Welcome to Quick Lit, where I share short and sweet reviews of what I’ve been reading lately on (or around) the 15th of the month, and invite you to do the same.
I hope your summer reading life is bringing you joy. If you’ve hung out around here for a while, you’ve heard me say before that once each year’s Summer Reading Guide is out I revel in bookish possibility, reading all kinds of stuff for all kinds of reasons. I tend to pick up very old books I’ve been putting off for ages (this summer much of my reading time has been devoted to Robert Caro’s 1974 classic The Power Broker, a 1,344 page behemoth), new summer releases I just hadn’t heard about yet when I was putting the Guide together, quirky books that are either just for fun or part of bigger personal literary projects, and yet-to-be-released titles I might feature in September’s Fall Book Preview.
In summer 2025, so far I’ve done exactly that—and as you might deduce, not all of the above categories make for good Quick Lit sharing! But today I’m happy to share a small sampling that gives a good indication of my reading life these days: narrative nonfiction that’s right up my alley, a plotty thriller by a new-to-me author that sounded super fun for summer, and literary fiction I’ve been meaning to read for ages.
I hope you find something that looks intriguing for your TBR here (and in these comments), and I look forward to browsing your recent reads below. Thanks in advance for sharing your short and sweet book reviews with us!
Welcome to July Quick Lit
Tunnel 29: The True Story of an Extraordinary Escape Beneath the Berlin Wall
The Last Flight
Heft
What have YOU been reading lately? Tell us about your recent reads—or share the link to a blog or instagram post about them—in comments.
68 comments
I’m picking up an old book this summer too – A Clockwork Orange – but it’s a tough one to read so far. ha. The Last Flight sounds intriguing. Thanks for the suggestions, Anne!
I had a great reading month of books that shifted my perspective on AI, positive thinking, and how I use my phone. They’re here:
https://lisanotes.com/8-books-that-shifted-my-perspective-this-month-nonfiction-fiction-picks/
This past month has been quite the eclectic group of reads! Only real standout, but all brought something different to my reading life this past month: https://cocoonofbooks.blogspot.com/2025/07/what-ive-been-reading-lately-quick-lit.html
I actually haven’t been reading much this month because of travel, but I’m sharing what I have and also included some cool vacation pictures this time!
Here’s my list: https://readeatrepeat.net/2025/07/books-in-progress-july-2025/
Red Clay by Charles Fancher! It’s fantastic!
Loved “The Correspondent,” by Virginia Evans.
Loved this book.
The Correspondent was my first 5 star book in a long time. Beautifully written! It has encouraged me to begin sending handwritten notes.
I also loved it. One of my only 5 star reads this year so far.
A wonderful book– loved it! One of my two five-star books so far this year (the other is Tony Woodlief’s We All Shall Not Sleep, published in 2024).
Oops! That title is, We Shall Not All Sleep.
Thanks for this rec!
Me too! Have you read 84 Charing Cross Road? I read it (in one sitting) right after I finished The Correspondent, they’re a great pair of epistolary novels!
The Last Flight was an incredible read. I read it almost three years ago, and haven’t forgotten the story line, and that’s something considering I read a lot of thrillers (some of which are forgettable)
I loved it too! Listened on audio.
Such a great combination of books! They all look good.
June was the best reading month I’ve had in a long time. Here’s the best of the best:
https://www.allthebooksihaventread.com/blog-1/2025/7/15/show-us-your-books-july-2025
If you’re looking for a good thriller I can recommend “Kill for Me,Kill for You” by Steve Cavanagh. Our book club read it and this was the first time everyone liked it. Lots of twists and a great ending!
He is a great author. Highly recommend his Eddie Flynn series. Characters build but can easily read out of order.
I have also loved the newer releases for Liz Moore and Julie Clark so I am intrigued by these backlist books!
This month I’m reviewing several buzzy new titles, including a quirky roadtrip story that I LOVED, an adorable wedding story with a twist, a beautifully written survival story/mystery mash-up, plus my hot takes on two of the year’s biggest books that just weren’t for me. Also reviewing some insightful nonfiction as well as the sweetest read-alouds that I finished with my kids.
https://kendranicole.substack.com/p/quick-lit-july-2025
Hi Kendra! You write such great reviews! I’m looking forward to reading The Road to Tender Hearts.
