🌞 Tell Us Your Summer Reading Mood — We'll Recommend Your Next Book

Hello, lovely reader —

It's that season. The TBR is overflowing, the sun is staying out longer than it has any right to, and you're standing in front of your bookshelf — or scrolling through your Kindle library — wondering what to read next.

We've all been there. So this week, we thought we'd help.

Tell us your summer reading mood, and we'll point you somewhere beautiful.

☀️ Mood: I Want Something That Feels Like Sunshine

You're not after darkness right now. You want warmth, lightness, a story that makes you smile more than it makes you ache. You want to feel good after you turn the last page.

Try: The House in the Cerulean Sea by TJ Klune, or Legends & Lattes by Travis Baldree. Both are cosy fantasy at its finest — low stakes, high heart, and the kind of found family storytelling that makes you want to hug your own people a little tighter.

🌙 Mood: I Want to Feel Things I Can't Explain

You want to be emotionally wrecked in a way that somehow still feels safe. You want slow-burn romance, atmospheric worlds, and prose that stays with you for days.

Try: Divine Rivals by Rebecca Ross — letters written between rivals who don't know they're falling in love, set against the backdrop of a war between gods. Or The Atlas Six by Olivie Blake, if you like your emotions shaken and intellectually complicated. (Rebecca Ross holds a special place in our heart here at TBW — our Letters of Enchantment collection was made for exactly this reading mood.)

🌿 Mood: I Want to Escape Somewhere Lush and Different

You want world-building that transports you completely — different rules, different landscapes, different everything. You want to forget you have a phone.

Try: The Poppy War by RF Kuang for something vast and mythologically rich, or The Jasmine Throne by Tasha Suri for sapphic romance wrapped in gorgeous South Asian-inspired fantasy. If you're a Grishaverse reader who hasn't ventured beyond it yet, Babel by RF Kuang is waiting for you.

🕯️ Mood: Give Me Gothic, Atmospheric, and a Bit Unsettling

You want mist. You want shadows that might be alive. You want romance that simmers through shared secrets and you want the world to feel just a little dangerous.

Try: Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia, which is exactly what it sounds like and twice as good. Or stay in the romantasy lane with One Dark Window by Rachel Gillig — possession magic, slow-burn romance, and Gothic atmosphere thick enough to touch. (If Gillig sounds like your kind of author, we have an exclusive licensed collection celebrating both of her series right here.)

🌊 Mood: Something with Romance That Actually Takes Its Time

You're tired of insta-love. You want the longing. You want every almost-moment and misunderstanding and the slow dawning realisation that this was always where the story was heading.

Try: A Court of Thorns and Roses by Sarah J. Maas if you haven't yet (and if you have, you already know). Or for something with that same slow-burn energy but a quieter voice: Sorcery of Thorns by Margaret Rogerson — books, libraries, a reluctant partnership, and the kind of romance that earns every page.

🌻 Mood: I Just Want Something Genuinely Fun

No heavy themes, no emotional devastation, no lingering existential questions. Just a great time.

Try: The Princess Bride by William Goldman (yes, the book is extraordinary), or Killers of a Certain Age by Deanna Raybourn if you want your fun with a side of sharp wit and retired assassins.

Whatever your summer reading mood looks like, we hope you find the book that becomes the one you press into someone else's hands and say: you have to read this. That's always the best kind of summer read.

With love, The Bean Workshop 🫘