July Reading Wrap-Up

Everything I read in July, nerdy stats, favorite books of the month, plus my Weekly What

Another month of reading in the books! I’m resisting accepting we’ve reached the back half of 2026; not to mention, once August hits and we shift into back-to-school mode, summer is essentially over regardless of what the calendar says. That said, I tried to live my best reading life in July and this month is a pretty good representation of my summer reading style.

July reading brought some solid backlist, lots of summery settings, plenty of romance, as well as political satire (of both the fictional and unfortunately non-fictional variety), a little bit of suspense, some solid literary fiction, and a few gripping true stories.

July was an audio-heavy month as I had plenty of home projects keeping my hands busy, including using my 13-year-old’s sleepaway camp week to give her bedroom a little refresh. The purple she picked out at 2-years-old when we first moved into our house is now a very teenage light gray 😥😥😥

Onto the books!

Everything I Read in July

I read 20 books in July. Here’s a little breakdown of my reading month:

• 17 library/Libby borrows

• 2 gifted (Alan Opts Out and Ash)

• 1 owned (Jazz)

• 2 backlist titles (10%)

• 4 non-fiction (20%)

• 11 audio (55%), 8 print (40%), 1 ebook (5%)

July Favorites

John of John by Douglas Stuart

Alan Opts Out by Courtney Maum

Down with the Shipmans by Meg Mitchell Moore

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Tell me:

• What did you enjoy reading in July?
  
  

Reading

• Look What You Made Me Do by John Lanchester. After three decades of marriage Kate is suddenly and unexpectedly widowed. Amidst her grief she is shocked to see intimate details of her marriage sprinkled throughout a buzzy new television series called Cheating about… well… cheating. She immediately assumes her deceased husband must have a connection to the young writer/creator of the series, though their relationship might be more complicated than she imagines. Literary leaning fiction with the unexpectedly twisty hint of a domestic thriller, I found this well written and plotted, and engaging enough, but the story never really grabbed me or made a strong impression. I will say, I’m seeing this book described as darkly comedic satire, and while I definitely picked up some of this thread, Lanchester is British and the story is set in London; it’s possible I may have missed out on subtle value-added cultural references.

• Down With the Shipmans by Meg Mitchell Moore. Three sisters, each experiencing upheaval in their lives related to their careers (or lack thereof), return to their beloved family beach house in the small, idyllic, coastal town of Rye, New Hampshire for the first time since their mother’s death 2 years prior only to learn it will be their final visit as the home is being sold. I feel like I’ve absolutely read this story before, but M³ does a good job in the telling. This beachy family drama is exactly what I’m looking for in an atmospheric summer read.
  
  Apparently I read my first Meg Mitchell Moore in 2019: The Islanders. I regret to say I don’t remember it at all 😅 And this is precisely why I track and share my reading experience! Goodreads tells me I found it to be a nice summer read. I do remember reading Vacationland in 2022 and really enjoying it. Per my Goodreads review: Pitch perfect summer reading which begs to be read on a beach somewhere. All this to say: per my Rule of Three¹, M³ can officially be considered a beach read favorite!

Listening

• The Witch’s Orchard by Archer Sullivan. Private investigator Annie Gore is hired to investigate a decade old cold case involving missing girls in a small town in Appalachian North Carolina. A good mystery suspense story²; I especially appreciated the setting and Appalachian folklore elements. It seems P.I. Annie Gore has a new assignment, this time in Eastern Kentucky, with Sullivan’s Brimstone Hollow releasing next month.

• The Future Saints by Ashley Winstead. Chronicalling a contemporary band on the rise while its frontwoman spirals due to the unexpected death of her sister. This was fine. I couldn’t help but directly compare this to Daisy Jones and the Six which is one of my favorites so Future Saints was automatically at a disadvantage.³ The story is interspersed with mixed media including magazine articles and social media posts. I found these elements interesting and thought the book was at its best when exploring the relationship between artists, celebrity, fans, and media.

• Romantic Hero by Kirsty Greenwood. Another fine read/listen and another situation where I couldn’t help but make a direct comparison. Suffering a recent breakup and a bad case of writer’s block, a romance novelist finds herself face-to-face with the villainous cowboy from her unfinished series. As I said, this was fine, and I quite enjoyed Greenwood’s The Love of my Afterlife, but I couldn’t help but directly compare Romantic Hero to Ashley Poston’s A Novel Love Story which I preferred. Of note, this audiobook features duet narration, where the voice actors narrate their own dialog (ping-ponging back-and-forth; this opposed to dual narration where different voice actors narrate different points of view, often switching off chapters or different sections of a story) which seems to be something of a trend and not something I personally care for. I find the constant back-and-forth jarring and distracting in a way that takes me out of the story.

