Some suggestions for summer reading...

Carl East of Winstone's Independent Bookshop (Image: Carl East)

In summer our customers often like to pick books that are a lighter read, and an antidote from the grim news each day can be a welcome distraction.

This month I am highlighting popular paperbacks that have more about them than being throwaway beach reads.

The Holiday Bookshop by Lucy Dickens

Lucy Dickins is the pseudonym for Lisa Dickenson, Sidmouth’s best-selling author of feelgood books. She excels at creating fun female characters reaching a crossroads in life and craving change.

Friends Marianne and Jenny, a free spirit and the sensible one, run a bookshop in their home town. Marianne drops a bombshell; she’s eloping with her boyfriend, for a Vegas wedding and an extended honeymoon.

Furious at being left with the responsibilities, Jenny accepts a temporary job at a luxury resort in the Maldives leaving Marianne’s brother to run the bookshop while she is away.

In the stifling heat of the Maldives Jenny finds new freedom, friendships and of course romance. It is a perfect for fans of Jenny Colgan, Veronica Henry and Katie Fforde.

Lincoln Highway by Amor Towles

Towles is a Winstones favourite, his previous book A Gentleman in Moscow has been a firm hit with our customers.

His new novel is a road movie in book form and like all good road movies it takes what could be a conventional point-to-point narrative and gives us misadventure and self-discovery.

Its 1954 Emmett Watson is driven home to Nebraska by the warden of the juvenile work farm where he has served time for involuntary manslaughter. With his parents gone, and the family farm foreclosed by the bank, Emmett’s intention is to take his younger brother Billy to California and begin their lives afresh.

As the warden drives away, Emmett discovers two prisoners from the work farm have stowed away in the trunk of the car. Together, they have hatched a different plan for Emmett, one that will take them on a fateful journey to New York city.

The Anglo-Saxons by Marc Morris

To work as a Summer read, non-fiction has to flow and be engaging. Morris’s lively narrative takes us through centuries of change and upheaval, from the departure of the Romans to the unification of our nation, through generations of invasion and warfare.

This is ‘Great Men’ territory and Morris centres his chapters on a single character who is used to illuminate their times, from Bishop Wilfred and the establishment of Christianity to Alfred the Great moving the political centre of the country to the South of England.

None of these men are really presented as heroes as such and Morris shows the cruelty of the times as he highlights the achievements of the founders of the nation.

Sorrow and Bliss by Meg Mason

Protagonist Martha reluctantly returns to her childhood home to live with her bohemian parents when her husband leaves her. As a clever and insightful writer used to describing others lives, why is she increasingly lost in hers own?

This is a funny and unsparing novel about mental health with our narrator looking back over how her world changed as her illness progressed.

Sorrow and Bliss comes on a wave of celebrity endorsement from Gillian Anderson and Emilia Clarke and rave reviews from the broadsheets such st the FT and Telegraph.

The Island of Missing Trees by Elif Shafak

Prize-winner Shafak’s new book moves back and forth in time and place and is split into three narratives, between London and Cyprus.

This is a modern family saga that asks important questions about secrets between generations. The books narrator is the fig tree in the taverna that acts as a key point in the story. It is an unusual device, but perfect for a multi-layered and magical tale.

This is her best work yet, mixing sunny locations, bittersweet romance and philosophical musings.