Our Deadly Summer by Emer McLysaght and Sarah Breen (Bloomsbury) The first standalone from the creators of the Aisling series sees them take on J1 summers and even dip a toe into the crime genre. At the end of a season waitressing in an upmarket golf club on Long Island, Dee Finn and Laura Leahy find themselves standing over a dead body, unsure what to do next. With their signature humorous style and insight, McLysaght and Breen thread together the story of this summer of 2001 with the grown-up lives of Dee and Laura, and in doing so, provide a snapshot of Irish life. The Things We Never Say by Elizabeth Strout (Viking) On the theme of new departures, beloved author Strout has left the worlds of Olive Kitteridge and Lucy Barton to introduce a new character and setting. Artie Dam, a teacher in Massachusetts, leads what looks like an average, content life, but on the inside he is struggling with loneliness and isolation. And then a long-held secret is revealed. Strout can always be relied upon for her perceptive style, attunement to detail and ability to draw great insight out of seemingly small occurrences. Our Deadly Summer by Emer McLysaght and Sarah Breen and The Things We Never Say by Elizabeth Strout Famesick by Lena Dunham and Yesteryear by Caro Claire Burke Famesick by Lena Dunham (4th Estate) Girls’ creator Lena Dunham has endured her share of adulation and condemnation since she first broke on to the scene aged 24. Now 40, she tells, in her rare unguarded style, of the spin and churn of fame, the grind of TV work and its toll on the body and soul, her harrowing struggles with chronic illness, her relationships, both functional and dysfunctional, the controversies she’s been at the heart of, and much more. Truly captivating in its subject matter and voice, this is the book everyone is reading and talking about. Yesteryear by Caro Claire Burke (4th Estate) Another buzzy title this summer comes from US debut novelist Caro Claire Burke and takes on the zeitgeisty topic of tradwives. An online tradwife influencer (a movement which promotes a return to highly traditional gender roles and puritan-housewife-style living for women) wakes up one day in the real version of the life she’s been cosplaying: the 1800s. Has she time-travelled? Is this some sort of hoax? A reality TV show? So begins a plot to escape her seemingly perfect life. London Falling by Patrick Radden Keefe and Little Vanities by Sarah Gilmartin London Falling by Patrick Radden Keefe (Picador) For those who enjoy an engrossing, meaty non-fiction beach read, Say Nothing author and New Yorker writer Patrick Radden Keefe brings a twisty tale of London’s dark underbelly. Using the unsolved case of Zac Brettler, a teen who fell mysteriously to his death from a luxury apartment balcony in 2019, as a central narrative, the book unfurls a tangled web of wealth and corruption. Little Vanities by Sarah Gilmartin (Pushkin One) The third novel from Gilmartin (a long-time book critic for The Irish Times), centres upon a decades-long friendship between two Dublin couples, Dylan and Rachel, Stevie and Ben, former Trinity students who are now in their late thirties. When Ben, a struggling actor, lands a role in Harold Pinter’s Betrayal, the themes of the play begin to seep into reality. Gilmartin writes with astute, gleaming prose. Rory by Alan Shipnuck and Such a Nice Girl by Andrea Mara Rory by Alan Shipnuck (Simon & Schuster) Shipnuck’s biography of Phil Mickelson was known for its no-holds-barred exposé of the golf legend. Sports fans from these shores will no doubt be fascinated by his take on our own hometown hero, Rory McIlroy, from his working-class roots in Holywood, Co Down, to golf stardom and Grand Slam glory, to his life off the golf course. Such a Nice Girl by Andrea Mara (Bantam) On the morning after a wedding, two mothers go to wake their daughters. Instead, they find empty twin beds, an abandoned phone, upturned lamp, scattered cushions and a reddish-brown smear on the rug. Then a voicemail emerges suggesting one girl might have killed the other. Now on her ninth novel, Mara (author of the recently-adapted All Her Fault) is a true master of the pacy psychological thriller. Land by Maggie O'Farrell and Other People's Lives by Kathleen MacMahon Land by Maggie O’Farrell (Tinder Press) Hamnet author and queen of historical fiction O’Farrell reaches into the Irish annals and draws on her own family history in her much anticipated tenth novel. Father and son, Tomás and ten-year-old Liam, are working on the great Ordnance Survey, mapping Ireland for the British. The year is 1865, famine has ravaged the country and Tomás is determined the maps will record this disaster. But when an unsettling encounter sets him off course, Liam is left to figure out how to finish the mapping and get them both home. Other People’s Lives by Kathleen MacMahon (Sandycove) With her third novel, author of the Women’s Prize-longlisted Nothing But Blue Sky, MacMahon brings a story of friendship, family, caregiving and mid-life reckoning. Justine and Iseult have been friends since they were very young. Now, aged almost 50, Justine is married to Iseult’s brother and caring for his mother, while Iseult lives in Beirut. When Justine’s daughter announces her engagement, the choices Justine has made in her own life are brought into high relief.