Summer Challenge 2026: Recommended By An Author You Admire

Looking for help completing your Summer Challenge Bingo Card? Here are some books recommended by well-known authors.

Updated June 27, 2026
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Greater Victoria Public Library Greater Victoria Public Library
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Summer Challenge 2026: Recommended By An Author You Admire

Looking for help completing your Summer Challenge Bingo Card? Here are some books recommended by well-known authors.

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Kin
Jones, Tayari
Paper Book
Kin is the kind of all-encompassing reading experience I'm always hoping to find- smart and funny. ANN PATCHETT A magnificent new novel from the bestselling, award-winning author of An American Marriage-a novel that sparkles with wit, intelligence...

Recommeded by Anne Patchett.

John of John
Stuart, Douglas.
Paper Book
The stunning new novel from the Booker Prize-winning, Sunday Times-bestselling author of Shuggie Bain and Young Mungo. Oprah's Book Club Book of the Month.'John of John has the emotional range and sense of sympathy of his earlier books, but this book is special, it...

Recommeded by Anne Patchett.

Words without music : a memoir
Glass, Philip
Paper Book
The long-awaited memoir by "the most prolific and popular of all contemporary composers" (New York Times). A world-renowned composer of symphonies, operas, and film scores, Philip Glass has, almost single-handedly, crafted the dominant sound of late-twentieth-century classical...

Recommended by George Saunders.

My brilliant friend. Book one, childhood, adolescence
Ferrante, Elena.
Paper Book
#1 BEST BOOK OF THE CENTURY - NEW YORK TIMES Now an HBO series: the first volume in the New York Times-bestselling "enduring masterpiece" about a lifelong friendship between two women from Naples (The Atlantic). Beginning in the 1950s in a poor but vibrant neighborhood on the...

Recommended by Esi Edugyan.

Such a fun age : a novel
Reid, Kiley
Paper Book
A Best Book of the Year: The Washington Post * Chicago Tribune * NPR * Vogue * Elle * Real Simple * InStyle * Good Housekeeping * Parade * Slate...

Recommended by Taylor Jenkins Reid.

The only good Indians : a novel
Jones, Stephen Graham
Paper Book
A NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER From bestselling author Stephen Graham Jones comes a "masterpiece" (Locus Magazine) of a novel about revenge, cultural identity, and the cost of breaking from tradition. This is a remarkable horror story that "will give you nightmares-...

Recommended by Silvia Moreno-Garcia.

Sula
Morrison, Toni.
Paper Book
'Extravagantly beautiful... Enormously, achingly alive... A howl of love and rage, playful and funny as well as hard and bitter' New York Times As young girls, Nel and Sula shared each other's secrets and dreams in the poor black mid-West of their...

Recommended by John Green.

Bunny
Awad, Mona
Paper Book
THE TIKTOK SENSATION, NOW REISSUED AS A BEAUTIFUL SPECIAL EDITION FEATURING BUNNY SPRAYED EDGES Meet BUNNY: the darkly funny, spellbinding trip of a novel that EVERYONE is talking about 'No punches pulled, no hilarities dodged, no meme unmangled. O Bunny...

Recommended by Margaret Atwood.

The history of a difficult child
Sibhat, Mihret
Paper Book
"An endearing coming-of-age story. . . . Sharp and witty. . . . A wily and operatic novel. . . . Propulsive." --The Washington Post "The History of a Difficult Child is an extraordinary novel." --Maaza Mengiste, Booker Prize-shortlisted author of The Shadow King...

Recommended by Rebecca Yarros.

The adventures of Amina Al-Sirafi : a novel
Chakraborty, S. A.
Paper Book
"A thrilling, transportative adventure that is everything promised--Chakraborty's storytelling is fantasy at its best." -- R.F. Kuang, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Babel and The Poppy War "An exhilarating, propulsive adventure, stitched from the threads of real history, Amina's...

Recommended by Rebecca Yarros.

Yellowface : a novel
Kuang, R. F.
Paper Book
INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER * A REESE'S BOOK CLUB PICK "Hard to put down, harder to forget." -- Stephen King, #1 New York Times bestselling author White lies. Dark humor. Deadly consequences... Bestselling sensation Juniper Song is not who...

Recommended by Rebecca Yarros.

The remains of the day
Ishiguro, Kazuo
Paper Book
From the Nobel Prize-winning author, here is an elegant Everyman's Library hardcover edition of the universally acclaimed novel--winner of the Booker Prize, a bestseller, and the basis for an award-winning film--with full-cloth binding, a silk ribbon marker, a chronology, and an introduction by...

Recommended by R.F. Kuang.

Piranesi
Clarke, Susanna
Paper Book
The award-winning, New York Times bestselling fantasy sensation that Madeline Miller called, "a miraculous and luminous feat of storytelling," Piranesi is an intoxicating, hypnotic novel set in a dreamlike alternative reality from the author of Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell.<...

Recommended by R.F. Kuang.

Exhalation
Chiang, Ted
Paper Book
NATIONAL BESTSELLER * ONE OF THE NEW YORK TIMES BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR * Nine stunningly original, provocative, and poignant stories--two published for the very first time--all from the mind of the incomparable author of Stories of Your Life and Others ...

Recommended by R.F. Kuang.

Georgie, all along
Clayborn, Kate
Paper Book
"Perfect for Emily Henry fans. [This] is the love story that proves you can go home again...It's so rich and wonderful." - Julia Quinn on The TODAY Show "A sweet novel that reminds you going back is sometimes the best path forward . . . and that planning is never as rewarding as...

Recommended by Ali Hazelwood.

The lost ticket
Sampson, Freya
Paper Book
One of Amazon's Best Books of September! Strangers on a London bus unite to help an elderly man find his missed love connection in the heartwarming new novel from the acclaimed author of The Last Chance Library. When Libby Nicholls arrives in London,...

Recommended by Ali Hazelwood.

South of the border, west of the sun
Murakami, Haruki
Paper Book
South of the Border, West of the Sun is the beguiling story of a past rekindled, and one of Haruki Murakami's most touching novels. Hajime has arrived at middle age with a loving family and an enviable career, yet he feels incomplete. When a childhood friend, now a...

Recommended by Kazuo Ishiguro.

Mr Wilder and me
Coe, Jonathan
Paper Book
A young woman named Calista meets the famed Hollywood director Billy Wilder in the sweltering summer of 1976. She knows nothing about him or his work, but this chance encounter will change her life for good. But while Calista is thrilled with her new adventure, Wilder himself - struggling to raise...

Recommended by Kazuo Ishiguro.

A manual for cleaning women : selected stories
Berlin, Lucia
Paper Book
One ofTheNew York Times Book Review's Ten Best Books of 2015 One ofJezebel's Favorite Books of 2016 A Manual for Cleaning Womencompiles the best work of the legendary short-story writer Lucia Berlin. With the...

Recommended by Colson Whitehead.

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