Readers, 2021 marks TEN YEARS of our annual Summer Reading Guide! I’m excited to get the brand new guide in your hands, but as a reflective reader, I’m also enjoying a look back at how this guide has grown and changed since its first iteration in 2012.
That inaugural guide included timeless classics like Pride and Prejudice and Brideshead Revisited, along with buzzy new releases hitting bookstore shelves. But it wasn’t long before I was reading advance review copies to sift through summer’s most anticipated releases so I could recommend my personal favorites.
Today I’m sharing 20 of those favorites from past Summer Reading Guides—the standout books that have stuck with me years later. I’ve returned to many of the books on this list for a reread (and not just in the summertime!).
In addition to your enthusiasm for our upcoming guide full of brand new releases, I’ve also heard many requests for backlist books to read this summer. “Backlist” simply means “not newly published.” (For example, since Don’t Overthink It is my most recent book, it’s my “frontlist” title. My backlist titles are I’d Rather Be Reading and Reading People.) Because backlist books have been out for awhile, they’re often available in paperback and have shorter wait times at the library.
Your bookish enthusiasm has helped our annual summer reading tradition grow from a blog post to a beautifully published digital magazine—and I can’t thank you enough for your support. If you’re eager to spread the Summer Reading Guide joy (or get it for yourself), we made it simple with an easy-to-link landing page.
In the meantime, I hope you find a few promising backlist Summer Reading Guide titles to add to your library tote or beach bag.
My Summer Reading Guide favorites
What We Were Promised
Clap When You Land
Evvie Drake Starts Over
I Miss You When I Blink: Essays
Rules of Civility
The Mother-in-Law
The Time in Between
The Island of Sea Women
Garlic and Sapphires: The Secret Life Of A Critic In Disguise
Maybe You Should Talk to Someone: A Therapist, HER Therapist, and Our Lives Revealed
Prodigal Summer
The Ensemble
The Light of the World: A Memoir
The Unquiet Dead (Rachel Getty & Esa Khattak Book 1)
Everyone Brave is Forgiven
Code Name Hélène
Musical Chairs
The Hazel Wood
The Vanishing Half
Hourglass: Time, Memory, Marriage
What are your favorite backlist books from past Summer Reading Guides? I can’t wait to see your summer reading favorites in the comments.
P.S. Check out my notable spring reads and 20 greatest hits from 8 years of summer reading.
43 comments
What We Were Promised is such a lovely book! And, of course, Lori Gottlieb! Congratulations on 10 years of creating such a useful resource, Anne!
I was thinking the same thing! What an accomplishment to do this for ten years!
The River by Peter Heller was definitely one of my SRL faves! So unlike my usual reads and a total page turner.
Lots of good ones here! Really excited to hear you’ll have nonfiction on this year’s list! Many of your NF picks have been favorites in former years. Yay- can’t wait!
Yes!! Always love her NF picks!
Simon the Fiddler by Paulette Jiles and The Huntress by Kate Quinn (on audio, as recommended in SRG) are two that really stand out for me. Wouldn’t have picked them up without the SRG and absolutely loved both
LOVED The Huntress and I listened to on Audible too. Certainly a favorite.
I agree–I read and loved Simon the Fiddler, as well as Jiles’ previous novel after hearing about them from MMD.
Celine by Peter Heller, Small Admissions by Amy Poeppel, and Love Walked In by Marisa de los Santos. Anne, thank you so much for your blogs and podcasts! Looking forward to this year’s guide!
Thank you for sharing this Backlist! It came at the perfect time. I need to restock the recipe card box that holds my “must reads.” Looking forward to devouring THE ENSEMBLE, THE ISLAND OF SEA WOMEN, and THE HAZEL WOOD.
What a fun way to track your “must reads”!
The Island of Sea Women and News of the World are two of my favorite books of the last few years. Because I loved Nothing to See Here, I’m going to check out Kevin Wilson’s backlist (starting with Perfect Little World)! Also adding The Mother in Law to my audible. Thank you
I was surprised how much I loved News of the World. I can’t even fully explain why I love it so much but I really, really did. Listened to Nothing to See Here – what a quirky book!
I look forward to your Guide every summer! I’ve liked so many books! Daisy Jones and the Six, Convenience Store Woman, Garden Spells, Mr Penumbra, Garden Spells….I could go on and on!
I just finished listening to Daisy Jones and the Six and it was wonderful. I would sit in my car when I got to work to listen to a little more.
Yes! Have you read Robin Sloan’s book Sourdough? Same quirkiness of Mr. Penumbra with a fantastical ending! It was one I thought about a lot last year as everyone was making sourdough. Sloan also has a pretty robust and fascinating newsletter archive if you like his style of writing and musings. He’s a great connector, in that he has connected me to things, authors, artists and ideas I wouldn’t necessarily have found otherwise.
I always read a slew of middle grade novels or books that I could use in my classroom during the summer! As I was dozing off to sleep last night, I was thinking about updating the summer reading list I made for our children’s book blog, but there are so many good ones on there it would be hard to make any changes: https://themiraculousjourneyofbooks.com/summer-2020-reading-list-grades-3-5/
Kate DiCamillo’s series that includes Louisiana’s Way Home is such a beautiful story that I think of regularly. It resonated with me in an unexpected way because the Louisiana’s life experience is really different from my own! I would recommend checking this one out.
