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Some of the best beach reads of summer 2024 are buy 2, get 1 free at Amazon ahead of Prime Day
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Planning a trip to the beach this summer? Don’t hit the beach without a great book. Whether it’s your style to pack paperbacks or an e-reader like the Kindle for all your reading needs, there are thousands of excellent reads you won’t be able to tear yourself away from this year.
But which books are actually worth your time? Does BookTok actually know what it’s talking about when you peruse its recommendations, or do you need to read some synopses and pages to see for yourself? If you don’t have time for any of that, we’ve done the hard work for you. We’ve curated some of the best novels and stories you can buy right now for a list of our picks for the best beach reads of 2024.
The best part? So many of these beach reads are currently being offered as buy two, get one free deal at Amazon ahead of Prime Day. In short: Now’s the perfect time to add some books to your collection (or a new Kindle). Tap the button below to see all books (and games!) that are eligible for the deal.
Our picks for the best beach reads this summer
Whether you love to dive into high-octane spy thrillers or complicated meet-cutes, you’ll find something exciting to dig into this summer. Grab your e-reader or a bookmark and get ready to chill beachside with a great story. These page-turners are on fire.
(Want to upgrade your summer reading experience with a new e-reader? Check out our picks for the best e-readers for 2024.)
“Eruption”
Amazon
Just released on June 3 and already a No. 1 Amazon and “New York Times” bestseller, “Eruption” was a passion project of late author Michael Crichton (“Jurassic Park”) that’s been finished by James Patterson.
When billionaire tech CEO John Crowley climbs an active volcano in the exotic island nation of Vanutu, he gets more than he bargained for. The volcano erupts violently while Crowley is on the mountain.
Cut off from his guides, Crowley must make a terrifying solo descent down the mountain to escape. This thrilling tale combines interactions with deadly forces of nature like volcanoes and fast-paced storytelling. It all makes for a thrilling adventure you won’t want to put down.
“Kill For Me, Kill For You”
Amazon
This fast-paced psychological thriller is the perfect book for reading with your toes in the sand. You’re going to need it to keep calm with a story that ends up being beautifully stressful.
In Steve Cavanagh’s harrowing novel, two grieving women form an unlikely pact to get revenge. Wendy and Amanda meet by chance in New York City, only to discover they share a common torment: the men who devastated their families were able to walk free. Fueled by rage and loss, they make a secret arrangement to kill each other’s tormentors.
But while both women make their plans to move forward, the plot thickens in ways neither anticipates. Full of dizzying twists and shocking revelations, this book will keep you guessing until the final paragraph. Can the pair pull off the perfect murders?
“The Chaos Agent”
Amazon
Looking for plenty of action with a splash of romance and exotic locales? The latest entry in Mark Greaney’s Gray Man thriller series is perfect escapist fare. Assassin Court Gentry just wants a peaceful life with his lover Zoya when they’re dragged into a game of cat and mouse.
Someone is eliminating the world’s top AI researchers, and an old acquaintance wants Court’s help extracting a Russian scientist from the kill list. But merely being seen with him puts a target on Court’s back. Now they’ve got to stay a step ahead of another assassin with seemingly unlimited resources.
If you’re a big thriller fan or find yourself going back to the classic Bond books over and over, you’ll fall in love with this series. Give “The Chaos Agent” a read.
“People We Meet on Vacation”
Berkley via Amazon
This novel, by the author who literally wrote the book on beach reads (or at least a book titled “Beach Read”), is a romance that’s unlike the others you might have read. Even though it didn’t come out in 2024, it’s still an Amazon bestseller and a favorite among those who like to hit the sand with good reading material in tow.
The book follows Poppy and Alex, two best friends who took a trip together every summer throughout college, up until their falling out near graduation. After not speaking to each other for two years, Poppy reaches out to Alex proposing they take one more vacation together.
As they travel, memories and feelings from their past friendship begin to resurface. Poppy has always had unspoken romantic feelings for Alex that she hid to preserve their friendship. It soon becomes clear Alex feels the same way. If you’ve ever experienced a friendship that turned into something more, you’ll feel right at home here.
“Good Material”
Amazon
This exploration of heartbreak and self-discovery is perfect for your next beach vacation. Andy is reeling from his breakup with Jen while struggling to figure out where it all went wrong. Now homeless, career-less, and watching his friends move on with life, he’s determined to solve the mystery of their failed relationship.
We get both Jen and Andy’s sides of the story in a series of flashbacks. Their beginning as a couple contrasts sharply with the misunderstandings that led to their relationship’s end. The book is packed with touching looks at a love that went sour for so many sometimes inexplicable reasons. It’ll have you reflecting on your own relationships all the way through.
“Took a minute to get into, then it hit hard,” says one verified Amazon reviewer. “So real. So good.”
“Sugar, Baby”
Amazon
Agnes is a 21-year-old who lives at home and works as a cleaner. On the weekends, she goes out and spends money she doesn’t have while looking for ways to distract herself from the life she doesn’t want to live. When she meets Emily, the daughter of one of her clients, she discovers the world of “sugar dating,” or dating rich men for money. Immediately, Agnes is intrigued and hops down the rabbit hole.
