100 Books Like Summer

This book has haunted me for decades. 

So much so that I’ve read it several times since I first encountered it as a teenager. (Plus watched both movie versions, twice each.)

The first line, "Last night I dreamt I went to Manderley again," drew me in and refused to let go. I wanted to return to Manderley. I wanted to find out what dark secrets would be revealed there. The unnamed, naive young heroine is haunted by the all-pervading presence of her husband’s first wife, Rebecca… and so was I.

And although some of the social attitudes are jarring to a 21st-century reader, and although I know the plot by heart now… I will still return to it.

I was drawn to this book because it’s loaded with atmosphere, and features hill folk like I do, with the difference that McCrumb’s characters inhabit the hills of Tennessee, while mine live in the Berkshire Hills of Western Massachusetts. I especially like the way she weaves local lore and legends into the story, and how she reveals how the landscape appears to different characters, ranging from a long-ago woman, kidnapped by Indians who escapes and makes her way homeward, to a modern-day non-hillbilly who struggles to re-create her difficult journey. Then, there’s the way McCrumb adds a dash of the supernatural through a character with psychic powers—all of which have been grist to my fictional mill.

I love how Dean takes a creepy cow head on a barn, and builds a compelling mystery around it. The cow head permeates the book, watching, judging, accusing, and shedding tears in the aftermath of a storm—seemingly more alive than wooden. Next to the cow head, snow is the dominant image. It’s a place for fun, as the main character and her close friend create snow angels, but it also carries a warning in the form of a message written in white, and as a blizzard, it knocks out the power in town, making getting around dangerous. Set in New England in the dead of winter, this is a book to read on a dark, frigid night with a hot drink and a blazing fire. 

A routine tale told in a familiar way can be comforting and satisfying.

Embers on the Wind is a different kind of thrill altogether. The story is fresh, the characters are multifaceted, and the storytelling is original. When I picked up this novel, I knew only that it was about a purportedly haunted home that had once been part of the Underground Railroad. I had no idea what I was in for or the wild ride the author would take me on.

Each character perceives reality a bit differently, and those differences make big waves. It's best to be surprised by a novel like this, so I won't say any more than that it's thought-provoking and entertaining at once.

This book is not a memoir per se, but it reads like a memoir.

Such a short book, but so packed with emotion and beautiful writing, as the protagonist attempts to find her place in the world. Although our family situations couldn’t have been more different in terms of the countries in which we grew up, and our family structure, I deeply identified with the protagonist’s feeling that she didn’t belong, wasn’t really part of the family situation in which she found herself. I read it months ago and it has remained with me.

Caerphilly, VA, is utterly fictional, but you would never know it. I love visiting Andrews’ little town not only for the crazy characters, but the sense of heart and what a community could be if decent people were willing to work at it.

Even in the midst of some pretty nefarious behavior one is more likely to associate with small Southern towns, in this one, Andrews came up with an absolutely fabulous resolution that really speaks to how goodness and kindness can overcome even the worst of behavior. 

It’s erudite as all hell, but for my money, half the fun of this book is hanging with the denizens of 62 New Square, a bunch of young barristers, in their favorite coffee place or bar or even, sometimes, in their offices. I also got a lovely feel for Venice, as well.

In fact, prior to a recent trip to Italy, I made a point of rereading this one. The story is told in multiple voices via a series of letters with slyly funny commentary by a fusty old professor of legal history, which creates the sense of place in a most unique manner.

I lived in Lagos for four and a half years, so a mystery in Nigeria grabbed my attention right away. Vanessa’s descriptions are so vivid that I was transported back there on the page.

I loved the insight into the lives of the Nigerwives—women from other countries married to Nigerian men. The power dynamics within the family were fascinating, and even as I wanted to know what happened to the missing Nigerwife, I was just as intrigued by the cultural insights.

I love this book because it features urbex (urban exploration) and I've done a bit of that myself; some of my previous books were about it. Much of the story is centred around the disused Blackwater Asylum, an enormous complex of wards and treatment rooms with only a skeleton staff of security guards. Everyone associated with Blackwater has their own secrets, from the former patient who lives within the grounds to the property developer with his eye on the land, and we follow Detective Lew Kirby and urban explorer Connie Darke as they try to unravel the crimes that have taken place there. There is mystery aplenty, but what really made this book for me were the locations. The bone jar itself – which I am not going to describe! Go and read the book! – is absolutely stunning and completely original. 

Perhaps it says something about where I live now that the best novel I’ve read that takes place in the San Fernando Valley is largely told through an unreliable and chemically addled narrator. Through a self-medicating veteran named Shep and the people he encounters – from a convenience store clerk to an actress he believes to be his daughter – Kinney conjures an often bleak but never hopeless vision of the Valley. In her hands, familiar sights to us Valley residents take on unnerving new contexts, and for any readers unfamiliar with the 818, her brilliant, hypnotic, and compassionate writing will be an exemplary guide.