The 2026 Summer Reading Guide
As summer draws nearer and the temperature creeps up, many kinds of leisure beckon: swinging in a shaded hammock; tending a smoky grill; swimming in cold, clear water on a hot, humid day. None, to our minds, surpasses the pleasure of reading just the right book in just the right spot. And while in just the right mood: Yours might call for an engrossing vacation page-turner, for instance, or a book that teaches you something completely new. You may crave a cult classic, vetted by generations of fans, or perhaps something that will make you lose yourself in your emotions. And because it’s only May, you have plenty of time to start that one great book you’ll be reading all summer long. Below are 25 recommendations to enjoy while the weather is balmy and spirits are high.Bring a Page-Turner on Vacation Go Gentleby Maria SempleAdora Hazzard, Go Gentle’s heroine, lives on the Upper West Side of Manhattan among a carefully selected group of female friends who plan to “grow old in curated company,” the kind of dreamy setup that one character describes irreverently as a coven with a waitlist. But that’s just the prelude to this crackling mystery-romance: Adora is a former TV writer and a professional Stoic philosopher who gets drawn into both spirited art-world intrigue and an amorous entanglement with an enigmatic man named Digby. Semple’s writing is warm and absurdly funny but also occasionally devastating—as when, roughly midway through the book, Adora digresses into recalling her experiences writing for a comedy show in the 1990s. The interlude is a sharp account of gender dynamics in a boys’-club environment. But Go Gentle remains dedicated, like Adora, to positivity and joy, and Semple makes it hard to resist either quality. — Sophie GilbertHow to End a Love Storyby Yulin KuangThe cover may look like it was colored with Barbie’s nail-polish stash, but Kuang’s debut novel is far from predictable, chipper romance fare. It starts with a tragedy: A high-school girl ends he