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5 Perfect Summer Book Club Reads By Jennifer Weiner

April 20 2021
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As I connect with book clubs and friends alike, I continually find that Jennifer Weiner’s stories are the perfect discussion-worthy novels. Her engaging plots and lovable characters always seem to burrow a place in my heart. Now, as the colder weather makes its way into a sunny spring, I feel the urge to part the pages of another Jen Weiner novel. And I’m especially excited that Book Club Favorites will be discussing her book, Big Summer, LIVE on April 27 at 12 pm ET. Mark your calendars!

With bright days ahead, I’m thinking about all the reasons why Jennifer Weiner’s novels make such great spring and summer book club reads. Check out my top picks below, and when you’re through take a moment to pour a refreshing drink, bask in the light of the sun, and indulge in one of these fantastic reads.

Big Summer
by Jennifer Weiner

I love when a good book reminds me of an old friend, giving me the opportunity to reach out and spark a bookish conversation. Jennifer Weiner’s BIG SUMMER is the perfect sunny read to help spark that reconnection! Daphne is a plus-size model building a life of self-confidence and empowerment through her social following. She’s worked hard to build up her life online, so when an ex-best friend from her past knocks on her door, Daphne is entirely shocked. Although Drue and Daphne’s friendship ended in a massive blowout, Drue is back to ask Daphne for a massive favor. Would she stand as her maid of honor in her wedding? Letting Drue back into Daphne’s life is risky, but the request comes with a chance to spend a weekend at a Cape Cod mansion. How could she refuse? The second you finish this stunning novel you’ll be gunning to share it with your own friends, and perhaps rekindle a few friendships from your past as well!

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Big Summer
Jennifer Weiner

AN INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

“Sexy and satisfying, Big Summer is the perfect quarantine read.” —USA TODAY

“The beach read to end all beach reads.” —Entertainment Weekly

“Big fun, and then some. It’s empowering and surprising—a reminder to put down the phone and enjoy each moment for what it is.” —The Washington Post

A deliciously funny, remarkably poignant, and simply unputdownable novel about the power of friendship, the lure of frenemies, and the importance of making peace with yourself through all life’s ups and downs. From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Good in Bed and Best Friends Forever, Big Summer is the perfect escape with one of the most lovable heroines to come to the page in years.

Six years after the fight that ended their friendship, Daphne Berg is shocked when Drue Cavanaugh walks back into her life, looking as lovely and successful as ever, with a massive favor to ask. Daphne hasn’t spoken one word to Drue in all this time—she doesn’t even hate-follow her ex-best friend on social media—so when Drue asks if she will be her maid-of-honor at the society wedding of the summer, Daphne is rightfully speechless.

Drue was always the one who had everything—except the ability to hold onto friends. Meanwhile, Daphne’s no longer the same self-effacing sidekick she was back in high school. She’s built a life that she loves, including a growing career as a plus-size Instagram influencer. Letting glamorous, seductive Drue back into her life is risky, but it comes with an invitation to spend a weekend in a waterfront Cape Cod mansion. When Drue begs and pleads and dangles the prospect of cute single guys, Daphne finds herself powerless as ever to resist her friend’s siren song.

A sparkling novel about the complexities of female relationships, the pitfalls of living out loud and online, and the resilience of the human heart, Big Summer is a witty, moving story about family, friendship, and figuring out what matters most.

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5 Perfect Summer Book Club Reads By Jennifer Weiner

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Who Do You Love
by Jennifer Weiner

Everyone dreams of igniting a summer fling that may just last a lifetime. For Rachel and Andy in Jennifer Weiner’s WHO DO YOU LOVE, their story of lasting friendship is a bit more complex. Rachel and Andy meet in an ER waiting room–Rachel with a congenital heart defect and Andy with a broken arm. After sharing a story, the two part ways, but over the course of three decades the pair finds their way back to each other time and time again. Through high school, college, marriage, divorce, heartbreak, and happiness, the two complex individuals must discern whether their love can surmount their differences and if life keeps bringing them back together for a purpose.

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Who Do You Love
Jennifer Weiner

WHO DO YOU LOVE is a warmhearted, intimate modern-day fairy tale about the passage of time, the way people change and change each other, and how the measure of a life is in the people you love.

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Mrs. Everything
by Jennifer Weiner

One of the things I love most about Jennifer Weiner’s books is that she continually writes in complex characters and themes to keep me captivated in her stories. The perfect example of this is MRS. EVERYTHING. Sisters Jo and Bethie grew up in 1950s Detroit. Jo is a passionate bookworm with a tomboy style, while Bethie is feminine and beautiful. Surviving traumas and tragedies throughout their lifetimes, the two grow up to each live a life entirely unlike the one they imagined for themselves. Bethie becomes a wild child, while Jo becomes a young mother in Connecticut. Neither sister is particularly fond of the life they created, but is it too late to rewrite their story?

