PowellsBooks.Blog
Authors, readers, critics, media − and booksellers.

Wondering what to read this summer? You know we’ve got you covered — with our annual midyear roundup! The post where the booksellers at Powell’s get to lovingly shout about our favorite books of the year (so far!). The 25 books on this list include occult nightmares and alt-histories, faes and garbage collectors and robotic nurses, murder investigations and love affairs and hot dogs. That's your summer reading sorted.

Unseelie

Unseelie is the story of Isolde and Iselia who are on the run from the fae when a heist goes awry. Iselia (Seelie) is an Autistic changeling trying to figure out how to control and utilize her magic in order to save herself and her sister. This is the Autistic representation in young adult sci-fi/fantasy we've been waiting for. — Rin S.

Our Share of Night

Our Share of Night is a brutal epic of a horror story. It's simultaneously a family drama and an occult nightmare; a coming-of-age story and a journey into darkness. Yet, Enriquez never loses sight of her characters' intimate realities as traumatized and grieving people. I'm in awe of how much I cared about these characters, and how they've stuck with me long after reading the final page. I can't recommend this one enough! — Marley S.

I really, really believe that Our Share of Night is a masterpiece. It’s such a lush book with vividly rendered, complicated characters; a world that is dangerous and slippery; and language that is so precise, you won’t be able to help being sucked into the depths of this book’s horror. I thought a lot about 2666 while reading this — the structure, the section told from a journalist’s perspective — which is a really high compliment. And the eyelids. The eyelids! Absolute masterpiece. — Kelsey F.

In the Lives of Puppets

Klune does it again! In the Lives of Puppets is a story about the power of found family, the lengths we go to for the people we love most, and how everyone is deserving of love and happiness. Featuring an anxious vacuum cleaner, a sociopathic robotic nurse, and lessons on what it means to be human, this book is not to be missed. And yes, you will need tissues! — Chris P.

To Shape a Dragon’s Breath

To Shape a Dragon's Breath is a book I want to shove into everyone's hands. Anequs is a fantastic lead, and the supporting characters are wonderfully diverse. It is a fun and smart alt-history that leans into a very cool science system that relates to dragons and the riders that study at the academy Anequs is forced to attend. But Anequs is an indigenous native of these colonized lands, and she begins to learn that there are much older native ways and traditions that bond rider and dragon. A wonderful and compelling read! — Lesley A.

I can't stop talking/YELLING about this book! Set in the 1800s in an alternate North America colonized by Vikings, a world where dragons can be beasts of war or lifelong companions sacred to communities, it follows a young Indigenous woman as she and her dragon try to navigate a colonizer-run school for dragoneering. Alternate history, a magic system deeply informed by science and spirituality, a coming-of-age story that is also a coming to power, queer love, incredibly rich worldbuilding, and so much else. I'm so very glad this is the first book in a series. — Claire A.

Fairy Bargains of Prospect Hill

A bobble here, for fair weather. A trinket there, to find something lost. These bargains are simple; these bargains are safe. But when the family orchard is on the brink of insolvency, when the fabric of society is on the cusp of upheaval, when the safety of your dearest loved one is on the line — how do you articulate what you truly need? And where the fae are concerned, how can you be certain you can bear the price? I was enchanted and startled by this fairy tale from beginning to end. Set against a backdrop of industrial excess, labor conflict, and women’s suffrage, Rowenna Miller has crafted a story whose themes are as timeless as the fae themselves. — Brandon S.

A Living Remedy

Oh, I was so lucky and grateful to read the advance reader copy (ARC) of this book last year. Chung has written another beautiful book about the hardships of life, this time focusing on the American healthcare system, the loss of her parents a few years apart due to various health issues, and what it means when a child parents a parent in the last stages of their life. I managed to hold it together until a scene where Chung's mother calls her on the phone for a special occasion. This book is perfectly layered, and I think that it's going to resonate with everyone. It is a work of art. — Katherine M.

Witch King

This was one of those books that I devoured over a long weekend and every second I wasn't reading it, I was thinking about how much I wished I was. I adore every little thing I learned about the cultures, peoples, and histories in this world and would happily visit again and again (please! more!). Also, maybe I only want to read epic fantasies with hyper-competent protagonists tasked with solving their own murders served with a side of massive geopolitical complications now? Thanks Martha Wells. — Sarah R.