Thanks so much Adrienne. It is such a great book, I hope you enjoy it as much as I did!
I keep hearing about Liz Moore…!
I loved Heft, I think it’s still my favorite Liz Moore. I just finished and loved BUG HOLLOW by Michelle Huneven and now I’m reading THE BOY FROM THE SEA by Garrett Carr.
Recently I’ve read:
Jane Austen at Home: a biography, by Lucy Worsley
The Last Mona Lisa, by Jonathan Santlofer
The Mutual Friend, by Carter Bays
Letters, Oliver Sacks
The First Gentleman, by Bill Clinton and James Patterson
and Spare, by Prince Harry
And I’ve started:
Lake Success, by Gary Shteyngart
The Doorman, by Chris Pavone
I loved *Lake Success*; it was so quirky. I made a list of Barry’s watches in my reading journal!
The only book I finished this month was *Bomb Island* by Stephen Hundley. It was quirky, too. The side plot about a pet tiger was amazingly well-paced.
4 mid-summer reads that will show up on my 2025 Favorite Books list!
https://lindastoll.substack.com/p/4-mid-summer-literary-winners-porch
Heft was the first book I ever really enjoyed on audio!! Really great performances.
I read The Last Flight too…great page turner, clever plot, and even liked the ending! What more can you ask!? Also read Wally Lamb’s The River is Waiting and Fredrick Backman’s My Friends. My best books of the year so far… which will probably stand the test of time til end of the year. Both outstanding!
I had a good mix of heavy and light reads in June, not all of them winners, but I did have one five-star book that’s sure to be one of my best of the year, and the light ones were good summer reads (one was totally unhinged, but funny!).
https://www.mindjoggle.com/june-2025-book-reviews/
I’m making my way through The Covenant of Water for book club, while also reading Tom Lake. Before that I finished El Dorado Drive (suburban suspense set in Grosse Pointe, MI) and Murderland (nonfiction with the premise that environmental toxins might be partly to blame for the rash of serial killers and rapists in the Pacific NW in the 70’s).
The Covenant of water is amazing on audio. Loved it.
Loved The Covenant of Water, and “just happened” to find Tom Lake in a little free library before a flight this summer, and guess who binge-read her way through that beautiful story before she got home?
You’ve had some rich reading this summer!
I am excited that you are reading The Power Broker! I loved it, but partly because I am from NYC (Riverside Drive) and it gave me so much insight into my city. would love to hear what you think.
Several years ago I listened to a BBC podcast called Tunnel 29 that was fascinating. I am guessing this is that in book form?
I recently finished Run for the Hills, Everything Is Tuberculosis, and Martyr! I loved them all, and as an overly critical reader (I make myself cringe at times), that is saying something! Currently reading Three Bags Full and enjoying that too.
Bridge of Sighs by Richard Russo
Joe Country by Mick Herron, in the Slow Horses series
I just finished Woodworking by Emily St James last night. She said she wrote it as a comedy, and it is funny, but shows the dark parts of life as well in a very effective and moving way.
Wanted to start My Friends today, but now my cat is napping on the book, so I’m checking my email instead!
I have a ton of great romances, thrillers and fantasy books to share this month!
https://neverenoughnovels.com/2025/07/14/july-2025-mini-book-reviews/
Belinda Bauer, Snap
Janelle Brown, What Kind of Paradise
Anthony Horowitz, The Marble Hall Murders
All great reads to get through this hot summer! I was delighted to discover Belinda Bauer. Her way with words and plot kept me glued to the page.
My top reads were The Corresponent and Run for the Hills. Bughollow didn’t grab me – I gave up after 50 pages. I had read her book The Search, and enjoyed it.
I’m finding it unusually difficult to stick with a new book…..a result, I guess, of the frightening decisions being taken in Washington. I’m doing a lot of re-reading of books that are comforting.
I finished The Power Broker last year and I made myself a t shirt to celebrate(?) finishing it. I’m a native New Yorker (well, Long Island) so I was intimately familiar with the geography. I now drive my family crazy on trips back to NYC with Robert Moses facts. If only his powers could have been used for good instead of evil.
