A debut novel from short story supremo Wendry Erskine, a brand new title from much-loved author Taylor Jenkins Reid, and a portrait of the endurance of female friendship are among the best new books landing this June.
Eat the Ones You Love, by Sarah Maria Griffin (On sale now, Titan Books)
After losing her job and her fiancé and moving back from the city to live with her parents, Shell Pine needs some help. And according to the sign in the window, the florist shop in the mall does too. Shell gets the gig, and the flowers she works with there are just the thing she needs to cheer up. Or maybe it’s Neve, the beautiful shop manager, who is making her days so rosy?
But you have to get your hands dirty if you want your garden to grow—and Neve’s secrets are as dark and dangerous as they come. In the back room of the flower shop, a young sentient orchid actually runs the show, and he is hungry… and he has a plan for them all.
When the choices are to either bury yourself in the warmth of someone else’s fertile soil, or face the cold and disappointing world outside—which would you choose? And what if putting down roots came at a cost far higher than just your freedom? This is a story about desire, dreams, decay—and working retail at the end of the world.
Atmosphere, by Taylor Jenkins Reid (On sale now, Hutchinson Heinemann)
An epic novel set against the backdrop of the 1980s space shuttle program about the extraordinary lengths we go to live and love beyond our limits, Atmosphere transporting readers to iconic times and places, creating complex protagonists, and telling a passionate and soaring story about the transformative power of love – this time among the stars.
In the summer of 1980, astrophysics professor Joan Goodwin begins training to be an astronaut at Houston’s Johnson Space Center, alongside an exceptional group of fellow candidates: Top Gun pilot Hank Redmond; mission specialists John Griffin and Lydia Danes; warmhearted Donna Fitzgerald; and Vanessa Ford, the magnetic and mysterious aeronautical engineer.
As the new astronauts prepare for their first flights, Joan finds a passion and a love she never imagined and begins to question everything she believes about her place in the observable universe. Then, in December of 1984, on mission STS-LR9, everything changes in an instant.
Just See Me: seeing beyond difference, by Sarah Gannon (On sale now, Austin Macauley Publishers)
Wouldn’t it be great if people could just see you for who you are? Not just see your differences, or equipment but see you, and your strengths? Seeing beyond someone’s disability means we can see the real person. Just See Me is about a little girl who wants just that. This book is about seeing beyond a child’s differences and disabilities and seeing their strengths, interests, and potential.
Sarah Gannon is an occupational therapist living in Kilkenny and is mum to two children, one of whom has CHARGE syndrome. Sarah has worked with children with disabilities since 2008 in paediatric hospital and community settings. She has published multiple peer-reviewed journal articles. Sarah is passionate about encouraging inclusion and acceptance for children like her daughter, Ciara, who is the inspiration for this book.
Our Song, by Anna Carey (5 June, Hachette Books Ireland)
Laura used to have big dreams, but she gave them up – because that’s what grown-ups do. Trying to turn her love of music into a career would have been absolutely ridiculous. But when she hears one of Tadhg’s songs on the radio, she isn’t so sure.
Tadhg and Laura used to be in a band together. They used to be a lot of things. Now he’s a superstar, touring the world with his songs, making Laura feel like a failure and reminding her of what might have been.
Then she gets an email that could change everything: Tadhg wants to finish a song they started writing together nearly twenty years ago. Making music again would literally be a dream come true, even if it’s with a person she swore she’d never speak to again. And they can keep things professional, right?
As Tadhg and Laura start working together though, sparks begin to fly. Maybe music isn’t the only thing that deserves a second chance?
The Unthinkable, by David Challen (5 June, Hachette Books UK)
David Challen grew up in the perfect home with the model family. He also grew up inside a house which concealed his father’s manipulation and control.
One Saturday in 2010, David’s mother struck more than twenty blows to the back of her husband’s head with a hammer after thirty years of abuse. She then washed the dirty dishes from the lunch she had just cooked and left the house. In those few minutes, David’s life was changed forever.
Over the next decade, he led the fight to overturn her conviction; and in doing so he not only freed his mother and helped change the legal system, but also became a voice for the countless victims of coercive control across the country.
This is a powerful story of a son’s love for his mother; of an insidious form of abuse that must be better understood if we are to truly tackle it; and a fight that reshaped how society understands domestic abuse.
Some of This is True, by Michelle McDonagh (5 June, Hachette Books Ireland)
A gripping, twist-filled story of secrets, deception and suspicion from the bestselling author of Somebody Knows and There’s Something I Have to Tell You, the novel opens on an icy morning in January, when a body is discovered at the bottom of the Wishing Steps at Blarney Castle, seemingly the tragic death by falling of a young tourist.
Jessie DeMarco had travelled to the Cork village in search of the father she’d never known, bringing only a name and general location of his whereabouts. When her bereft mother Dani arrives from America to identify Jessie’s body, she brings with her a story of this man’s past that will soon lead to shocking accusations – and fervent denials.
Convinced that her daughter’s death was not accidental, Dani sets about uncovering evidence, as the local community begins to take sides. But who to believe – the highly respected man they have known all their lives, or a devastated mother with nothing to lose?
Thirst Trap, by Gráinne O’Hare (12 June, Picador Press)
Hotly tipped as one of the most anticipated Irish releases of the summer, Thirst Trap by Gráinne O’Hare is described as a blazing, bittersweet, bitingly funny, and painfully relatable story about the friendships that endure through the very best and the very worst of times.