Sage

Marilyn Chin is angry, and that means we all are lucky, for there is so much energy in these wonderfully diverse poems focused on social justice and the state of the world as we know it! She makes us laugh and cry, sometimes in the same poem. And this, too: "Don't say we are nothing / Year after year / The pear tree blossoms." — Marianne T.

Yellowface

Reading Yellowface was like watching a train wreck in slow motion. In this scathing indictment of racism and tokenism in the book world, you spend the book inside the head of the deeply unlikeable and unreliable narrator, a white woman who steals a novel from an Asian author and publishes it herself. You won't be able to tear your eyes away from the pages as she scrambles to keep her secret and postpone her downfall, revealing a plethora of very real issues in the publishing industry today. — Eloise B.

The Queer Revolt

Need some queer anger? There's plenty to be mad about, right? Well, this is a work to stoke your passion. It certainly did mine. A collection of poetry, with a mini-zine essay sandwiched in the middle, this innovative work also features poems in envelopes and a pop-out waterfall poem. With fabulous illustrations by the author, The Queer Revolt: Poetry for Revolution is a little zine bursting with heart, creativity, and some well-justified queer rage. Brought to you by The Poet Heroic founder and author of Dear God I'm a Faggot and Happy LGBTQ Wrath Month, Timothy Arliss OBrien. — Nicholas Y.

Small Mercies

A gritty and unflinching look at South Boston during a time of racial unrest in the 1970s — a mother stops at nothing to find her missing daughter, tearing an Irish mob-run city apart with her fists and her teeth. Written with beautiful prose and insightful, layered characters, this breathtaking, unforgettable read is one bloody-knuckled knockout of a book that will leave you walloped and bruised. I sit here licking my wounds and recommending this one to anyone who will listen. — Heather A.

Chlorine

A modern, thalassic gothic about girlhood, queerness, and obsession briny with coming-of-age tenderness and body horror that'll hit you like a tidal wave. Disturbing, creeping, and wholly unhinged, Chlorine is the wide-eyed read of the year for me. Fully, unabashedly obsessed. — Stacy Wayne D.

Sam

This book has all the elements of a perfect (for me) read — great writing, an addicting storyline, and well-developed characters. The best coming-of-age tale I've read in a long time. Messy, a little dark, but ultimately hopeful. I really loved this one. — Carrie K.

Bariloche

Across 66 vignette-like chapters, Andrés Neuman’s Bariloche tells the story of Buenos Aires garbage collector Demetrio Rota. With melancholic beauty and his trademark emotional depth, Neuman chronicles Rota’s life, alighting on moments past and present, memories bucolic and brutal, to offer a stirring, rich portrait of an individual life awash in loneliness and hauling around so many discarded dreams. Matching the novel’s mournfulness is the sheer magnificence of Neuman’s prose, as well as the Argentine-Spanish author’s impressive capacity for compassion. Bariloche is a near-perfect sketch of imperfect people — tender and touching in its telling and further proof of Neuman’s massive storytelling talents. — Jeremy G.

Raw Dog

"The Jamie Loftus Hot Dog Book," as my coworker and I have taken to calling it so we don't get fired, is exactly the kind of deep dive microhistory I live for. Loftus invites her reader along on a cross-country culinary road trip, during which she consumes an absolutely horrific amount of encased meat while exploring the history, politics, production (heed the content warnings here), regional varieties, and culture of hot dogs. Learn about competitive eating, Wienermobile drivers, and the mystifying phenomenon that is gender pickles. Discover even more reasons to rage about capitalism. Find out which Portland, Oregon hot dog made Jamie's Top 5! This smart, funny, gross, and exceedingly thorough book is a wiener winner. — Tove H.

Rombo

Bewitching, exquisite, almost unbearably bittersweet (I had to blink back tears more than once), Rombo evokes the transience of all life through seven characters' accounts of what happened on the day and night of a devastating earthquake in the mountains of northern Italy in May 1976. Intermingled with their ruminations on the day that changed everything for them and their villages, as well as the long aftermath of the quake, is a kind of testimony from the plants, animals, and rock formations that make up the area, making the novel part of the emerging pluriversal genre, which feels so current and fresh, yet so ancient in its scope and wisdom. Kinsky enchants the reader throughout, especially when she begins weaving in a thread of local tales of witches turned to mountains, magical dwarves, and Riba Faronika, the fish-tailed woman bearing the world on her back who sleeps at the bottom of the sea and causes earthquakes as she stirs in her sleep. — Jennifer K.

