Skip to content

Top Navigation

Southern Living Southern Living
  • Food
  • Holidays & Entertaining
  • Home & Garden
  • Style & Culture
  • News
  • Video

Profile Menu

Your Account

Account

  • Join Now
  • Email Preferences
  • Newsletters
  • Manage Your Subscription this link opens in a new tab
  • Logout

More

  • Give a Gift Subscription this link opens in a new tab
Login
Subscribe
Pin FB

Explore Southern Living

Southern Living Southern Living
  • Explore

    Explore

    • These Haircuts Are Going To Be Huge in 2021

      The trendy haircuts you’ll be seeing everywhere next year. Read More Next
    • How To Season A Cast-Iron Skillet

      Learn how to season this Southern kitchen staple in five easy steps. Read More Next
    • The Right Way to Heat a Pre-Cooked Ham

      It's so easy, trust us. Read More Next
  • Food

    Food

    See all Food

    Lost Cakes of the South

    These simple and spectacular Southern cakes deserve a comeback
    • All Food
    • All Recipes
    • Holidays & Occasions
    • Quick Fix Suppers
    • Slow Cooker Recipes
    • Desserts
    • Casseroles
    • Healthy Recipes
  • Holidays & Entertaining

    Holidays & Entertaining

    See all Holidays & Entertaining

    70 Wedding Vow Examples That Will Melt Your Heart

    Fight writer's block and find ways to express your love with these romantic, funny, and short wedding vow examples.
    • Christmas
    • Entertaining
    • Thanksgiving
    • Southern Weddings
    • Easter
    • Kentucky Derby
    • Valentine's Day
    • 4th of July
    • Mother's Day
  • Home & Garden

    Home & Garden

    See all Home & Garden

    7 Paint Colors We’re Loving for Kitchen Cabinets in 2020

    ‘Tis the season to ditch your all-white palette in favor of something a little bolder and brighter.
    • Home Decor Ideas
    • Idea Houses
    • Before & After
    • Inspired Communities
    • Curb Appeal
    • House Plans & Builders
    • The Grumpy Gardener
    • Plant Names A-Z
  • Style & Culture

    Style & Culture

    See all Style & Culture

    50 Books Everyone Should Read in Their Lifetime

    Curl up with a classic!
    • Southern Culture
    • Hair
    • Travel
    • Beauty
    • Pets
    • Southern Fashion
    • Healthy Living
  • News
  • Video

Profile Menu

Subscribe this link opens in a new tab
Your Account

Account

  • Join Now
  • Email Preferences
  • Newsletters
  • Manage Your Subscription this link opens in a new tab
  • Logout

More

  • Give a Gift Subscription this link opens in a new tab
Login
Sweepstakes

Follow us

  1. Southern Living
  2. Southern Culture
  3. The Best New Books Coming Out Summer 2018

The Best New Books Coming Out Summer 2018

By Caroline Rogers
April 13, 2018
Skip gallery slides
Save FB Tweet
Credit: amazon.com
It’s shaping up to be another great summer for books, which is why the number one item on our spring cleaning to-do list is—you guessed it—clearing space on our bookshelves. Our bookmarks are at the ready in anticipation of a whole host of exciting summer releases. There are new books from Lauren Groff, Rachel Cusk, Ottessa Moshfegh, Kevin Wilson, and Anne Tyler on the horizon, as well as highly anticipated debut novels from Tommy Orange and R.O. Kwon preparing to hit bookstores in June, July, and August. There are plenty of new releases slated for summer that you just can’t miss ( Sweet & Low: Stories by Nick White, The Third Hotel by Laura van den Berg, and The Incendiaries by R.O. Kwon among them), and we’re expanding our reading lists accordingly.Looking for books set in the South? Check out Florida by Lauren Groff, Treeborne by Caleb Johnson, and The New Inheritors by Kent Wascom. Excited to dive into some compelling new short stories? Pick up Baby, You’re Gonna Be Mine: Stories by Kevin Wilson and Certain American States: Stories by Catherine Lacey. Whether you’re reading on the porch, in the park, or by the sea (or in an air-conditioned coffee shop while seeking respite from the summer heat), we have plenty of summer book recs for you. Also, if you’re looking for new spring releases and beach reads, we have you covered there too.
Start Slideshow