Maggie, Harley and Róise are friends on the brink: of triumph, catastrophe, or maybe just finally growing up. Their crumbling Belfast houseshare has been witness to their roaring twenties, filled with questionable one-night stands and ruthless hangovers. But now fault-lines are beginning to show.
The three girls are still grieving the tragic death of their friend, Lydia, whose room remains untouched. Their last big fight hangs heavy over their heads, unspoken since the accident. And now they are all beginning to unravel.
Ordinary Love, by Marie Rutkowski (12 June, VIRAGO)
Emily has a life many would envy: a Manhattan townhouse, two sweet children, and an adoring husband, Jack. But Jack isn’t what he appears to be, and Emily’s marriage is secretly troubled.
During their rocky separation, Emily crosses paths with someone she’s tried not to think about for years: Gen Hall. As teenagers, Gen was Emily’s best friend, first love—and first heartbreak. Emily thought she’d never recover from losing her.
Now, separated by more than a decade of mistakes and miscommunications, can they find their way back to each other? What follows is a sweeping queer love story about desire, friendship, and—above all—the possibility of second chances.
The Benefactors, by Wendy Erskine (17 June, Sceptre Books)
From the prize-winning author of short story collections Dance Move and Sweet Home, this is an astounding novel about intimate histories, class, money, and what being a parent means. Brutal, tender, and rigorously intelligent, The Benefactors is a daring, polyphonic presentation of modern-day Northern Ireland.
We meet Frankie, Miriam, and Bronagh—very different women but all mothers to 18-year-old boys. They do not know each other yet, but when their sons are accused of sexually assaulting Misty Johnston, whose family lacks the wealth and social standing of their own, they’ll leverage all the power of their position to protect their children.
Told through varying perspectives and momentary snapshots of those on the periphery of the event, these short illustrations of many different mindsets speak to a wider social and cultural context, and it’s just so immersive. When you’re reading it, it’s like you’ve broken through the veil of the spine and are roving around in a world of Wendy’s creation.
Monaghan, by Timothy O’Grady (19 June, UNBOUND)
Moving from West Belfast and Monaghan to the streets of San Francisco, Timothy O’Grady’s exhilarating new novel is an epic portrait of art and war, authenticity and selling out, told through the fates of three men.
Ronan Treanor, Monaghan native and teller of this tale, is a celebrated theorist of postmodern architecture in New York. Paul Crane, single son of a hotel maid in Indiana, turns his mathematical gift into a multimillion-dollar career as an investment banker. And the mysterious Ryan, who drew as a boy in besieged West Belfast, but was swept up in the war against the British and lived a decade of extreme and escalating violence as a sniper.
Through him, the war in Ireland and its psychic legacy are brought into close focus in a way rarely seen in contemporary fiction. Their lives merge and conflict, rise and fall, as one man becomes the undoing of the next. Hauntingly beautiful, lyrical and profound, this is a novel about what happens when you cannot escape your past, featuring drawings and paintings by Anthony Lott.
The Tarot Reader of Versailles, by Anya Bergman (19 June, Manilla Press)
It is the early days of the French Revolution and, on the streets of Paris, terror reigns. Adelaide Lenormand is a young woman with an extraordinary power – through her tarot cards, she can commune with the dead. Her reputation is such that revolutionaries and the aristocracy alike seek her out to divine their fortunes, though she is loyal to Marie Antoinette and the dauphin of France.
But Lenormand has seen the queen’s fate in the cards, and must take care that it doesn’t become her own. Then, one fateful day, she comes across Caitlin, a scullery maid from Ireland who has travelled to Paris for love. Caitlin has powers too – she can read people’s pasts as Lenormand reads their futures. The two young women have an instant connection, drawn to each other’s abilities. But Caitlin is hiding something from her new friend: as much as she loves Lenormand, she loves freedom and her country more. What will she do – and who will she betray – to bring revolution to the shores of Ireland?
Set against the background of the French Revolution and the Great Rebellion in Ireland and entwining dark folklore with tarot mysticism, this is a novel of fate and free will, where allegiances and romances can be forged or broken by the turn of a card.
The Landlord, by RB Egan (19 June, Hodder & Stoughton)
After Cathy’s boyfriend surprisingly ends things, she is distraught. She also needs to move out of their flat and find a new place to live. When a friend tips her off about a room to rent it seems like her luck has suddenly changed. The house is on one of the city’s most sought-after streets and the live-in landlord, whose son has just left home, is charming and kind. Best of all, it’s affordable.
Cathy’s invited to make herself at home. But there is one rule: she can never go into the garden. Everything else seems so perfect that she doesn’t think twice. But she’ll soon realise the deal she has made is too good to be true… and now it’s far too late.
The Landlord is described as a totally gripping and edge-of-your-seat thriller that will keep you up late into the night.
The Ethics of Cats, by Alice Kinsella (30 June, Broken Sleep Books)
This is an incisive, unflinching interrogation of memory, survival, and inheritance, written with the lyricism and wry clarity that defines Alice Kinsella’s work. Navigating the tensions between domesticity and wildness, history and the self, these poems shift fluidly between personal reckoning and collective consciousness, from the intimate disarray of motherhood to the ghosted architectures of Ireland’s institutional past, and the rising tide of the climate crisis.
Kinsella’s voice is both tender and unsparing, attuned to the body’s vulnerabilities and the quiet devastations of time. The Ethics of Cats is a fierce and deeply felt collection, as intelligent as it is unrelenting.
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