Chelsey's 2025 Fiction Summer Reading Guide
A bunch of books with less intense deaths than my normal reading
I’ve seen a bunch of fun summer reading guides on Substack recently, and I wish I had thought about this before now so that I could have made a bigger and more comprehensive summer reading guide. But it’s already summer, and I know many people are about to be going on vacation and maybe hoping to bring along a good book.
Here are 20 fiction books that I think give off summer vibes. Some of them have darker themes and death does occur in some of them. But when people die in these books, it’s usually summer! So it’s not as bad as when people die in books in the dead of winter. I decided to make a little key so you can decide if any of these books are not for you.
🪦| Someone dies
🗡️ | Violent death or murder
🔥| Adult content (I don’t read anything extremely graphic)
🌧️| Unhappy / bittersweet ending
Remember that the library is a great place to get books! Either put a print book on hold or use Libby to get audiobooks or Kindle books.
The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion
This is one of my favorite fiction books of all time, and it is probably one of the most lighthearted books I’ve ever read and really enjoyed. No one dies in this one! In this book, we follow a man who is looking for a romantic partner and in a very neurodivergent way goes about trying to do so in the most efficient and successful way possible.
The River by Peter Heller 🗡️🪦🌧️
This is a very simple book, but it stayed with me for months when I first read it. Two friends embark on a trip down a river, but circumstances conspire in such a way that their adventure is threatened.
🪦 Raft of Stars by Andrew J. Graff 🗡️ 🪦
This is another book about two friends going down a river, but the friends in this case are two young boys who are running away from home after something awful happens. The author of this book is a Christian, but he doesn’t hit you over the head with it. This book is an example of writing Christianly.
🪦 Bullet Train by Kōtarō Isaka 🗡️ 🪦🌧️
I saw the movie first and absolutely loved it, because I love very intense movies and I also have an affinity for movies that take place on trains (Snowpiercer, anyone?). The movie is both intense and hilarious, and the book is even more so. It is actually almost a modern retelling of Murder on the Orient Express, with a bunch of people who all have different motives the reader is unaware of but who are interacting with (and sometimes try to kill) each other.
Josh Malerman has become one of my favorite horror writers (second only to Stephen King), and this was the first book of his that I read. If you can listen to this one, I think that’s the superior way to experience it, because you are immersed in the world of the book, where no one can see anything, either.
Florence Adler Swims Forever by Rachel Beanland 🪦
This book takes place in New Jersey and begins in the summer of 1934. World War II is on the horizon. This is a family drama that shows how actual people behave when they are under stress.
Billy Summers by Stephen King 🪦🗡️
Billy Summers is a war vet who becomes a hit man. Many people shy away from Stephen King because they think he only writes horror. This is one of his books that is more like a thriller and doesn’t contain anything overly supernatural or spooky.
This is a beautiful story about an old professor who finds himself unexpectedly asked to care for an 11-year-old relative.
I’m a big John Grisham fan and have enjoyed many of his legal thrillers. This one is a standalone book about a basketball player from South Sudan who travels to America, and I think it’s one of his best.
Boy Swallows Universe by Trent Dalton 🪦
I read this one after my husband and I watched the television show. It’s a hilarious tale from the point of view of a young boy who is trying to cope with tough family dynamics, including an older brother who doesn’t speak.
I Cheerfully Refuse by Leif Enger 🪦🌧️
I don’t think I love Leif Enger’s books as much as I am supposed to. I like them fine, but so many people I respect absolutely love them, and I find them consistently four star reads for me but never five. That said, this is a book about the end of the world that also manages to be hopeful and uplifting. It’s also a book with books and reading as a theme, which is something I am always happy about.
Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin 🪦🗡️ 🌧️
A young man creates a video game that becomes extremely popular, and this book follows the story of how he does it and the relationships he formed along the way. I am not a gamer, but I truly enjoyed the way this book was written.
Hollow Kingdom by Kira Jane Buxton 🪦🗡️ 🌧️
This book is one of the funniest books I’ve read recently. I started it because it was a zombie book, but it is told from the perspective of a crow. Nevertheless, it has a lot of language in it, so if that is something that bothers you, do not read this book.
The God of the Woods by Liz Moore 🪦🌧️
This book has been all over the place this year. It takes place at a summer camp in the Adirondack mountains and follows the disappearance of a preteen girl whose family owns the camp. It does a lot of timeline jumping, but it was easy to follow. There are many plot twists that I did not see coming.
This is another family drama about two sisters who have both found themselves in lives they didn’t necessarily choose. I don’t think I liked it as much as other people did, but it was a solid read.
This book has been out for a long time. It’s not for everyone, because some people are going to get bogged down in how the main character figures out how to grow potatoes on Mars. But if you have a science mind, you’ll probably like this one. (I consider it a summer book because Mars is hot.)
The Great Alone by Kristin Hannah 🪦🌧️🗡️
This is my favorite Kristin Hannah book. It is long, but I think it would be perfect to take a long road trip. It takes place in Alaska after the Vietnam War, and one of the things that impressed me the most is how much research the author clearly did about what life is like in Alaska.
Nothing to See Here by Kevin Wilson
Kevin Wilson is a hilarious writer who likes to treat the absurd as normal and just keep on going. This book is about a family where the two kids sometimes burst into flames. It is told from the point of view of the kids’ babysitter.
Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan
This is one of those fun and over-the-top books that is perfect for binge reading. It follows a bunch of really rich people who live in Singapore. I knew nothing about this area of the world or of the amount of wealthy people who live there.
Devolution: A Firsthand Account of the Rainier Sasquatch Massacre by Max Brooks 🪦🌧️🗡️
Well, when a word has massacre in the title, I may not need my emojis. People die, and people die violently. It is told through primary source documents and I am calling it a summer book because to me, Bigfoot = summer.
In looking back at my emoji designations, I see that I didn’t include many stories with happy endings. Also, I read a lot of books where people die. If these books are not your cup of tea, then I hope you can find another book list somewhere with books that are more your style.
In the meantime, I’d love to know 1) if you’ve read any of these and what you thought, 2) books you’d recommend to me this summer, and 3) what you’re planning to read this summer!