Our Summer 2025 Reading Lists
I’ve met with varying success for my summer reading lists over the years. (You can find those lists linked below.) Whether I I accomplish all of my summer reading goals or not, I’ve found these lists very helpful in finally getting around to reading books that I’d failed previously to make a priority.
This year, I asked other members of the family looking for more reading accountability to chime in with their goals. My 22-year-old son and 17-year-old daughter took me up on the invitation. (If my 13-year-old daughter made a list, it’d be outdated by the time I hit publish based on the speed with which she tears through books.)
My list: Uneasy Street by Becky Wade
Blurb: Once upon a time Max Cirillo and Sloane Madison were close friends and business partners. But when their business relationship imploded, so did the friendship.
Now, four years later, Max is a rich CEO. Sloane’s a not-so-rich etiquette expert who returns to Maine to serve as her niece’s temporary guardian and help the girl search for her birth father. Sloane and her niece move into a darling garage apartment but Sloane’s joy in their accommodations soon turns to horror when she realizes their apartment belongs to Max. Thanks to an unbreakable lease, she’s stuck living right next door to him.
Max pulled strings to bring Sloane into his orbit because he needs closure on what went wrong between them. Quickly, though, his scheming comes back to bite him. The world might view him as a cold-hearted rake, but this one woman has dangerous power over his emotions.
They’ll have no choice but to confront their history—and the undeniable spark between them—while living side by side on uneasy street.
Why I want to read it: I thoroughly enjoyed the two previous books in the Sons of Scandal series and am looking forward to the final novel. I’ve enjoyed many of this author’s Contemporary Christian romances.
The Happy Life of Isadora Bentley by Courtney Walsh
Blurb: She’s out to prove that there’s no such thing as choosing happiness.
Isadora Bentley follows the rules. Isadora Bentley likes things just so. Isadora Bentley believes that happiness is something that flat-out doesn’t exist in her life—and never will.
As a university researcher, Isadora keeps to herself as much as possible. She avoids the students she’s supposed to befriend and mentor. She stays away from her neighbors and lives her own quiet, organized life in her own quiet, organized apartment. And she will never get involved in a romantic relationship again—especially with another academic. It will be just Isadora and her research. Forever.
But on her thirtieth birthday, Isadora does something completely out of character. The young woman who never does anything “on a whim” makes an impulse purchase of a magazine featuring a silly article detailing “Thirty-One Ways to Be Happy”—which includes everything from smiling at strangers to exercising for endorphins to giving in to your chocolate cravings. Isadora decides to create her own secret research project—proving the writer of the ridiculous piece wrong.
As Isadora gets deeper into her research—and meets a handsome professor along the way—she’s stunned to discover that maybe, just maybe, she’s proving herself wrong. Perhaps there’s actually something to this happiness concept, and possibly there’s something to be said for loosening up and letting life take you somewhere . . . happy.
Why I want to read it: I enjoy Courtney Walsh’s books but can no longer keep up with her pace. Of the half-dozen recent novels I haven’t read, this one seems the most beloved, so I’ll start here.
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
Blurb: A beautiful society wife from St. Petersburg, determined to live life on her own terms, sacrifices everything to follow her conviction that love is stronger than duty. A socially inept but warmhearted landowner pursues his own visions instead of conforming to conventional views. The adulteress and the philosopher head the vibrant cast of characters in Anna Karenina,Tolstoy’s tumultuous tale of passion and self-discovery.
This novel marks a turning point in the author’s career, the juncture at which he turned from fiction toward faith. Set against a backdrop of the historic social changes that swept Russia during the late nineteenth century, it reflects Tolstoy’s own personal and psychological transformation. Two worlds collide in the course of this epochal story: that of the old-time aristocrats, who struggle to uphold their traditions of serfdom and authoritarian government, and that of the Westernizing liberals, who promote technology, rationalism, and democracy. This cultural clash unfolds in a compelling, emotional drama of seduction, betrayal, and redemption.
Why I want to read it: In my senior year of high school, I had a very young English teacher who assigned a variety of Russian novels–and I loved them. Despite that, I’ve never returned to reading Russian authors, and this classic has been on my to-be-read list for much too long.
Les Miserables by Victor Hugo
Blurb: Widely considered Victor Hugo’s masterpiece, Les Misérables is both an epic story and a penetrating social criticism of nineteenth-century France. In this tale of crime, punishment, love, and the pursuit of justice, we meet some of the most unforgettable characters in literature, including Jean Valjean, the heroic peasant arrested for stealing a loaf of bread; Cossette, the abused daughter of a prostitute; and Inspector Javert, the policeman who relentlessly hounds Valjean at every turn. With encyclopedic sweep, Hugo’s novel investigates topics ranging from the construction of Parisian sewers to the Battle of Waterloo.