A recent “backlist” read for me that I loved was Everything I Never Told You, by Celeste Ng. ❤️❤️❤️
I’m reading Everything I Never Told You next month! Hope I enjoy it as much as you did.
I also just finished a backlist title by the amazing Tayari Jones, The Untelling. So good!
What a great reminder of books that we may have shelved previous summer!
I will read ANYTHING by Dani Shapiro! I would highly recommend any of her memoirs, they are raw and honest like none other.
Lots of favorites on this list! I wanted to mention that The Time In Between has been made into a wonderful Spanish TV series that is sometimes available on Netflix with English subtitles. Great story.
I love that you have compiled this – I rarely read new books straight away but note the interesting or buzzy ones on my list and get to them in time. It’s an extraordinary tribute to publishers’ marketing work how few of them have an impact that lasts even the two or three years until I get to them in the library lists. If you want a recommendation of a recent-ish book that’s stayed with me – because it’s touching and funny, and by crikey I’m looking for humour and skilled writing after last year – is Old Baggage by Lissa Evans.
Same! I always add the most books to my TBR list from backlist titles! I don’t like to queue to read the buzziest new titles. The last 2 years I have a separate TBR list for new releases by date and if I still see or hear about them being recommended in the future I may give them more serious consideration as a “next read.” Many on the above list are on my TBR list already. Each time I read a recommendation for a book it receives a star- so books with several stars stand out on my list. Evvie Drake was a recent DNF- may pick up a print copy in the future and attempt again. I am currently in a novel reading slump so most of my reads/listens have been in the nonfiction or memoir category.
So glad to read your note about Old Baggage. I loved it for the same reasons. Lissa Evans is a wonderful author.
Love Prodigal Summer but also get summer vibes from Kingsolver’s Animal, Vegetable, Miracle. So filled with nature and science!
I will forever remember The One-in-a-Million Boy! So different and wonderful!
I loved The One-in-a-Million Boy also! How could you not love Ona?!
That was such a GREAT book!!
Looking forward to the summer reading guide! This is my first time seeing it released live.
Wondering if you would ever consider posting trigger warnings? I mention this because Island of Sea Women, though a beautiful story, sent me into quite a depression based on its extreme violence, especially against children. I don’t think adding those types of warnings would be spoilers, but I know that ever since reading that book I’m very cautious about spontaneous reads.
Several of my favorites listed here. I loved Harry’s Trees and I actually prefer A Gentleman in Moscow to Rules of Civility. I’m almost finished with Mr. Penumbra’s 24-Hour Book Store…it’s a fun one! I’ll have to check out Sourdough. Meanwhile, I have Daisy Jones and Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo waiting at the top of my TBR stack!
So many great reads here! I just finished Maybe You Should Talk To Someone on audio, and it was brilliant. Quite a few others here I’ve picked up on your recommendation, too: Rules of Civility, Clap When You Land, Evvie Drake… Somehow I missed Musical Chairs, though! It sounds great!
Anne, you have so widened my reading world (and my mother’s!—she’s amazed at the books I’m bringing her!) and I am forever grateful. I’ve only been following since the 2019 SRG and my two favorites from that year are Maybe You Should Talk to Someone, and Inheritance, but also The River led to my beloved Celine!
In 2020, my favorites were The Vanishing Half and Redhead by the Side of the Road. And This Tender Land led to a better liked backlist title Ordinary Grace!
From your current backlist here, I have just added I Miss You When I Blink free from Kindle Unlimited and will look for The Light of the World. Thank you! Two I missed.
I just finished Rules of Civility yesterday and thought the language was beautiful.
Can’t wait to hear Anne talk about this summer’s books today. Just a few of my favorites from last year’s SRG were Code Name Helene, The Vanishing Half, and This Tender Land (which led me to Ordinary Grace-even better!). Two I would have absolutely never read without Anne’s recommendation were Nothing to See Here and Stationery Shop which was barely mentioned in the SRG. Love them both. Thank you for all your hard work, Anne.
I never got mailed the link for the live event tonight
Kathy, it should have arrived shortly after you posted this comment, at about 6:30 Eastern time. If it didn’t, please let us know so we can troubleshoot! [email protected]
Your reminder above about code name Helene made me run to the library. I loved the interview you did with her when the book came out. Just finished the book a few minutes ago and while the book was great, I was astounded reading the end pages of the book to see so much of the story was true. What a story! I am better for having g read about this true life female hero. More importantly I have found an author I can trust. It was well done and all in a tasteful way. I’m careful of what I read and Ariel Lawson has my trust. On to read I was Anastasia.
A big thank you to you, Anne, for always giving your readers such a diversified list of books to read. I know the kind of books I normally like to read, but you introduce me to books that I probably wouldn’t have pulled off the shelf. That’s for expanding my reading list!
I loved Garlic and Sapphires more than I ever imagined I would. Just a marvelous read and I loved hearing Reichl’s adventures in restaurant criticking. I recommend it to everyone!
I so appreciate these backlist posts – it’s fun to find books at the library and on Libby! My MMD-TBR Goodreads tag is growing larger. “The Vanishing Half” was a really powerful read. I paired it with “Passing” by Nella Larsen.