Your summer reading list

The team at independent bookseller The Colombo Bookstore have picked out a few of their favourite new books to read on the beach this summer.

Sally Rooney – Beautiful World, Where are You

The third novel from the Irish literary sensation about the lives and loves of a group of intellectually unsatisfied young Dubliners. Alice and Eileen, best friends on the cusp of 30, discuss the fraying world, art, relationships and the high price of fame.

C.J. Farrington – Death on the Trans-Siberian Express

Farrington’s Siberia-set locomotive whodunit is blessed with a suitably perplexing mystery, a richly evoked wintry setting and a marvellous, larger-than-life amateur sleuth to really root for.

Anuk Arudpragasam – A Passage North

Shortlisted for the Booker Prize, we follow a young man’s journey into Sri Lanka’s war-torn north in this searing novel of longing, loss, and the legacy of war from the author of The Story of a Brief Marriage.

Mark Solomon – Mana Whakatipu

The story of how Solomon went from metal worker to chairman of Ngāi Tahu and made the tribe into a billion-dollar powerhouse. Tā Mark offers his forthright views on leadership and life.

Terje Tvedt – The Nile: History’s Greatest River

A travelogue through 5000 years and 11 countries, from the Mediterranean to Central Africa. Brimming with accounts of central characters in the struggle for the Nile – from Caesar and Cleopatra, to Churchill and Mussolini, and on to the political leaders of today.

Donovan Bixley – My Kiwi Christmas

One for the little ones from award-winning author Donovan bixley. Learn about Christmas in Aotearoa in both English and te reo Māori, from Santa (Ko Hana Kōkō) to dessert (purini).