Three Books to Read Right Now

We’re heading down to South Carolina next week, and this is what I’ve packed so far, even though bringing hardcover books on a trip seems like a very poor decision packing-wise! Reading a new hardcover feels so luxurious and like a vacation treat to me, so I do it anyway-it’s totally worth once you survive lugging the suitcase around.

Each of these three books has a strong female character, ranging from a pioneering feminist to a gifted landscape architect, to a woman trying to figure out the truth behind the stories in her marriage. After some disappointing beach reads-I did not love That Summer by Jennifer Weiner or Where the Grass is Green by Lauren Weisberger-I’m hoping these books bring me better luck and a few peaceful hours under an umbrella.

Good Company by Cynthia Sweeney

When Flora Mancini finds her husband’s wedding ring in an envelope, the wedding ring that he claimed to have lost one summer years ago, she begins to question everything about her marriage, her friendships, and what really happened the summer that it went missing.

Leaving Coy’s Hill by Katherine Sherbrooke

Lucy Stone may have grown up in a time when it was considered unladylike for a woman to speak in public, but nothing could dim her enthusiasm for the abolitionist cause and women’s rights and stop her powerful speeches. Nothing, that is, until she meets Henry, and she begins to wonder if a marriage of equals is really possible.

The Last Garden in England by Julia Kelly

The story of the gardens at the beautiful Highbury House begins in 1907 with Venetia Smith, who is hired to design a series of gardens that will leave a lasting impression on the guests. Little does she know how much of an impression the gardens will make on her own life and the lives of the other women to follow in her footsteps, including Emma Lovell who has been hired in the present day to bring the gardens back to all their previous glory.