Haha my family members were so annoyed by constant Power Broker facts! I grew up on Riverside Drive and near the Bloomingdale (on the UWS) neighborhood so had a lot of thoughts. It would be difficult to find a Mayer whose life hasn’t somehow been affected by Robert Moses. Even now I live right near the terminus Taconic Parkway, which his struggles with FDR prevented from being extended further north.
Robert Caro is featured in the documentary “Turn Every Page” (Available on Amazon Prime). I found it fascinating.
I finished Mary Robinette Kowal’s Lady Astronaut series, then read her book of short stories (Word Puppets) and a couple of standalone short stories. I liked the full length books more than the short stories. Also flirting with the idea of being a completist for her. But I moved onto a couple of library holds- The Irresistible Urge to Fall for Your Enemy, which is….aggressively fine, Lights Out which is dark romance (not typically my genre) but I am liking a surprising amount (probably because it has a good amount of humor mixed in), and reading my recent BOTM pick Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil. I’m about 50 pages in and it is also fine. I assume it will get better so I’m giving it another 50 pages before I DNF.
Just finished listening to a podcast recommending The Irresistible Urge. This can’t be a coincidence…
This summer I am reading only lighter fare. Just finished book three of the Thursday Murder Club and re-read and enjoyed Donna Leon’s Blood From a Stone.
Nature by David B. Williams, a naturalist. Short essays with color & black and white sketches. Just started The Peculiar Gift of July by Ashley Ream. Set on on a small island off the Pacific coast (San Juan area). The town grocer, Anita, takes in the orphaned daughter of a distance cousin. FInding it very engaging so far. I’m also listening to Ann Packer’s 2008 novel, The Children’s Crusade, while anticipating her new novel, Some Bright Nowhere, due out in January, 2026. Just finished the audio of Marriage at Sea. I think it was on Anne’s Summer Guide list. Highly recommend all of these.
Love that you are reading Robert Caro! I have the first of his Lyndon Johnson books sitting on my shelf and hope to embark on it soon.
Recently I have read The Wide Wide Sea by Hampton Sides, The Firm by John Grisham, and God’s Smuggler by Brother Andrew. A nice mix!
I listened to Heft earlier this year after reading a Lit Hub interview about Liz Moore’s process. I LOVED IT. Truly, Authur Opp and Kel Kellerman will remain with me as two favorite characters. I cared about them so much.
Last Flight looks so intriguing, and I have a physical copy waiting on my TBR cart. Yippee! Last month’s reading was a mixed bag for me, and included:
* The In-Between by Hadley Vlahos (4 stars) – this is a thought-provoking memoir by a hospice nurse, featuring 12 very different cases. In May, my mother and mother-in-law both passed away in the span of 3 days. My mother’s death was very unexpected, but MIL had been in poor health for a couple of years and was on hospice, so her death was not a surprise. This memoir really helped me deal with some mixed emotions and grief.
* Greenlights by Matthew McConaughey (audiobook, 3 stars) – another memoir!
* Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil by V.E. Schwab – I stopped reading this about at about 40%. It’s beautifully written and the stories are so good but I just cannot deal with the gore. If you have read this you likely know what I mean. Not sure if I will pick it back up or not.
Currently reading The Fisherman’s Gift by Julia Kelly. Good, but sad…
Happy Reading!
So sorry for your loss (losses!) and grateful to hear that the right book at the right time offered comfort.
Thank you Michele and Stacie for your kind words. ❤️
So sorry for the loss of two special women in your life. I found this book to be helpful, as well as Hadley’s, when my dad passed away.
I PROMISE IT WON’T ALWAYS HURT LIKE THIS by Clare Mackintosh (yes, the author of thrillers…she writes about her own grief after losing her 5-week-old son to meningitis. Surprisingly, grief is grief, and I found it so comforting and relatable.
https://www.sincerelystacie.com/2024/04/book-review-i-promise-it-wont-always-hurt-like-this-by-clare-mackintosh/
Thank you for the recommendation Stacie. I’ll see if I can find a copy of this book.
We are reading The Last Flight by Julie Clark for book club next month. I am reading Not My Type by E Jean Carroll and I find it hilarious, sobering and well written. I’m also reading Finding the Mother Tree by Susanne Simard which is a scientific discovery book but it entertaining.
