The Best New Books of 2026: Ten Great Summer Reads for Curious Women

10 great books for summer reading

1. Land by Maggie O’Farrell (set in Ireland)

“A heart-bursting story of resilience and love” – Louise Kennedy

On a windswept peninsula stretching out into the Atlantic, Tomás and his reluctant son, Liam, are working for the great Ordnance Survey project to map the whole of Ireland. The year is 1865, and in a country not long since ravaged and emptied by the Great Hunger, the task is not an easy one. Tomás, however, is determined that his maps will be a record of the disaster.

The British soldiers in charge are due to arrive any day, expecting the work to be completed, but Tomás is sent off course by an unsettling encounter in a copse. His life, and those of his family, will never be the same again. Liam is terrified by the sudden change in his taciturn father. What was it that caused such cracks to open in Tomás and how is Liam, aged only ten, going to finish the mapping and get them both home?

Land is a story of buried treasure, overlapping lives, ancient woodland, persistent ghosts, a particularly loyal dog, and how, when it comes to both land and history, nothing ever goes away.

2. Whistler by Ann Patchett (set in New York)

“..a moving story of love and family…”

When Daphne notices an older gentleman following her around the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, she doesn’t expect it to be Eddie – her former stepfather.  Married to her mother for a short time when Daphne was nine, she hasn’t seen Eddie for many years; not since the fateful event that changed the direction of both their lives.

Meeting again now, Daphne and Eddie feel that time has fallen away. Their earlier relationship was brief but had a profound impact on both of them. Together, they consider not only their past, but the joys of the present and their commitment to face the future together.

A moving, luminous story about how family, memory and love endures, Whistler paints an intimate portrait of how the feeling of being known by one other person, even for a short period of time, can change everything.

3. It Could Have Been Her by Lisa Jewell (set in London)

It was the night she almost died.

Jane Trevally, newly divorced and feeling a little lost, agrees to accompany a man she doesn’t know to his house in the darkest corner of Hampstead Heath. She’s offered a drink, goes in, and then – a scream and the sound of something falling upstairs – Jane senses she’s in a bad place. She runs.

Twenty-five years later, Jane finds herself outside the same house, this time to return a small white dog who’s been found near her home in the country; a dog whose owner has just been reported missing.

A fleeting glimpse of a haunted-looking woman through the window sends Jane on a mission to uncover the house’s secrets – secrets more terrifying than she could have ever imagined, especially when she realizes it could have been her. . .

4. Watching Over Her by Jean-Baptiste Andrea (set in Italy)

“..inventive and a beautifully drawn story…”

In an Italian monastery, an infamous sculptor lies on his deathbed.

During Mimo’s final hours, he reveals his life story: his impoverished childhood, his unlikely rise to fame and most importantly, his meeting with Viola, the daughter of a powerful aristocratic family.

Mimo and Viola are instantly drawn to one another. Together, they traverse the unrest of the twentieth century. While Mimo becomes a celebrated artist, Viola fights to claim her education and independence.

Over the decades, they will lose and find each other, but never will they give up on the love they share.

5. Love, After All by Ewald Arenz (set in Bavaria)

“A poignant hidden gem that deserves a wide readership”

When Clara meets Elias, she isn’t looking for love. Widowed and wary of being hurt again, she has built a careful life of work and quiet independence. Elias, an actor in his thirties, is trapped in a relationship that no longer feels real, more at ease slipping into a role than being himself. Yet from the moment they meet, something genuine sparks between them – something neither has felt in years.

They fall into step easily, sharing secrets, laughter and the sense of being seen. But there is the age difference, the miles between their worlds, and the lingering guilt that ties Clara to her past. When a new job takes her to another part of the country, she ends the relationship before he can – certain that love like theirs cannot last. And then Elias falls ill, forcing them both to confront what truly matters.

Told with warmth, gentle humour and quiet insight, Love, After All is a luminous portrait of two people finding the courage to open their hearts again – proof that love, at any age, can still take us by surprise.

6. The Calamity Club by Kathryn Stockett (set in the Mississippi, USA)

“..wonderful storytelling..”

“You give a girl a taste of fresh air and then you take it away—she’ll grow fierce and wild to get it back.”

Oxford, Mississippi, 1933.

Eleven-year-old Meg Lefleur has learned the hard way to rely on no one. Ever since her beloved mother failed to come home last Christmas Eve, she’s been one of the ‘unadoptable’ girls at the town’s orphanage, where she fights each day to keep her wits sharp and her spirit unbowed.