1 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

Florida by Lauren Groff

Credit: amazon.com

This highly anticipated collection of short stories from Lauren Groff—whose previous work includes the novels Fates and Furies, The Monsters of Templeton, and Arcadia and the story collection Delicate Edible Birds—delves into the state of Florida and assembles a cast of characters as memorable as they are well wrought. (June 5)

To buy: $27, amazon.com; indiebound.org

1 of 30

Advertisement
Advertisement

2 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

Half Gods by Akil Kumarasamy

Credit: amazon.com

Ten connected stories form Half Gods, the beautiful debut collection from Akil Kumarasamy that explores the depths that exist within and between people—brothers, families, strangers, friends, refugees—in changing landscapes across the world. (June 5)

To buy: $25, amazon.com; indiebound.org

2 of 30

3 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

In the Distance with You by Carla Guelfenbein

Credit: amazon.com

This novel by Chilean writer Carla Guelfenbein probes the mysteries of the life of an enigmatic novelist named Vera Sigall and the curiosity she sparks in the people around her, including a student, a poet, and a neighbor. (June 5)

To buy: $17.95, amazon.com; indiebound.org

3 of 30

Advertisement

4 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

Kudos by Rachel Cusk

Credit: amazon.com

The final installation in Rachel Cusk’s Outline trilogy, which also includes the novels Outline and Transit, focuses on a writer, Faye, who finds herself in Europe recalibrating the ways she understands the people she encounters in the world around her. (June 5)

To buy: $26, amazon.com; indiebound.org

4 of 30

5 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

Rough Animals by Rae DelBianco

Credit: amazon.com

In this haunting new novel by Rae DelBianco, a child with a gun interrupts the lives of twins Wyatt and Lucy at their ranch in Utah, prompting Wyatt to set out on a harrowing journey across both interior and exterior landscapes—both of which prove equally complex to navigate. (June 5)

To buy: $24.99, amazon.com; indiebound.org

5 of 30

6 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

Southernmost by Silas House

Credit: amazon.com

The latest novel from Silas House explores the relationship between a father and his son as they flee to Key West, leaving behind the life they’ve known and, along the way, grappling with hard-won new understandings of family, tolerance, and love. (June 5)

To buy: $26.95, amazon.com; indiebound.org

6 of 30

Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement

7 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

Sweet & Low: Stories by Nick White

Credit: amazon.com

The alchemy in this collection is anything but ordinary. These fantastic short stories from Nick White introduce surprising, memorable, and ultimately human characters whose journeys play out on familiar Southern landscapes and in White’s thrillingly executed prose. (June 5)

To buy: $25, amazon.com; indiebound.org

7 of 30

8 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

Treeborne by Caleb Johnson

Credit: amazon.com

Elberta, Alabama—its people, its past, and its uncertain future—is the focus of Treeborne, a story about complicated legacies and the people who bring to life the places we call home. (June 5)

To buy: $25.48, amazon.com; indiebound.org

8 of 30

9 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

There There by Tommy Orange

Credit: amazon.com

When Marlon James says that a book “drops on us like a thunderclap; the big, booming, explosive sound of 21st century literature finally announcing itself,” you know you have something to look forward to. This is Tommy Orange’s stunning debut novel, a powerful story about twelve characters assembling at the Big Oakland Powwow seeking tradition and grappling with their histories. (June 5)

To buy: $25.95, amazon.com; indiebound.org

9 of 30

Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement

10 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

Upstate by James Wood

Credit: amazon.com

A family—a professor and his two daughters—reunite in upstate New York and, over the course of a week, struggle with the pain of their past while asking essential questions about their present. (June 5)

To buy: $26, amazon.com; indiebound.org

10 of 30

11 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

Visible Empire by Hannah Pittard

Credit: amazon.com

A disaster has deep effects on the city of Atlanta, its citizens, and the progression of the Civil Rights movement in this novel based on the aftermath of a true event, the 1962 Air France Flight 007 crash of the Chateau de Sully. (June 5)

