellar family saga."--Jacqueline Woodson, New York Times bestselling author of Red at the Bone
Named a Most Anticipated Book by Time ∙ Essence ∙ Real Simple ∙ Good Housekeeping ∙ Atlanta-Journal Constitution ∙ The Root ∙ SheReads ∙ Atlanta Magazine ∙ Zibby Mag
A father's sudden disappearance exposes the private fears, dreams, longings, and joys of a Black American family in the late decades of the twentieth century, in this page-turning and intimate new novel from the author of The Care and Feeding of Ravenously Hungry Girls.
It's a warm, bright October afternoon, and Ozro Armstead walks out into the brilliant sunshine on his thirty-seventh birthday. At home, his wife Deborah and daughter Trinity prepare a surprise celebration; down the street, his brother waves as Oz heads back to his office after having lunch together.
But he won't make it to the party or even to his briefcase back at his desk. He's about to disappear.
In the days, months, and years to follow, Deborah and Trinity look backward and forward as they piece together the life of the man they love, but whom they come to realize they might never have truly known.
In a gripping narrative that moves from the Great Migration to 1970s Detroit and 1990s New York, we follow the hopes, triumphs, losses, and secrets that build up and tear apart an American family.
The Forgotten Girls: A Memoir of Friendship and Lost Promise in Rural America
by Potts, Monica
Talented and ambitious, Monica Potts and her best friend, Darci, were both determined to make something of themselves. How did their lives turn out so different?
"The Forgotten Girls is much more than a memoir; it's the unflinching story of rural women trying to live in the most rugged, ultra-religious, and left-behind places in America."--Beth Macy, author of Dopesick
Growing up gifted and working-class poor in the foothills of the Ozarks, Monica and Darci became fast friends. The girls bonded over a shared love of reading and learning, even as they navigated the challenges of their tumultuous family lives and declining town--broken marriages, alcohol abuse, and shuttered stores and factories. They pored over the giant map in their middle-school classroom, tracing their fingers over the world that awaited them, vowing to escape. In the end, Monica left Clinton for college and fulfilled her dreams, but Darci, along with many in their circle of friends, did not.
Years later, working as a journalist covering poverty, Potts discovered what she already intuitively knew about the women in Arkansas: Their life expectancy had dropped steeply--the sharpest such fall in a century. This decline has been attributed to "deaths of despair"--suicide, alcoholism, and drug overdoses--but Potts knew their causes were too complex to identify in a sociological study. She had grown up with these women, and when she saw Darci again, she found that her childhood friend--addicted to drugs, often homeless, a single mother--was now on track to becoming a statistic.
In this gripping narrative, Potts deftly pinpoints the choices that sent her and Darci on such different paths and then widens the lens to explain why those choices are so limited. The Forgotten Girls is a profound, compassionate look at a population in trouble, and a uniquely personal account of the way larger forces, such as inheritance, education, religion, and politics, shape individual lives.
Don't have a Reader Type?