Carole Barrowman's Thrilling Summer Book Picks

Grab your lawn chair and your umbrella drink because our book reviewer is here with her picks for the best sizzling summer reads. These page-turners are must-haves for the season! She’s joined by her grandchildren Finn and Adeline with their recommendation for local author Rachel Grider’s If the Dentist Were An Animal. For more information on Carole, visit CaroleBarrowman.com. And see below for her picks! Catherine House by Elizabeth Thomas - Set in an exclusive Boston college, “Catherine House” is a wonderful debut cleverly constructed on the architecture of classic gothic novels with a strange castle, spiral staircases, warrens of corridors, and a locked tower. The book is seductive and twisty and unpredictable. Death on Tucker Nuck by Francine Mathews - If you loved the recent film “Knives Out,” take a stab at this sharp mystery set on Nantucket where the island’s only detective, Merry Folger, struggles to investigate a double murder and drug smuggling on a luxury yacht while her wedding and a hurricane barrel down on her. The Mountains Wild by Sarah Stewart Taylor - If your book club is Zooming over the summer, Carole recommends this wonderfully layered story set in Dublin and Long Island. Erin has been missing for 23 years, disappearing in the mountains in Ireland. Her cousin, Maggie went to Dublin in ’93 to help search for Erin. Twenty one years later, while searching for another missing woman, the Dublin police find Erin’s scarf. Friendship, love and loyalty carry Maggie back to Ireland again. This beautifully atmospheric novel is an intimate story about loyalty and loss and how both can blind us to the truth. The Cabinets of Barnaby Mayne by Elsa Hart - In 18th century London, young women of means are expected to collect potential husbands. Instead Cecily Kay collects curious artifacts and strange plant specimens. When Dr. Barnaby Mayne is murdered, she uses her knowledge of botany to root out the killer.