Why I want to read it: I actually read this book once or twice in high school, including for extra credit in History class. Many of my classmates and I bemoaned the length of “The Miserables,” but I ended up loving the story. I’ve been wanting to re-read it as an adult and a writer for a very long time.
Wormwood Abbey by Christina Baehr
Blurb: As a Victorian clergyman’s daughter, Edith Worms has seen everything — until a mythical salamander tumbles out of the fireplace into her lap.
When a letter arrives from estranged relatives, Edith is swept away to a crumbling gothic Abbey in the wilds of Yorkshire. Wormwood Abbey isn’t just full of curious beasts and ancient family secrets: there’s also a tall, dark, and entirely too handsome neighbour who is strangely reluctant for her to leave.
An unexpected bond with her prickly cousin Gwendolyn gives Edith a reason to stay in this strange world — especially when it turns out that Edith herself may have a role in guarding her family’s legacy.
But not all of the mysteries of Ormdale are small enough to fit in her lap…and some of them have teeth.
Why I want to read it: I’ve seen this book highly recommended by several Goodreads friends and a regular contributor to An Open Book, and I think my daughters and I would enjoy it.
The Bennetts Bloom by Katie Fitzgerald
Blurb: When Fern Mattingly moves in next door to twenty-something widower Dave Bennett and his toddler daughter, Grace, the three of them form an instant bond. At first Fern is just a neighbor, but over time she becomes Dave’s cheerleader, mentor, dining partner, babysitter, best friend, and eventually, after nearly sixteen years, something more. This collection of flash fiction stories is a mosaic of moments from the lives of Fern, Dave, and Grace, that celebrate the healing power of friendship and remind us that the best relationships sometimes take a long time to bloom, but they flourish beautifully in the end.
Why I want to read it: I’ve read a little of Katie Fitzgerald’s short fiction, but this is another case of where I can’t keep up with a writer’s prolific output. I’ve seen a lot about the characters in this project on Instagram, and I’d like to enjoy their whole story.
The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins
Blurb: A new edition of Wilkie Collins’s classic novel, The Woman in White, one of the finest examples of Victorian-era Gothic mystery and suspense. Told from multiple narrative perspectives, The Woman in White begins with the story of Walter Hartright, a young artist and teacher who encounters on the streets of London a mysterious woman in distress who is dressed entirely in white, who he later learns was an escapee from an asylum. Later on, after he has left London and takes a job as a drawing teacher for a family in the English countryside, he meets and falls in love with a young woman who bears a striking resemblance to the mysterious woman he encountered before, which opens the door to discovering dark secrets about the woman and her family. A gripping and suspenseful story of frustrated love, switched identities, and dark secrets, The Woman in White is considered to be one of the greatest novels of the nineteenth century and Wilkie Collins’s masterpiece. A popular sensation in its own day, it remains widely read and has been the subject of multiple film and screen adaptations.
Why I want to read it: I’m not sure how this novel made it onto my radar, but it intrigues me, likely because of its Gothic nature.
My 22-year-old son’s list:
I greatly admire my son’s ambition to read great stories and expand his knowledge and understanding of history. He’s a bazillion times more knowledgeable about any number of topics than I am or will likely ever be.
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck Tolkien: Man and Myth by Joseph Pearce The British Are Coming by Rick Atkinson Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad Sir Gawain and the Green Knight by unknown
My 17-year-old daughter’s list:
Every time I look at this list, I start warbling, “One of these things is not like the other.” I guarantee this is the only list in which one of my novels will stand alongside Dante and Tolkien. Were the author not her mother, I strongly doubt All in Good Time would be featured here. But, she is a loving and dutiful daughter, and here you have it.
The Two Towers by J.R.R. Tolkien The Return of the King by J.R.R. Tolkien All in Good Time by Carolyn Astfalk Purgatorio by Dante
Past summer reading challenges:201920202021202220232024THANKS FOR STOPPING BY! STAY A WHILE AND LOOK AROUND. LEAVE A COMMENT. SHARE WITH A FRIEND. IF YOU LIKE WHAT YOU SEE, PLEASE SIGN UP FOR MY AUTHOR NEWSLETTER TO KEEP UP-TO-DATE ON NEW RELEASES, EXTRAS, AND HOT DEALS!
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