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Mrs. Everything
Jennifer Weiner

In this instant New York Times bestseller and “multigenerational narrative that’s nothing short of brilliant” (People), two sisters’ lives from the 1950s to the present are explored as they struggle to find their places—and be true to themselves—in a rapidly evolving world from #1 New York Times bestselling author Jennifer Weiner.

Jo and Bethie Kaufman were born into a world full of promise.

Growing up in 1950s Detroit, they live in a perfect “Dick and Jane” house, where their roles in the family are clearly defined. Jo is the tomboy, the bookish rebel with a passion to make the world more fair; Bethie is the pretty, feminine good girl, a would-be star who enjoys the power her beauty confers and dreams of a traditional life.

But the truth ends up looking different from what the girls imagined. Jo and Bethie survive traumas and tragedies. As their lives unfold against the background of free love and Vietnam, Woodstock and women’s lib, Bethie becomes an adventure-loving wild child who dives headlong into the counterculture and is up for anything (except settling down). Meanwhile, Jo becomes a proper young mother in Connecticut, a witness to the changing world instead of a participant. Neither woman inhabits the world she dreams of, nor has a life that feels authentic or brings her joy. Is it too late for the women to finally stake a claim on happily ever after?

In “her most sprawling and intensely personal novel to date” (Entertainment Weekly), Jennifer Weiner tells a “simply unputdownable” (Good Housekeeping) story of two sisters who, with their different dreams and different paths, offer answers to the question: How should a woman be in the world?

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MENTIONED IN:

5 Perfect Summer Book Club Reads By Jennifer Weiner

By Holly Claytor | April 20, 2021

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Best Friends Forever
by Jennifer Weiner

Jennifer Weiner’s books always offer an exciting storyline, beloved characters, and heartfelt themes, but with an added benefit of beautiful covers. Just look at the cover of BEST FRIENDS FOREVER. Can’t you imagine cracking this book open on the beach? This story follows best friends Addie and Valerie, who connected as neighbors at just nine years old. As the two grow up, they drift apart. But flash forward fifteen years: Addie opens her door to find her long-gone best friend standing there, a terrified look on her face and blood on the sleeve of her coat. Something terrible has happened, and Val knows that Addie is the only one who can help.

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Best Friends Forever
Jennifer Weiner

This heartrending novel charts the longtime friendship between Val and Addie, two young girls who grow up to be very different women: one achieving fame and fortune, one staying behind.

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That Summer
by Jennifer Weiner

Jennifer Weiner never fails to disappoint! That’s why I’m so excited for her newest dazzling read THAT SUMMER, which comes out on May 11. Daisy has a seemingly perfect life on the Main Line in the Philadelphia suburbs, but despite it all she can’t shake the feeling that something is missing from her life. While she attempts to navigate her dissatisfaction, her email gets mixed up with that of a woman named Diana Starling. Diana’s glamorous, sophisticated, single-lady life is miles away from Daisy’s simpler existence. After an apology turns into an invitation to connect, the two women become close friends. But as the story continues on, readers learn that this connection was not completely accidental. Who really is Diana and what could she want with Daisy?

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That Summer
Jennifer Weiner

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Big Summer comes another timely and deliciously twisty novel of intrigue, secrets, and the transformative power of female friendship.

Daisy Shoemaker can’t sleep. With a thriving cooking business, full schedule of volunteer work, and a beautiful home in the Philadelphia suburbs, she should be content. But her teenage daughter can be a handful, her husband can be distant, her work can feel trivial, and she has lots of acquaintances, but no real friends. Still, Daisy knows she’s got it good. So why is she up all night?

While Daisy tries to identify the root of her dissatisfaction, she’s also receiving misdirected emails meant for a woman named Diana Starling, whose email address is just one punctuation mark away from her own. While Daisy’s driving carpools, Diana is chairing meetings. While Daisy’s making dinner, Diana’s making plans to reorganize corporations. Diana’s glamorous, sophisticated, single-lady life is miles away from Daisy’s simpler existence. When an apology leads to an invitation, the two women meet and become friends. But, as they get closer, we learn that their connection was not completely accidental. Who IS this other woman, and what does she want with Daisy?

From the manicured Main Line of Philadelphia to the wild landscape of the Outer Cape, written with Jennifer Weiner’s signature wit and sharp observations, That Summer is a story about surviving our pasts, confronting our futures, and the sustaining bonds of friendship.

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