The Secret Service of Tea and Treason

India Holton brings us back to her quirky and lovable Dangerous Damsels universe that is once again filled to the brim with pirates, witches, flying houses, and tea. This time we focus on two adorably awkward rival spies (Agent A and Agent B) as they attempt to keep the Queen alive. They begin their undercover mission as enemies, but with a fake marriage, fake emotions, and only one couch... things just might lead to heart palpitations. Full of cameos from our favorite heroes and villains of the previous books, Secret Service of Tea and Treason is the light summer read you need. — Mecca A.

The Princess and the Grilled Cheese Sandwich

Not to sound cheese-y, but I am really fondue of a gouda love story and this — this is nacho ordinary love story! You cheddar believe it'll make your heart melt. Seriously I camembert how cute it is and the illustration is un-brie-lievably adorable! It's cheesily the most charming romance any cheese enthusiast curd hope for <3 — Linnet B.

Berlin

A literary mystery which effortlessly switches between the creepy and mundane days of Daphne's new life in Berlin. We get to hear her (possibly paranoid) thoughts about her past and current loves, her stalker, her series of apartment misfortunes, and her continuous need to cut ties and begin again. This book holds you in suspense and makes you care for a main character you aren't even sure you want to like. — Aster H.

Soil

What does ‘diversity’ mean to you? Dungy explores the lack of it across the canon of natural history, emphatically focusing her musings on plant life and the natural world through her own lens as a Black working mom. On the surface, diversity means resisting the monoculture of her suburban homeowner's association to rewild her garden with native pollinator plants; it also means deliberately inserting the mundanities of mom life and the isolation of Black voices into the exalted, but often detached, space of nature writing. I listened to the audiobook while rewilding my own backyard, pausing for revelations about the authenticity of nonfiction writers and how to bring our whole selves to pen and paper. — Mary O.

Flux

In trying to describe Flux, I felt myself reaching for comparisons. In no particular order, I landed on: Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow; the photo of Elizabeth Holmes holding a tiny vial of blood; Interior Chinatown; Inception; the bittersweet experience of aging; Glass Onion... Flux is a little bit of all these things, and yet totally unique. You will gasp, and cheer, and cry, and you will be changed. — Michelle C.

An Amerikan Family

Honestly, I was never that interested in Tupac Shakur's music, but this deep dive into his revolutionary family has given me a lot of contexts to his importance. His mother, however, is the true star of this story, as her resistance and strength prove to be vital to the Black Panther Party, which she joined in 1968. Holley's book skillfully maps the hard-fought victories and struggles of the Shakur family tree. At times enraging, and at other times thrilling, An Amerikan Family is sure to have a transformative effect on any reader. — Kevin S.

Shubeik Lubeik

Set in a world where wishes exist, but are a resource to be extracted and commoditized, Deena Mohamed’s Shubeik Lubeik is the most sophisticated work of literature that I have read so far this year. Her linework is every bit as clear and expressive as her writing. Focusing in on a few individuals navigating their wish-fueled society, Mohamed has crafted a smart, engaging, and moving masterpiece. — Keith M.

The Golden Spoon

Don't be fooled by the flashy cover — this is a deliciously cozy mystery through and through. Devout followers of The Great British Bake Off will devour this sweet homage and love the in-depth descriptions of the different bakes. Safe to say that stodgy bottoms are the least of anyone's worries when there's dead bodies about... — Alice S.

Meet Me Tonight in Atlantic City

Jane Wong's poetry has already established her as one of our finest writers at the intersection between food, family, and identity. Her memoir delves even more vulnerably into this vein, exploring what it means to grow up as a working-class artist swirling between depths of care (from friends, family, and sliced fruit) and carelessness (from boyfriends, family, and food bloggers). With playful free-associative prose and a multiplicity of styles and tones, she resists any simple linear narrative of her experience. Highly recommended for anyone who has ever felt saved by someone you love feeding you something delicious. — Kai B.