Summer holidays are all about reading for me. As the school holidays begin here is Cultural Wednesday’s Best Summer Books 2026. Time was, before the Kindle, more than half my luggage would be taken up by books and I would still buy more at the airport book store. No temptation at the airport this year as we won’t be flying anywhere! Let me offer some suggestions for Summer reading.
We now have our own Cultural Wednesday bookshop, where you can find all the books that I recommend powered by Bookshop.org. This is an affiliate link, if you buy books linked to our site, we may earn a commission from Bookshop.org, whose fees support independent bookshops. Some books were given to me by publishers, others via NetGalley and others I paid for. Books which I don’t enjoy, don’t get reviewed
Table of Contents
Best Books I have read so far in 2026
I have enjoyed all the books that are reviewed here. Some I absolutely loved, missed bus stops because I was so engrossed. Still think about, long after they have been installed on my bookshelves. Yes, those shelves are alphatised and categorised.
- Pixie by Jill Dawson
- The Queen’s Painter by Wendy Holden
- Whistler by Ann Patchett
- A Great Act of Love by Heather Rose
- Nonesuch by Francis Spufford
- Fen Women by Mary Chamberlain
Best Fiction Books Summer 2026
Good fiction, in my book, transports you to another place. Time travel, proper geographical travel or just stepping into somebody else’s shoes. It doesn’t matter, sometimes all three together.
The House of Boleyn by Tracy Borman
As I picked up The House of Boleyn by Tracy Borman an inner voice told me I had read enough fictional takes on Anne Boleyn’s life. I’m so glad that I listened to the louder voice, telling me to just read it. The House of Boleyn is different to all the others. In a sense Hever Castle is the star of the story, all the action takes place there, you never actually go up to London. Letters come from court, visitors arrive with tales to tell and all the main characters visit at one time or another. Also Jane Boleyn has always been painted as a bad player but here she is a more nuanced and likeable character.
Cape Fever by Nadia Davids
It is 1920. We are in an unnamed colonial city … in my head it is Cape Town. Soraya has just found a job as a live in maid to Mrs Hattingh. Soraya and Mrs Hattingh are not alone, although only Soraya can see the spirits that live in the house. Mrs Hattingh awaits the return of her son from the First World War, letters arrive regularly promising an imminent visit. Soraya pines for her fiancé. Mrs Hattingh suggests that she writes Soraya’s words to him in letters. Slowly their lives become more entangled. Cape Fever by Naida Davids is a slim volume with every page filled with colour and tension.
Pixie by Jill Dawson
You will be familiar with the work of Pamela Colman Smith aka Pixie. If you have ever seen a tarot deck the chances are it will have been the Rider-Waite tarot which she designed. Pixie by Jill Dawson is a fictionalised account of Pamela Pixie’s life. We meet her as her mother and father die in short order leaving her impoverished and alone. Her talent as an artist brought her into the circle of Ellen Terry and Henry Irving. I absolutely loved this book, on Sunday, it was impossible to dislodge me from my reading nook.
The Queen’s Painter by Wendy Holden
Another book about Anne Boleyn. Surely every possible aspect of her sorry tale has been explored. Turns out no. The Queen’s Painter by Wendy Holden focuses on the relationship between Anne and Hans Holbein. Our story begins with Anne’s death. Holbein then joins forces with Thomas Wyatt to bring about the downfall of Thomas Cromwell. I loved this unlikely tale. Along the way you learn lots about the sourcing of pigments and construction of brushes and will never look at Holbein’s The Ambassadors painting in the same way ever again.
My Year in Paris with Gertrude Stein: A Fiction by Deborah Levy
My Year in Paris with Gertrude Stein: A Fiction by Deborah Levy is fiction, the title tells us so, but feels like a mashup between autobiography and a stream of consciousness. We start with a missing cat, called it. Yes, that “i” is deliberately lower case. Cue much confusion about what it is that is being written about. The narrator of the fiction is in Paris writing an essay about Gertrude Stein. She has two friends. Eva, who is married to a man in the United States and they talk increasingly rarely using FaceTime. Fanny is a polyamorous lesbian. When the essay is finished the narrator will leave. Facts about Gertrude Stein are intermingled with the present day relationship between the three friends. A really interesting concept and I learnt a lot about Gertrude Stein.