To buy: $25, amazon.com; indiebound.org

11 of 30

12 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

The Shades by Evgenia Citkowitz

Credit: amazon.com

If you’re looking for a mystery to keep you on the edge of your seat, add this electrifying new novel by Evgenia Citkowitz to your reading list. In it, an unexpected visitor interrupts the grief-stricken aftermath of a family tragedy. (June 19)

To buy: $25.95, amazon.com; indiebound.org

12 of 30

Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement

13 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

We Begin Our Ascent by Joe Mungo Reed

Credit: amazon.com

Joe Mungo Reed explores ambition, family drama, and the unknowability of the future in his first novel, a story about a professional cyclist and a geneticist, also a married couple, whose lives begin to change as their dreams for the future begin to warp. (June 19)

To buy: $26, amazon.com; indiebound.org

13 of 30

14 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

The World Is a Narrow Bridge by Aaron Thier

Credit: amazon.com

Take to the open road alongside Murphy and Eva, a couple from Miami whose journey is soon sidetracked by the incomprehensibility of the world—and a visitation from a figure from the Old Testament, who sends them into ever more absurd, funny, and poignant scenarios in their trip across the country. (July 3)

To buy: $26, amazon.com; indiebound.org

14 of 30

15 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

The New Inheritors by Kent Wascom

Credit: amazon.com

Partly set on the Gulf Coast in the early 1900s, Kent Wascom’s poetic and grounded new book—one in a series of connected novels including The Blood of Heaven and Secessia—tells the story of the Woolsack family, its rivalries, its fractures, and its tumult amid the tides of storms and war. (July 10)

To buy: $26, amazon.com; indiebound.org

15 of 30

Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement

16 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

Clock Dance by Anne Tyler

Credit: amazon.com

In this new novel from Anne Tyler, central character Willa Drake’s life takes an unexpected turn. After playing many roles defined by the choices of others, she agrees to take care of her son’s injured ex-girlfriend and, in the process, becomes part of a new community and begins to re-write her future. (July 10)

To buy: $26.95, amazon.com; indiebound.org

16 of 30

17 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

My Year of Rest and Relaxation by Ottessa Moshfegh

Credit: amazon.com

What if you could check out of your life for months at a time? A young woman tries to do just that by literally hibernating through her days in early 2000s New York City in Ottessa Moshfegh’s propulsive and altogether uncategorizable new novel. (July 10)

To buy: $26, amazon.com; indiebound.org

17 of 30

18 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

The Last Cruise by Kate Christensen

Credit: amazon.com

A retro-style cruise aboard the 1950s ocean liner Queen Isabella doesn’t go according to plan in this novel of adventure, crisis, and the powerful grip of history. (July 10)

To buy: $26.95, amazon.com; indiebound.org

18 of 30

Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement

19 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

What We Were Promised by Lucy Tan

Credit: amazon.com

This book introduces readers to the Zhen family—Wei, Lina, and Karen—who move back to Shanghai from the U.S. and find that a whole world of long-quiet anxieties reemerges in their lives amid the changed and changing city. (July 10)

To buy: $26, amazon.com; indiebound.org

19 of 30

20 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

From a Low and Quiet Sea by Donal Ryan

Credit: amazon.com

Three men—Farouk, Lampy, and John—and their lives in a small Irish town are at the heart of this affecting new novel by Irish writer Donal Ryan, whose 2012 novel The Spinning Heart was longlisted for the Man Booker Prize. (July 17)

To buy: $16, amazon.com, indiebound.org

20 of 30

21 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

America for Beginners by Leah Franqui

Credit: amazon.com

Leah Franqui’s debut novel follows Pival Sengupta, a widow traveling from India to the U.S. with the First Class India USA Destination Vacation Tour Company, as she sets her sights on California. While she hopes to find her son at the end of the trip, it’s the journey that brings her and her two traveling companions new understanding of themselves and of America. (July 24)

To buy: $26.99, amazon.com; indiebound.org

21 of 30

Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement

22 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

Fruit of the Drunken Tree by Ingrid Rojas Contreras

Credit: amazon.com

Set in Bogotá, Colombia, amid permeating violence and with Pablo Escobar at large, this novel tells a story about two young women—Chula, a daughter of a privileged family, and Petrona, the family’s maid—and the connections, betrayals, and difficult choices the two must make as they grow up. (July 31)