• June Baby by Shannon Garvey. 10 years ago, shortly after the death of her mother, 17-year-old Ruth finds safe haven in the Block Island home of her mother’s friend, Diana. Now, 10 years later, Diana is gone too, and a 27-year-old Ruth is at a real crossroads in her life, faced with the decision to stay where she is, spinning her wheels, or possibly go and grow. June Baby is a melancholic, grief-infused, late coming-of-age story with an excellent summer beach setting and a hint of a love triangle. This is not a perfect book, but I found enough here to appreciate it for what it is. I’m not really a Carly Fortune fan, but June Baby struck me as somewhat similar to the books I’ve read from Fortune, though far less romance focused and stronger for it.

Watching

• Sex and the City, Seasons 5-6 (HBO Max). Our re-watch has concluded. Gone too soon 😢

• The Odyssey (Theater!). I love seeing movies at the theater! I also don’t get the opportunity to go to the theater as often as I’d like. Circumstances conspired to allow us to see The Odyssey in the theater along with our 16-year-old and it was an excellent experience! This is absolutely the kind of movie best enjoyed on the big screen. It’s entertaining, it’s theatrical, it’s an interesting modernized perspective on an ancient story, it was a good time—two thumbs up from me!
  
  I’ve seen a surprising number of readers preparing for the movie by reading, or re-reading, (translations of) Homer’s epic poem—good on them! While I’m nearly always a must-read-it-before-I-watch-it kind of gal, I had a particularly negative run-in with The Iliad early in my college career placing Homer up there with Herman Melville as some of the few authors I’d rather not revisit. Though I did not read The Odyssey before I watched The Odyssey, I have enjoyed Odyssey adjacent media that helped to provide some valuable context before I saw the film. If you’re interested, here’s some of what I listened to:

  • Zero to Well-Read: The Odyssey of Homer

  • Zero to Well-Read: Book vs. Movie: The Odyssey

  • Plain English with Derek Thompson: Why ‘The Odyssey’ Is the West’s Greatest Story

  • Plain English with Derek Thompson: What Translator Emily Wilson Thinks of Christopher Nolan’s ‘The Odyssey’

    
    

Eating & Drinking

• Grilled BBQ Chicken with Baked Potatoes

• Creamy Shrimp Pasta with Corn and Tomatoes is a seasonal favorite and a recipe I return to again and again when we have leftover sweet corn. I also love that it gives me a use for cherry tomatoes and basil from my garden. Plus, the meal comes together quickly and eats like something you might get at a restaurant.

• Teriyaki Turkey Burgers with Sweet Corn

• Salad with peaches, avocado, goat cheese, pistachios, basil, and balsamic dressing. I threw this together for a quick lunch with things I had on hand and it turned out to be an excellent flavor combination!

• Bagel sandwich with everything bagel, whipped cream cheese, chives, garden tomato sprinkled with a little salt and pepper, pickled red onion, lettuce, and avocado with peaches on the side. Another successful seasonal lunch thrown together with items on hand!

• And I made another batch of our favorite granola to eat atop yogurt bowls.

Links + Loves

• Speaking of salad, I recently picked up these pasta plates. I’m reluctant to add things to our already overloaded kitchen cabinets, but we eat a fair amount of salads, grain bowls, pasta, etc. and have never had great dinnerware to accommodate those types of meals. Our bowls are deep and much better suited to soup, and plates are plates. We’re finding these wide, shallow bowl-like plates to be a nice addition and they're seeing frequent use. The set is affordable, nice quality, and neutral—exactly what I was looking for.

• Probably the biggest book news of the week: the 2026 Booker Prize longlist was announced.

• More exciting to me: Obama’s Summer 2026 Reading List. Even if I’ve already read half of his recommended titles—we have good taste!

• The Best New Books of August, According to Indie Booksellers (Book Riot)

• Bestselling Odyssey translator Emily Wilson’s unimpressed review of Nolan’s film adaptation titled “An Uncomplicated Man” is crashing the internet and I am so here for it. (London Review of Books)

• S/O The Odyssey: Nolan’s “The Odyssey” sends Philly library waitlists soaring. (Axios Philadelphia) We love to see it 👏

• As Book Criticism Disappears, the Booksellers Are Stepping In (Lit Hub)

• When Friendship Is the Real Love Story (Electric Lit)

• Author or Actor: Who Should Narrate Audiobooks? (Lit Hub)

• AI Questions Spoil Book & Movie Heat On Unpublished Debut Novel (Deadline) 👀

What are you reading, listening to, eating, watching, liking, and/or linking this week? Let’s chat!

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Until next time!

1. I have this thing where an author can’t fully achieve favorite status unless and until I’ve read and enjoyed at least three of their books.

2. Sometimes I’m in the mood for a mystery/suspense/thriller type story, but TBH I’m rarely impressed by the genre(s) and often disappointed. A good/decent/servicable reading experience is what I was looking for here and what I got.

3. This is very much a me thing and likely completely irrelevant to other readers.