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Books

Reporter Clare Mulroy shares bookish news and recommendations.

Thu Jun 25 2026

Clare Mulroy | Books Reporter

Happy Thursday, booklovers!

Have you ever spent an entire day with a book? I had this experience on a recent travel day while on the West Coast for a reporting assignment. I needed a really good book to keep me company through the airport, a cross-country flight and a solo afternoon.

“Whistler” by Ann Patchett did just that. In it, schoolteacher Daphne runs into her former stepfather at a museum more than 40 years after they last saw each other. Eddie was only in her life for about a year, and reconnecting unearths childhood traumas, family secrets and a transformative father-daughter relationship.

Patchett crafts characters who feel like close friends, dialogue that leaps off the page and an unforgettable family story. I read this perfect summer novel in a breathless two days by the pool. I highly recommend it, wherever you may be reading this summer.

From romance to memoir to thrillers, we have 15 new book recommendations to share.

HarperCollins, Penguin Random House, Macmillan

Whatever your preferred genre, we have a new list of book recommendations to bring with you to the bookstore or library. Bonus points if you use them to fill out our Summer Book Challenge. Here are three in particular I want to highlight, all of which had me running to recommend to friends and colleagues:

🚀‘ Into the Blue’ by Emma Brodie: Two young actors drift in and out of each other’s lives over more than a decade in this intoxicating romance.

🏠 ‘The Children’ by Melissa Albert: A chilling fairytale about a world famous fantasy series, the grown-up children it's based on, ghosts and haunted houses.

🫂 ‘John of John’ by Douglas Stuart: A coming-of-age about a father and son hiding the truest parts of themselves from each other, set on a small island off the coast of Scotland.