To buy: $26.95, amazon.com; indiebound.org

22 of 30

23 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

The Incendiaries by R.O. Kwon

Credit: amazon.com

When Phoebe Lin and Will Kendall meet at Edwards University, they are soon gripped by the thrall of a mysterious cult. While Phoebe disappears into the cult’s extremism, Will resists and soon sets out to find her—and the truth behind a crime he can’t believe she's committed. If you only read one book this summer, make it this complex and searing debut novel by R.O. Kwon. (July 31)

To buy: $26, amazon.com; indiebound.org

23 of 30

24 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

Baby, You’re Gonna Be Mine: Stories by Kevin Wilson

Credit: amazon.com

Prepare to be captivated by Kevin Wilson’s latest collection of short stories. The author of the collection Tunneling to the Center of the Earth and the novels The Family Fang and Perfect Little World is back with stories that make the strange all at once funny, fractious, and familiar. (August 7)

To buy: $26.99, amazon.com; indiebound.org

24 of 30

Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement

25 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

Certain American States: Stories by Catherine Lacey

Credit: amazon.com

This quietly poignant and utterly moving collection of short stories—about characters seeking, struggling, and attempting to come to terms with the world around them—is forthcoming from the author of the novels The Answers and Nobody Is Ever Missing. (August 7)

To buy: $26, amazon.com; indiebound.org

25 of 30

26 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

The Distance Home by Paula Saunders

Credit: amazon.com

Two siblings are at the heart of this vividly imagined debut novel by Paula Saunders. It’s a story set in rural South Dakota in the 1960s, and it probes questions of family, ambition, and belonging in America. (August 7)

To buy: $27, amazon.com; indiebound.org

26 of 30

27 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

The Third Hotel by Laura van den Berg

Credit: amazon.com

On a visit to Havana, Cuba, a woman named Clare glimpses her supposedly dead husband and embarks on a journey through the city—following him, revisiting her past, and encountering metaphysical mystery along the way—in this otherworldly and unputdownable new novel. (August 7)

To buy: $25, amazon.com; indiebound.org

27 of 30

Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement

28 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

A River of Stars by Vanessa Hua

Credit: amazon.com

Vanessa Hua’s debut novel—a story about immigration and motherhood and adventure—follows an expectant mother named Scarlett Chen from China to Los Angeles, where she has been sent to give birth, and from whence she flees, embarking on a journey toward a future of her own making. (August 14)

To buy: $27, amazon.com; indiebound.org

28 of 30

29 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

Severance by Ling Ma

Credit: amazon.com

When a fever spreads across New York, Candace Chen finds herself unaffected, left in the deserted city, and blogging about what she sees. She soon encounters a group of survivors who promise to rescue her but perhaps have other plans in this sharp satire about habits, belonging, and the rhythm of modern life. (August 14)

To buy: $26, amazon.com; indiebound.org

29 of 30

30 of 30

Save FB Tweet
Pinterest Mail Email iphone Send Text Message Print

French Exit by Patrick DeWitt

Credit: Courtesy of Ecco/HarperCollins Publishers

When the threat of ruin looms, an Upper East Side widow and her adult son flee to Paris and along the way encounter an unforgettably curious cast of characters in this darkly comic novel of manners by Patrick DeWitt. (August 28)

To buy: $25.99, amazon.com; indiebound.org

30 of 30

Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement
Replay gallery

Share the Gallery

Pinterest Facebook

Up Next

By Caroline Rogers

Share the Gallery

Pinterest Facebook
Trending Videos
Advertisement
Skip slide summaries

Everything in This Slideshow

Advertisement

View All

1 of 30 Florida by Lauren Groff
2 of 30 Half Gods by Akil Kumarasamy
3 of 30 In the Distance with You by Carla Guelfenbein
4 of 30 Kudos by Rachel Cusk
5 of 30 Rough Animals by Rae DelBianco
6 of 30 Southernmost by Silas House
7 of 30