Hello book lovers. I have been struggling with the end of summer and I have conflicted feelings about the start of fall. As a teacher, I usually love the start of fall. It is the start of a new school year, I get to decorate my house for fall, and I typically have this fresh energy to do new things. That is not the case this year. I am feeling very nervous going back to teaching during a pandemic, and I am feeling a loss of the warm weather, reading in my backyard in my pool, and the availability of my coffee machine throughout the day. In order to keep the magic of summer alive, I thought I would create a book list of books that elicit that summer feeling to me! If you are looking to keep that summer feeling alive, then check out these books!

Love and Gelato by Jenna Evans Welch

Love and Gelato is a really cute teenage love story that totally evokes the summer love feeling. Lina goes to spend the summer in Italy with her father after the death of her mother, and she is not in the mood to enjoy the magical Tuscan countryside. But Lina meets a group of people, and a young boy who pushes Lina out of her comfort zone and she eventually begins to enjoy her time in Italy. Spoiler alert, she eats lots of gelato! A dream!

Red, White, and Royal Blue by Casey McQuiston

If you are looking for a cute queer love story, then you must pick this one up. This has a love story between the son of the President of the United States and the Prince of Wales! They not only have to navigate a new relationship, with all the new feels, trying to get to know each other, but their relationship is technically an international affair! Alex and Henry are much more complex than I was expecting! Summer is a time for romance, and this will having you feel all the feels!

Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins

If you are like me and usually feel inspired by back to school and September, but not really feeling it this year, then this book will be the cure. Anna gets shipped off to boarding school in Paris, France, which she is not too pleased about. But then she meets the dreamy Etienne, and all of a sudden Paris does not seem that bad! If you enjoy this book, then check out the other two in the series!

To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before by Jenny Han

Lara Jean is the cutest teenager. She loves her family, she loves to bake, and she loves love. Whenever she has a crush, she writes a love note and puts it away in her hat box. But when the letters mysteriously disappear, and the boys of her youth start popping up asking questions, Lara Jean is thrown int a whirlwind of a year! Lara Jean is such a lovable character and you can’t help but cheer her on from the comfort of your couch!

One True Loves by Taylor Jenkins Reid

I don’t know about you, but sometimes I love to read a romance novel that is not just happy, but evokes all the emotions out of you! This is the case for this book. Emma marries her high school sweetheart and it seems like life is perfect. But then her husband dies in a helicopter crash over the Pacific Ocean, and her life turns upside down. Emma has to start over, and she begins to build up her life again, including dating someone new. But then her husband is found alive, and her world tumbles again! I really loved how complex this book was for a romance novel, and how you really had to think about how people grow and change.

Love from A to Z by S.K. Ali

This book is not your typical teenage love story, which is why I love it so much. The book follows Zayneb, who goes to her aunts place in Qatar to get away from an incident at her school where she called out a teacher for talking about how “bad” Muslims are. In Qatar, she meets Adam, she has recently been diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. This book deals with anti-Muslim sentiments, what dating looks like for Muslim teens, and also dealing with loss and a chronic illness! I highly recommend this book!

Fatal Inheritance by Rachel Rhys

I don’t know if anything screams Summer more than the south of France. Set in 1948, Eve receives a mysterious letter saying she has come into an inheritance and must go to the French Riviera to claim it. While there, she meets a ton of new people, and discovers a lot about herself and what she wants. She knows that she is in a loveless marriage, and this inheritance might be her change to begin a new life! Be ready to escape to a new destination in this time that travel is not allowed!

The Selection Series by Kiera Cass

For me, summer is a time to relax and read YA novels that you can binge read in a weekend. That is what the Selection series was for me when I read it! The book evokes “The Bachelor” feels as it is about young women to come to the castle to compete for the princes hand in marriage. However, there is a war going on, and not all of the women are there to find love-some are there to make it far enough to gain wealth for their families! This was a nice fast paced YA series that I encourage you to check out!

All right, that is all! I hope you are able to escape into books to fight the scaries of entering a new school year during these unknown times!