River of Stars by Georgina Moore
Have you ever been to Eel Pie Island in the Thames? Well how about visiting the fictional Walnut Tree Island with River of Stars by Georgina Moore. It was home to an hotel that was home to a flourishing music scene in the 60s. Now the hotel is in ruins and the island is home to artists and boat yards. The new owner is rumoured to be about to visit the island. What will happen to the community? River of Stars takes us back and forward in time to discover a community like no other in London.
Whistler by Ann Patchett
Any novel that starts in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York has my attention. Whistler by Ann Patchett, her latest novel, does just that. Daphne and her husband are meandering around when they meet her stepfather, whom she has not seen for forty years. From there we discover the events that lead up to his departure from her life. Long kept secrets are revealed. A story about love, redemption and guilt. I read it cover to cover in the time it took to travel from Cultural Wednesday Towers to Newcastle upon Tyne by train.
Old Girls Go Off the Rails by Maddie Please
My friend Hillary and I set off to circumnavigate the Netherlands by bike rather than go inter railing. Old Girls Go Off the Rails by Maddie Please has fired up my desire to explore Europe by train. When Lizzie was 18, she was forbidden by her parents to join her best friends going Inter railing. Now, 46 years later, the three of them are setting off to see Europe by train. Will it be all that Lizzie dreamt it would be or did her friends gloss over the bad bits? Now I want to pack my bag and head off exploring Europe by train … anyone care to join me?
A Great Act of Love by Heather Rose
In 1839 Caroline sets sail from London heading to Van Dieman’s Land. A Great Act of Love by Heather Rose tells Caroline’s story. Along the way we meet her father, her aunt, a ship’s cabin boy and skilled blacksmith. We see the story from each of their viewpoints. Along the way we learn about colonial prison islands, champagne cultivation, deception and love. I loved every twist of the story and now need to visit Tasmania, as Van Dieman’s Land became.
Fireflies in Winter by Eleanor Shearer
Fireflies in Winter by Eleanor Shearer is my kind of book. It has a cracking narrative, the kind that makes you miss your stop. Is filled with facts. Even better facts that I didn’t know before. Before reading Fireflies in Winter I had no idea that there was a colony of Maroons (unslaved Africans) living in Nova Scotia at the end of 18th century. At the heart of the book is the relationship between Cora, an orphan who has come from Jamaica and Agnes, a runaway living wild in the woods. Beautifully observed. Now I want to go to Nova Scotia.
Nonesuch by Francis Spufford
I chose to read Nonesuch by Francis Spufford because I live close to Henry VIII’s Nonsuch Palace and thought it would be a riff on a place I knew by an author that I like. Turns out that I was wrong. Nonsuch Palace never appears. This Nonesuch is a realm governed by Angels that lies beyond ours. Francis Spufford weaves a tale of war, love, London, statues and Angels. It is a fantastically, wonderful otherworldly tale. Angels are trapped inside sculptures on London’s buildings, they can be used for good or evil and so a battle begins. You will never look at sculpture on a building in quite the same way ever again.
The Riviera Secret by Sarah Steele
My reading this week has taken me to the French Riviera in the run up to and the immediate aftermath of World War II. The Riviera Secret by Sarah Steele is sort of mash up between Rebecca and Tender is the Night. Château Violette, set on a rocky promontory of Cap d’Antibes, is heroine of the story. Current custodians are Lord Sinclair Castlemere and his wife Daisy, as war threatens ghosts of the past seem to haunt the house.
