Two hundred years ago this month, Emily Brontë was born in a tiny village in West Yorkshire. If you haven't read Wuthering Heights, what better opportunity to dive in and discover why it's a classic of English literature (if anyone's got that BDE, it's Heathcliff). If, however, your tastes run more contemporary, there's passion and intrigue aplenty in July's tantalising crop of new books.
The Wives, Lauren Weisberger's long-awaited follow-up to The Devil Wears Prada, gets its UK release and this time around, the focus is on Miranda Priestly's other – and in our opinion, far superior – assistant, Emily, as she swaps NYC for suburbia. How will she fare, away from the glitz and glamour of the Big Apple?
Elsewhere, Adrienne Celt pens an engrossing tale of a writer, his brilliant wife, his lover and a missing manuscript – we challenge you not to get sucked in – and Jen Beagin's hilarious debut, Pretend I'm Dead, follows 24-year-old drifter Mona as she struggles with one bad decision after another. Devastating meditations on life and loss come courtesy of Golnaz Hashemzadeh Bonde and Josephine Wilson, while Katie Williams' Tell The Machine Goodnight is a Black Mirror -esque exploration of how technology might change the way we live – and not necessarily for the better.
Click through for the books we're getting excited about this July. Emily would definitely approve.
Pretend I'm Dead
Jen Beagin
With her droll humour and hilarious (but also earnest) observations, the 24-year-old narrator of Pretend I’m Dead had us hooked from page one. Mona gets by cleaning houses; in her free time, she hands out clean needles to heroin junkies. She is adrift; a dreamer without the fuel to make her dreams real. Pretend I’m Dead follows Mona as she moves to a new city, through a few relationships. But reciting the plot doesn’t do the book justice. Glide through Mona’s series of bad decisions with her – she’s a good companion.
Out 5th July
What We Owe
Golnaz Hashemzadeh Bonde
What We Owe follows 18-year-old Nahid, forced to flee revolutionary Iran with her lover Masood when their efforts to overthrow the regime put their lives – and the life of their unborn child – in danger. Decades later, Nahid, exiled in Sweden and raging against the cancer that doctors say will kill her in a matter of months, replays her life: the country she left behind but which refuses to let her go; the daughter she struggled to protect; the mother she betrayed. What, asks Hashemzadeh Bonde, do we owe the ones we love?
Out 5th July
Extinctions
Josephine Wilson
Josephine Wilson's second novel is a beautifully written study of love, loss and making amends. Fred Lothian is a retired academic nearing the end of his life, tormented by his memories and regret for all the things he did wrong. When a series of incidents forces him and his neighbour, Jan, together, he realises it might be his last chance to build something meaningful and atone for a lifetime of selfish decisions. In our narcissistic, social media-hungry age, this is a timely reminder to set aside our obsessions and reach out to those around us.
Out 5th July
Invitation To A Bonfire
Adrienne Celt
Plucked from a Russian orphanage and deposited in a New Jersey boarding school where she's surrounded by rich girls for whom life seems to come so easy, Zoya Andropova is floundering. Then she meets fellow emigré Leo Orlov, and everything seems to change...until she discovers his magnetic wife, Vera, and the hold she has over her husband. Skilfully combining Zoya's diary entries, Leo's love letters to Vera, newspaper reports, police accounts and pages torn from history books, Celt constructs a gripping and sinister story of a love triangle inspired by the intense, real-life marriage of Vladimir and Vera Nabokov.
Out 12th July
The Wives
Lauren Weisberger
Calling all fans of The Devil Wears Prada: The follow-up book is here, and it won’t disappoint. The novel picks up immediately where Prada left off — only this book focuses on Emily, Miranda Priestly’s other assistant (in the movie, she’s played by Emily Blunt). Emily leaves New York for Greenwich, Connecticut, where she works as an "image consultant" for a supermodel and senator’s wife. Weisberger is just as good at unpacking the glitz, social customs and hypocrisies of Greenwich as she was with New York.
Out 12th July
Tell The Machine Goodnight
Katie Williams
Since we’re between seasons of Black Mirror, look to Katie Williams’ debut novel, Tell the Machine Goodnight, for an extended thought experiment about how a futuristic technology might change the way we live. Pearl works for a company geared towards making people happy. As a happiness technician, she gives personalised recommendations for achieving total contentment. The only person she can’t help is her son, Rhett, who almost seems to seek un happiness.
Out 12th July
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