WWW Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Taking on a World of Words, where bloggers share the books that they’ve recently finished, what they are currently reading and what books they are planning to read next. Essentially you have to answer three questions (the Three Ws):
What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you’ll read next?
So, let’s get to it.
Currently Reading?
Title: The Rachel Incident
Author: Caroline O’Donoghue
Publisher: Knopf (27 June, 2023)
Genre: General Fiction (Adult), Contemporary, Coming of Age, LGBTQIA+
A brilliantly funny novel about friends, lovers, Ireland in chaos, and a young woman desperately trying to manage all three
“If you’ve ever been unsure what to do with your degree in English; if you’ve ever wondered when the rug-buying part of your life will start…if you’ve ever loved the wrong person, or the right person at the wrong time…In short, if you’ve ever been young, you will love The Rachel Incident like I did.” —Gabrielle Zevin, New York Times best-selling author of Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow
Rachel is a student working at a bookstore when she meets James, and it’s love at first sight. Effervescent and insistently heterosexual, James soon invites Rachel to be his roommate and the two begin a friendship that changes the course of both their lives forever. Together, they run riot through the streets of Cork city, trying to maintain a bohemian existence while the threat of the financial crash looms before them.
When Rachel falls in love with her married professor, Dr. Fred Byrne, James helps her devise a reading at their local bookstore, with the goal that she might seduce him afterwards. But Fred has other desires. So begins a series of secrets and compromises that intertwine the fates of James, Rachel, Fred, and Fred’s glamorous, well-connected, bourgeois wife. Aching with unrequited love, shot through with delicious, sparkling humor, The Rachel Incident is a triumph.
Recently Finish?
Title: Going Bicoastal
Author: Dahlia Adler
Publisher: St. Martin’s Press (13 June, 2023)
Genre: General Fiction (Young Adult), LGBTQIA+, Romance, Contemporary
“This is what it looks like when a brilliant high concept is executed to perfection. It’s got all the Dahlia Adler trademarks—romance, wry humor, specificity, and genuine emotional depth.” – Becky Albertalli, New York Times bestselling author of Kate in Waiting and Simon vs. The Homo Sapiens Agenda
A queer Sliding Doors YA rom-com in which a girl must choose between summer in NYC with her dad (and the girl she’s always wanted) or LA with her estranged mom (and the guy she never saw coming).
In Dahlia Adler’s Going Bicoastal, there’s more than one path to happily ever after.
Natalya Fox has twenty-four hours to make the biggest choice of her life: stay home in NYC for the summer with her dad (and finally screw up the courage to talk to the girl she’s been crushing on), or spend it with her basically estranged mom in LA (knowing this is the best chance she has to fix their relationship, if she even wants to.) (Does she want to?)
How’s a girl supposed to choose?
She can’t, and so both summers play out in alternating timelines – one in which Natalya explores the city, tries to repair things with her mom, works on figuring out her future, and goes for the girl she’s always wanted. And one in which Natalya explores the city, tries to repair things with her mom, works on figuring out her future, and goes for the guy she never saw coming.
Read Next?
Title: The Unsinkable Greta James
Author: Jennifer E. Smith
Publisher: Ballantine Books (01 Mar 2022)
Genre: General Fiction (Young Adult), Chick Lit, Contemporary
An indie musician reeling from tragedy and a public breakdown reconnects with her father on a weeklong cruise in “a pitch-perfect story about the ways we recover love in the strangest places” (Rebecca Serle, bestselling author of In Five Years)
“The characters are drawn with a generosity that allows them to be wrong but also right, loving but also prone to missteps, and ultimately deserving of a resolution that’s full of hope.”—Linda Holmes, New York Times bestselling author of Flying Solo
ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR: She Reads
Just after the death of her mother—her first and most devoted fan—and weeks before the launch of her high-stakes sophomore album, Greta James falls apart on stage. The footage quickly goes viral and she stops playing, her career suddenly in jeopardy—the kind of jeopardy her father, Conrad, has always predicted.
Months later, Greta—still heartbroken and very much adrift—reluctantly agrees to accompany Conrad on the Alaskan cruise her parents had booked to celebrate their fortieth anniversary. It could be their last chance to heal old wounds in the wake of shared loss. But the trip will also prove to be a voyage of discovery for them both, and for Ben Wilder, a charming historian struggling with a major upheaval in his own life. As Greta works to build back her confidence and Ben confronts an uncertain future, they find themselves drawn to and relying on each other.
It’s here in the unlikeliest of places—at sea, far from the packed city venues where she usually plays and surrounded by the stunning Alaskan wilderness—that Greta will have to decide what her path forward might look like—and how to find her voice again.
duffrunstough 