It’s time. You’ve survived the plane and the airports, and are now finally heading down to the beach. But what book have you brought with you? The best summer reads can do more than stop your towel blowing away: they can make you laugh, make you cry, make you think or simply keep you entertained between dips in the water.
Beach reads have an undeserved reputation of being lightweight – of being the kind of books you pick up at the airport newsagent before you dash to your gate. But any kind of book can be lightweight. In fact, there’s a good case to be made that being on holiday, when you have the time and energy to focus, is the best occasion to give something challenging a go.
Luckily, you can have it both ways – this pick of the best novels for summer will keep you engrossed without skimping on literary quality. The Hypocrite by Jo Hamya A novel about a play about the writing of a novel, The Hypocrite is centred around three members of a family trying (and generally failing) to view each other objectively. A divorced couple have recently been forced back into proximity by the pandemic, and their daughter Sophia has written a play about a trip she went on with her father as a teenager.
Their separate perspectives create a funny, painful and poignant picture, looking at the subjective natures of memory and writing and the humiliation of being observed. Evil Under the Sun by Agatha Christie Queen of crime, queen of atmosphere and queen of the holiday read Agatha Chr.