When she meets Birdie, a young woman who has come to Oxford determined to remind her socialite sister of the impoverished family she left behind, for the first time in a long while it seems someone else might care about Meg’s future.

But as the Depression tightens its grip, Birdie begins to suspect her sister’s charmed life may be founded on a tapestry of lies. Then, Birdie encounters Charlie, a woman haunted by loss who has been pushed to the brink with nothing left to lose.

Drawn together by circumstance, they find unexpected kinship among a disreputable, determined band of women. But in a town steeped in hypocrisy, even the smallest act of defiance can have dangerous consequences …

Bold, heartwarming, and riotously funny, The Calamity Club is an unforgettable story of resilience and friendship, and a sisterhood of underestimated women who risk everything to take back control of their fates.

7. The Midnight Train by Matt Haig (set in Sheffield, UK and Venice)

“.. life-affirming and magical..”

When your life flashes before your eyes, what will matter most?

For Wilbur it was his time with Maggie, the love of his life. Their honeymoon in Venice. Before he threw it all away.

Years later, on the brink of his own death, a train arrives. It can take Wilbur back in time. To relive his most important moments. Soon he realizes just how much he would have changed.

An adventure through time, The Midnight Train is a story of love and second chances, from the world of  The Midnight Library.

8. The Last Mandarin by Louise Penny / Mellissa Fung (set in China and the USA)

“.. a contemporary thriller for our times…”

When security and fire alarms go off simultaneously all around the world, setting off a panic, the signal is traced back to China. As world leaders scramble to respond, mother and daughter Vivien and Alice Li are called to the White House in hopes Madame Li can decode the Chinese intentions.

Alice is a first-generation Chinese-American food blogger. A Chinese dissident who escaped China after Tiananmen Square, Vivien is now a globally recognized human rights activist and passionate advocate for a free and democratic China. While it makes some sense that the President would turn to Vivien, what isn’t clear is why they’d want to talk to Alice.

Caught up in the chaos, Vivien and Alice are uniquely placed to stop the next, cataclysmic attack. But there are forces deep within both the American and Chinese governments intent on stopping mother and daughter. The estranged pair, who excels at misunderstanding each other, must figure out how to work together.

The increasingly frantic search for answers takes the women from the Oval Office to an office building in Akron, Ohio, from the noodle shops of Hong Kong to the necropolis of the first emperor. Along the way they must decode an old legend, and an old language invented by women, for women.

The Last Mandarin is the story of a mother and daughter, as well as a compelling international thriller about the precarious balance of power across the world, and within a family. And what happens when both break down.

9. Five Days in Venice by Fiona Collins (set in Venice)

“..Venice is a terrific backdrop for this Will they? Won’t they? story…”

He’s the old flame she’s tried to put out. But should they rekindle their love—one more time?

When bestselling romance novelist Olivia Sackville arrives at Venice’s prestigious winter literary festival, she’s prepared for everything except seeing Leo Greene—Britain’s number-one crime author and the man who’s forever turning her life upside down. The festival’s demanding schedule keeps throwing them together, and in a city like Venice, there’s no escaping the past—or each other.

While Leo seems determined to prove he’s changed, Olivia battles against the magnetic pull between them—twenty years of almost-love have taught her that falling for Leo Greene only leads to heartbreak.

Between champagne receptions and foggy canal walks, their undeniable chemistry resurfaces. But with both harbouring devastating secrets and the scars of old betrayals still fresh, they must decide if their story deserves a second draft—or if some loves are better left unfinished. As the festival’s five days draw to a close, will they finally find the courage to write their own ending?

10. Skylark by Paula McLain (set in Paris)

“A dual timeline story that is perfect for literally getting under the skin of Paris”

Skylark is a spellbinding story about defiance and love that beautifully uncovers the hidden history of the City of Light.

1664: Alouette Voland is the daughter of a master dyer at Paris’ famed Gobelins Tapestry Works. With a gift for her craft and a drive to prove she is as good as the male dyers controlling the industry, Alouette dreams of creating her own masterpiece. But her boldness will put everyone she loves at risk.

1939: Kristof Larson is starting his medical residency in the same Parisian neighbourhood once dominated by the tapestry works. The shadows of his past have left him determined to improve conditions for the patients of the infamous Salpetrière asylum. But as war breaks out across Europe and Nazi forces descend on Paris, he could lose his career – and his life.

Alouette and Kristof are both ambitious, idealistic and brave. But faced with authorities who will do anything to silence them, the secret web of tunnels lying beneath the shimmering streets of Paris might be their only hope of survival.