The Books I'm Reading Now
I'm reading what may be a perfect summer read with plenty of nostalgia; a dark, mythology-filled mystery; and an intriguingly odd collection of short stories.
Which books are you reading and enjoying these days, bookworms?
01 Last Summer at the Golden Hotel by Elyssa Friedland
Two families meet for the summer at their formerly sought-after resort in the Catskills, but the Weingold and Goldman families aren't as close as they used to be--and the resort itself is falling apart. Can the families come together to save their beloved sanctuary, or will the uncovering of secrets and lies, family drama, and powerful generational conflicts thwart any possible resolutions for the two clans?
Is this book going to be Dirty Dancing meets The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel like I hope it will? It feels like a perfect book for summer reading.
I received a prepublication digital edition of this book courtesy of NetGalley and Berkley Publishing Group.
Friedland is also the author of The Floating Feldmans and other titles.
02 The Maidens by Alex Michaelides
In The Maidens, the newest book by the author of The Silent Patient, to be published next week, Mariana, a group therapist coping with her own personal tragedies, becomes embroiled in trying to identify and catch a killer at her alma mater, Cambridge University.
Mariana lost her husband a year ago in a holiday accident in her coastal Greek hometown, and she's still reeling. When her beloved niece Zoe calls from her Cambridge dormitory, frantic that her friend is missing, Mariana leaves her most problematic client and hops on a train to try to help.
So far the male characters in this story are obnoxious, condescending, creepy, and generally problematic. Michaelides has woven Greek mythology, references to ancient ceremony, and superstition into this dark tale.
I received a prepublication digital edition of this book, to published May 11, 2021, courtesy of Celadon Books and NetGalley.
03 Sarahland: Stories by Sam Cohen
Cohen's debut, Sarahland: Stories, centers around characters who are mainly named Sarah.
In the first story of the collection the Sarahs are college women, and Cohen takes tongue-in-cheek potshots at their various shallow, superficial behaviors and priorities--and presents disturbingly normalized patterns of sexual assault and exertions of male sexual power.
In other stories, Cohen recasts Sarahs and explores various roles for women, different searches for self, and provocative circumstances and reactions. A Buffy the Vampire Slayer fan and a Bible-era trans woman are two of
So far this is a weird and edgy and wonderful set of short stories.