Queen by Birgitta Trotzig
Prepare to be taken to dark places with this one. Queen by Birgitta Trotzig was written in Swedish in 1962, but has only recently been translated into English. We start on a dark night with an unknown person heading toward a remote coastal farm. From there we ping back to the same farm at the beginning of the 20th century. It is a time of hardship, many people are leaving for the promise of America. Queen and her family stay for now, but not for long. Queen is a short but not an easy read.
Hooked by Asako Yuzuki
Hooked by Asako Yuzuki made me cautious about the digital breadcrumbs that I scatter. Our heroines are Shoko and Eriko, both 30 and living in Tokyo. Shoko writes a blog about her life, Eriko reads the blog and engineers a meeting between the two. Then things begin to get a bit mind bendingly odd.
Best Summer Non-fiction Books Summer 2026
Facts I love a good fact. Even better is a set of new facts related to a subject that I already know that add extra depth and excitement.
Fenwomen by Mary Chamberlain
One of the Cultural Young Men gave me Fenwomen by Mary Chamberlain for Christmas. What a gem of a book. In 1975 Mary Chamberlain moved to a village in the Fens and interviewed the women who lived there about their lives. It was the first book to be published by Virago and a response to Akenfield that mainly talked to men. I grew up, not far from the Fens, in a small rural village and much of what the women said rings true. The poverty of farm workers, the lack of plumbing, the isolation. A snapshot of a world that was changing and utterly fascinating.
Along the Borders by Richard Collect
Borders fascinate me. I have never knowingly passed up the opportunity to stand with one foot in one country or county and one in another. Crossing the Norfolk border is always a moment for celebration. Turns out that I am not the only one who loves a border. Richard Collett has explored the borders of the United Kingdom for Along the Borders. He traversed the Tamar valley, followed Offa’s Dyke, found the furthest reaches of the Danegeld, explored Northern Ireland’s land border, went up to Shetland and hiked the White Cliffs. All the way, he talked to people about what it means to be Cornish, Welsh, Scottish, Irish and English and most importantly of all can you be any of these and proud to be British too.
Divine Light: The Stained Glass of England’s Cathedrals by Janet Gough
Mr CW and I have set ourselves the task of visiting all the Church of England cathedrals in England. Divine Light: The Stained Glass of England’s Cathedrals by Janet Gough is a slim but lavishly illustrated volume, detailing the most stunning stained glass to be found in England’s cathedrals. One of the things that I especially love about cathedrals is the way the ancient and the modern sit side by side. Glass from the 12th century right up to the present is featured in the book and all sitting perfectly in their surroundings.
Mavericks by Nick Higham
As war rages once again in Iran, Mavericks by Nick Higham tells the true story of a different war in northern Iran. At the end of First World War, four men are sent to lead a daring and secret mission around the Caspian Sea. You have to keep pinching yourself to remind yourself that you are not reading spy fiction, but real history. Remarkably, all four men lived to tell the tale, although much of it was top secret for years. I would love to see this made into a film. Read to understand that the battle for the control of oil is nothing new.
Revelations: A History of the Secrets Women Keep and Tell by Juliet Nicholson
Do you have a secret? Most of us do. Women, secrets and revelations are explored in The Book of Revelations: A History of the Secrets Women Keep and Tell by Juliet Nicholson. She divides the book into three sections, her Mother’s generation, her own and her daughters. The different things that we keep secret and the impact that those secrets have on future generations. Fascinating reading.
Working in Art by Alexandra Steinacker
Have you ever fancied a career in Art? Then Working in Art: How to Build a Career in the Art World by Alexandra Steinacker-Clark is for you. Alexandra has done just that. Along the way she has hosted the All About Art podcast, where she talks to people in the art world about, well, jobs. Working in Art is the distillation of all those conversations. It shows, that you don’t need impeccable connections and a trust fund to work in art and that a lucrative career is possible.
Which books will you read this summer?
If you seeking geographically themed reading inspiration check out my guides to books to read in The Netherlands, Germany and California. Or check out my Best Books 2025
