Three Books I'm Reading Now, 9/1/25 Edition

The Books I'm Reading Now

After a long Fredrik Backman hiatus (after reading Beartown I swore off this author for an extended period), I'm reading his newest novel, My Friends; I'm reading and loving Patrick Ryan's upcoming (to be published tomorrow) literary fiction, Buckeye; and I'm listening to Carley Fortune's romantic novel This Summer Will Be Different.

What are you reading, bookworms?

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01 My Friends by Fredrik Backman

I really liked Fredrik Backman's gentle, funny, lovely novel A Man Called Ove. Based on a collective love for that title, my book club dug into his novel Beartown--and there was a dramatic split between those who loved that story and those who did not. I found it incredibly frustrating, overly dramatic, and somewhat facile, and I took a break from Backman books.

But I was intrigued by the premise of My Friends, his most recent work, and some reader friends urged me to give him another try.

In the novel we follow young Louisa, an aspiring artist, and her inspiration, a dying artist with an extensive backstory centering around a group of dedicated friends and a pivotal summer in their early teens. The book tracks back in time to that summer that changed everything, and it alternates peeks into the past with present-day events and an unlikely modern-day friendship that comes out of a painful loss.

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02 Buckeye by Patrick Ryan

In Patrick Ryan's upcoming literary fiction title Buckeye, set during and after World War II, we follow the story of a young couple in Bonhomie, Ohio, as they meet, fall in love, build a family, and struggle to stay connected.

Young wife Becky Jenkins is fearlessly unconcerned with others' opinions. Since a young age she has been able to contact the dead, and she holds regular seances to help those who are worrying and suffering from loss. Her husband Cal is unable to serve in the war due to congenital factors causing one leg to be shorter than the other. Now he's working at his father-in-law's hardware store and is bewildered about how to live a life worth living, feeling helplessly buoyed along by others' interests and concerns.

They day the news of the Allied victory is announced, Margaret Salt enters their lives. Overcome with relief at the radio report, she passionately kisses Cal, a stranger, then strides away. But her general relief turns to fear when she learns that her husband, serving out of harm's way on a cargo ship, might have been a casualty of war after all.

I received a prepublication version of this title, to be published September 2, courtesy of NetGalley and Random House.

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03 This Summer Will Be Different by Carley Fortune

I thought reading a second Carley Fortune novel might be a nice way to close out the summer, so I went back to her 2024 release, This Summer Will Be Different.

Lucy is a twentysomething from Toronto vacationing in Prince Edward Island and awaiting her best friend Bridget's arrival when she meets Felix, a gorgeous guy serving up oysters at a local restaurant. But due to various convenient gaps in knowledge on both their parts (confusion about arrival dates, the consistent use of nicknames, and a lack of recent family photos on display on the island and in the city), Felix doesn't realize that Lucy is Bridget's best friend, and Lucy doesn't realize that Felix is Bridget's brother.

And one of Bridget's most important rules was that Lucy not fall in love with her brother.

I'm listening to an audiobook version of this title.

Carley Fortune is also the author of Meet Me at the Lake, Every Summer After, and One Golden Summer.