2021 · Book · List · Summer

Summer Reads 2021!

It’s been a while since I shared with you a list of books, so, if you are looking for some summer reads here is my list to you! Not all of them are romance, expect some mystery/thrillers too! 😉

The Good Neighbours by Nina Allan (riverrun)

Cath is a photographer hoping to go freelance, working in a record shop to pay the rent and eking out her time with her manager Steve. He thinks her photography is detective work, drawing attention to things that would otherwise pass unseen and maybe he’s right…
Starting work on her new project – photographing murder houses – she returns to the island where she grew up for the first time since she left for Glasgow when she was just eighteen. The Isle of Bute is embedded in her identity, the draughty house that overlooked the bay, the feeling of being nowhere, the memory of her childhood friend Shirley Craigie and the devastating familicide of her family by the father, John Craigie.
Arriving at the Craigie house, Cath finds that it’s occupied by financial analyst Alice Rahman. Her bid to escape the city lifestyle, the anxiety she felt in that world, led her to leave London and settle on the island. The strangeness of the situation brings them closer, leading them to reinvestigate the Craigie murder. Now, within the walls of the Craigie house, Cath can uncover the nefarious truths and curious nature of John Craigie: his hidden obsession with the work of Richard Dadd and the local myths of the fairy folk.


21 Truths About Love by Matthew Green (Piatkus)

Daniel Mayrock’s life is at a crossroads:

  1. His bookshop is failing.
  2. He’s sick of feeling useless.
  3. His wife, Jill, is ready to start a family.
  4. She has no idea about 1 and 2.
    Dan is scared.
    Then Jill gets pregnant.
    And now all Dan knows is:
  5. Dan loves Jill.

The Summer Job by Lizzy Dent (Penguin)

Have you ever imagined running away from your life?
Well Birdy Finch didn’t just imagine it. She did it. Which might’ve been an error. And the life she’s run into? Her best friend, Heather’s.
The only problem is, she hasn’t told Heather. Actually there are a few other problems…
Can Birdy carry off a summer at a luxury Scottish hotel pretending to be her best friend (who incidentally is a world-class wine expert)?
And can she stop herself from falling for the first man she’s ever actually liked (but who thinks she’s someone else).


The Stepsisters by Susan Mallery (Mills & Boon)

When Daisy’s dad married Sage’s mum, Daisy was thrilled to get a new sister. Except Sage was beautiful and popular, everything Daisy was not, and she made sure Daisy knew it.
Sage found herself living in a palatial home where she felt she didn’t belong. She didn’t have her new sister’s intelligence so she used her popularity as a weapon, putting Daisy down at every opportunity. After the divorce, the stepsisters’ rivalry continued until the final straw: Daisy married Sage’s first love, and Sage fled to Europe.
Eighteen years later, Daisy never expects—or wants—to see Sage again. But brought together by an accident involving the little sister they have in common they must learn to put aside their differences. Slowly, the stepsisters begin to view the past through one another’s eyes and long buried feelings are revealed. Until their fragile truce is threatened by one careless act that could have devastating consequences…


False Witness by Karin Slaughter (HarperCollins)

They thought they’d got away with it … they were wrong.
Leigh and her sister Callie are not bad people – but one night, more than two decades ago, they did something terrible. And the result was a childhood tarnished by secrets, broken by betrayal, devastated by violence.
Years later, Leigh has pushed that night from her mind and become a successful lawyer – but when she is forced to take on a new client against her will, her world begins to spiral out of control.
Because the client knows the truth about what happened twenty-three years ago. He knows what Leigh and Callie did. And unless they stop him, he’s going to tear their lives apart …


Murder by the Bottle by Ed Whitfield (Reddoor Press)

Keir Rothwell is an angry young man.
Spurned by his lover and mentor and ejected from his art school, he is lost – but determined this will not be the end of his artistic endeavours.
A new job in a local wine shop gives Keir a creative outlet – a chance to turn shop floor drudgery into an original work of art. But his wine critiques mock the shop’s clientele and tension builds on both sides of the counter.
When his new project is threatened, conflict becomes murder and long buried secrets threaten to destroy the artist. But Keir Rothwell will not be undone.


The Moment I Met You by Debbie Johnson (Orion)

It only takes a second…
For life to change forever.
Elena Godwin could never have known that her dream holiday to Mexico would change her life forever. She thought that she was in charge of her own destiny. But on a gorgeous summer evening, her whole world is ripped from her feet in a single moment.
Ten years later, she still can’t forget the face of the stranger who held her whilst everything she knew was destroyed. Thrown back together again, Elena starts to uncover the truth around that fateful night – and questions whether she made the right decision all those years ago.
She only met him for a moment, but maybe it’s not too late…


The Black Dress by Deborah Moggach (Tinder Press)

Pru’s husband has walked out, leaving her alone to contemplate her future. She’s missing not so much him, but the life they once had – picnicking on the beach with small children, laughing together, nestling up like spoons in the cutlery drawer as they sleep. Now there’s just a dip on one side of the bed and no-one to fill it.
In a daze, Pru goes off to a friend’s funeral. Usual old hymns, words of praise and a eulogy but…it doesn’t sound like the friend Pru knew. And it isn’t. She’s gone to the wrong service. Everyone was very welcoming, it was – oddly – a laugh, and more excitement than she’s had for ages. So she buys a little black dress in a charity shop and thinks, now I’m all set, why not go to another? I mean, people don’t want to make a scene at a funeral, do they? No-one will challenge her – and what harm can it do?


This is How We Are Human by Louise Beech (Orenda Books)

Sebastian James Murphy is twenty years, six months and two days old. He loves swimming, fried eggs and Billy Ocean. Sebastian is autistic. And lonely.
Veronica wants her son Sebastian to be happy … she wants the world to accept him for who he is. She is also thinking about paying a professional to give him what he desperately wants.
Violetta is a high-class escort, who steps out into the night thinking only of money. Of her nursing degree. Paying for her dad’s care. Getting through the dark.
When these three lives collide – intertwine in unexpected ways – everything changes. For everyone.


Animal by Lisa Taddeo (Bloomsbury Circus)

I drove myself out of New York City where a man shot himself in front of me. He was a gluttonous man and when his blood came out it looked like the blood of a pig.
That’s a cruel thing to think, I know. He did it in a restaurant where I was having dinner with another man, another married man.
Do you see how this is going? But I wasn’t always that way.
I am depraved. I hope you like me.

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