The best book I’ve read lately Is Kingmaker by Sonia Purnell. It’s a biography of Pamela Harriman, who led an incredible life. Married to the son of Winston Churchill, and two men after that, she also had affairs with Aly Kahn, the president of Fiat, Edward R. Murrow, and numerous others. In her later years she became a big donor to the Democratic Party and ended her life as the US Ambassador to France (appointed by Clinton). Just a fascinating life.
P.S. Anne—hang in there with The Power Broker! 😀
I looked forward to this one and it did not disappoint! My Name is Emilia del Valle reads like the biography of an outstanding woman of the late 19th century.
https://michelemorin.net/2025/07/09/unique-calling-doing-what-you-cant-not-do/
Enjoying the new Adriana Trigiani book “The View From Lake Como” – it is a delight!
Summer is for good reads. I am intrigued by Tunnel 29. I am going to have to put that on my TBR. Here is what I read in July
https://myviewofthehoneypot.blogspot.com/2025/07/what-i-read-july.html
I spent April-early July finally reading the Beartown trilogy. I almost stopped when I realized what the inciting was in the first book, but persevered because I love hockey and Backman. But now I can read SRG books! Starting with Rabbit Moon – so far so good. I read Heft a long time ago and still think about it, but haven’t yet read God of the Woods and never connected the two.
June reading wrap up
https://readingladies.com/2025/06/30/june-2025-reading-wrap-up-amreading-blogger-bookblogger-bookx-booksky-junereading-readinglife/
Books 51-61 of 2025: https://thereisnosuchthingasagodforsakentown.blogspot.com/2025/07/reading-update.html
I’ve been motivated to read by my library’s summer reading program. I read six books in June and counting. My stand-outs were How to Read a Book by Monica Wood and The Friend by Sigrid Nunez. I’m also enjoying a couple quick reads by Roselle Lim.
Just finished a delightful memoir, Jeff Hiller’s Actress of a Certain Age: My Twenty-Year Trail to Overnight Success. If you loved his HBO show, “Somebody Somewhere”, treat yourself to this book on audio.
I haven’t heard of any of the novels you mentioned. The Berlin Wall one sounds fascinating, but I don’t think I could read it due to the tunnel part. Unfortunately, I struggle to read about things underground or in closed spaces.
I have 3 books to share this month too: a popular and recent fiction title that will be a favorite this year, a fun mystery, and a historical fiction I didn’t expect to love but did.
Atmosphere
The Mystery Guest
Horse
https://www.sincerelystacie.com/2025/07/quick-lit-july-2025-edition/
I’m a teacher, so this time of year is my most productive for reading. Since June, I’ve finished several books that will probably make my annual top 10:
My Friends, The Names, What Kind of Paradise and Speak to Me of Home.
Not quite measuring up to that level but also worthwhile and/or entertaining reads: Dream State, All the Other Mothers Hate Me, Run for The Hills and the Griffin Sisters’ Greatest Hits. I’m currently enjoying listening to Culpability.
Hazel Says No–I picked it up because I was out of books on a trip. If I were reading it at home, I might have stopped at the first ick of inappropriate principal. But it was my only book on the flight, so kept going and then could hardly put it down. For tender readers–the ick is mild. Doesn’t have to be terrible abuse to be abuse. I felt like this was realistic and eye opening!
Also I have one more book thing to say! When I travel, and finish a book, I like to leave it in a prominent place with a note sticking out that says free. Saves weight to buy more books!
So,I finished Matriarch by Tina Knowles–Beyoncé’s mom– on the plane to Houston to see Queen Beyoncé herself. But I didn’t have a chance to leave it in the airport. Talking about the concert with a helpful parking garage attendant, I gave her the book. She ran out of the booth to hug me and I hopped out of the car to hug her! Super lovely book/concert connection!
I’m almost finished with White Oleander by Janet Fitch. It’s a strangely beautiful book with incredible writing.
Haven’t read The Power Broker but am a huge fan of Robert Caro. I’ve read all the series so far on LBJ and am waiting for that very last volume to be published. I so admire Caro’s in-depth writing and appreciate his collaboration with his wife on all his works.
Thanks to your summer reading guide, I gobbled up Fredrik Backman’s “My Friends”- so good! As soon as I finished, I wanted to to start it over, but too many books, to little time for a re-read right now! So, so amazing!
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