While we always enjoy our summer reads, they felt more important than ever in 2020. With coronavirus causing the cancelation of barbecues, vacations and theme park visits, our books became more important than ever as a means to get out of our own heads.
Earlier this year, the editors at Early Bird Books suggested our favorite quarantine reads. But now we've flipped the script and asked our Facebook followers to share their favorites! Below are the books our readers fell in love with this summer.
A Long Petal of the Sea
"The novel opens with the fall of the republican government of Spain by Franco's fascist takeover. Refugees flee first to France and then to Chile. Then Chile's government is toppled by a military coup aided by the CIA.. A history lesson beautifully written and a foreboding [tale] of how fascist ideas take hold in a society and destroy democratic rule." —Joe
The House in the Cerulean Sea
"It’s beautifully written, full of kind and interesting characters, wholesome, and it has a sweet queer romance to top it off. I remember clutching this book to my chest when I finished it." —Grace
Related: 10 Must-Read LGBT Books
The Snow Child
"It was a lovely fairytale like story. A story of family, neighbors, and people who enter our lives to make them richer and fill our lives with love." —Beth
How to Catch a Mole
"...part memoir, part poetry, part nature study, part philosophy. It's sooo unique and genuine ... I adored it!" —Lynn
Where the Crawdads Sing
"Some people gave it 3 stars but it left me breathless." —Carol
Related: 7 Books Like Where the Crawdads Sing
The British Are Coming
"If you love history, he is a writer who makes the Revolutionary War come alive. Not just facts and figures. Lots of anecdotes by the ordinary soldiers, graphic details of battles and the terrible hardships endured by combatants and noncombatants alike, great insights into the minds of the leaders of both sides. First book of a planned trilogy." —Diane
Guests of the Ayatollah
"I read an account of the 1979 Iranian hostage taking called, "Guests of the Ayatollah" by Mark Bowden. I was a young adult when this happened and I loved to read a full and thorough account of it as well as the rescue attempt now that I am older. I was not paying attention to this drama playing out in real time back then. There is something so fascinating about revisiting something now that you lived through then and taking note of the differing perspectives I had then as opposed to now. Totally clueless back then, more clued in now that I am older." —Christina
Keep Reading
13 Reader-Approved Book Club Suggestions
Quarantine Reads: All The Books You Can't Put Down
Featured photo via Blaz Photo / Unsplash