When Agnes immerses herself completely in this new world of compensated dating, her mother Constance kicks her out. She then moves in with Emily and a group of other sugar babies, and navigates dangerous, toxic relationships that do little to fill the hole in her life.
It’s a difficult read, but an engrossing one that you won’t soon forget.
“It Ends with Us”
Amazon
It’s a good time to read this bestseller from Colleen Hoover: The movie adaptation starring Blake Lively is airing this June. In this romantic drama, Lily has worked hard to build the life and business she wants in Boston. When she feels sparks with Ryle, a gorgeous but complicated neurosurgeon, it seems too good to be true.
Ryle has a rule against dating, yet Lily becomes the exception. But as their relationship deepens, she wonders what made him so commitment-phobic. The reappearance of her first love — Atlas, a kindred spirit from her hometown — throws Lily’s new life into turmoil as well. Eventually, she must make a difficult choice that she’s not sure she’s prepared for.
“This Summer Will Be Different”
Amazon
This steamy romance is one that’s best enjoyed beachside. You’ll want to cool off after you read it.
Lucy travels to her best friend Bridget’s beach house on Prince Edward Island every summer. Each visit, she finds herself drawn more and more to Bridget’s younger brother Felix, no matter how much she tries to resist.
Their chemistry is off the charts, leading to secret trysts she wishes she could stop having. But with Lucy and Felix’s tangled history and family bonds at stake, their electric connection gets complicated. Their feelings start to deepen and they soon find it difficult to keep their affair a secret.
“The Housemaid”
Amazon
Need a twisty thriller you’ll be thinking about long after you head to the beach? “The Housemaid” will do nicely.
Millie is an ex-convict looking for a fresh start as a live-in housemaid for the wealthy Nina Winchester. At first, the job seems promising. Nina is friendly and welcoming when Millie moves in. But Nina’s behavior soon takes a disturbing turn. She gives Millie confusing instructions, sometimes failing to mention critical information like her daughter’s severe allergy. Millie soon suspects her new boss may be unwell, or that maybe there’s something else hiding beneath the surface.
There are so many secrets to unravel as the novel wears on.
“A Court of Thorns and Roses”
Amazon
We suspect you may have already heard of “ACOTAR” (as it’s known on TikTok). But if you haven’t given this 2020 novel a read yet, we recommend sitting down with it on the beach this summer.
In this formidable fantasy, 19-year-old Feyre is a hunter who kills a wolf in the forest, which angers a mysterious fae who swears revenge. Feyre is taken captive to the land of Prythian, ruled by immortal faeries. She learns her captor Tamlin is not a beast, but one of the faeries that once ruled her world.
As Feyre adjusts to her new home, her feelings for Tamlin go from hatred to intense attraction. An ancient evil threatens Tamlin’s world, and Feyre realizes she must find a way to destroy it if she wants a chance at being with Tamlin.
“One of Us Knows”
Amazon
Kenetria Nash, diagnosed with dissociative identity disorder, gets a second chance when she accepts a job as caretaker to a historic Hudson River home. But as she settles in, she realizes she has no memory of how she got there in the first place.
When a storm traps her with strangers, including the man who ruined her past, Ken’s world is changed again. After the man turns up dead, she becomes the prime suspect.
To prove her innocence, Ken has to work with all of her alternate identities. Together, they battle to remember the truth about Ken’s past and the mysterious Kavanaugh Island before they lose everything.
“Just for the Summer”
Amazon
Justin is down on his luck when it comes to the dating scene. When he meets a woman, they break up and his partner finds a new soulmate. When he matches with a woman who claims the same fate, they joke about dating to “cancel out” their curses. That’s when nurse Emma moves to Minnesota for the summer to give it a shot.
Neither expects to actually fall for the other. But when Justin unexpectedly becomes a guardian to his siblings and Emma’s toxic mom causes drama, the pair begin to develop feelings for each other.
But all of this was supposed to be just for the summer. Will Justin and Emma stay together even though they swore they’d part at the end of the season? You’ll have to read to find out.
“The Women”
Amazon
Set during the Vietnam War (1965), 20-year-old nursing student Frankie McGrath enlists in the Army Nurse Corps. Frankie quickly becomes part of the chaos of war — a stark contrast to her sheltered upbringing in sunny California. She’s forced to figure out how to navigate life and death daily while getting closer to the soldiers she treats.
Soon, Frankie grows into a seasoned veteran. But the real battle proves to be returning home to a very different America than the one she left behind. As she reconnects with loved ones and immerses herself in the antiwar movement, she learns important facts about humanity and herself.
CBS News
After Tyre Nichols’ fatal beating, Memphis officer texted photo of bloodied man to ex-girlfriend, she testifies
A former Memphis police officer charged in the fatal beating of Tyre Nichols sent his ex-girlfriend a photo of the badly injured man on the night he was punched, kicked and hit with a police baton following a traffic stop, according to trial testimony Wednesday.
Brittany Leake, a Memphis officer and Demetrius Haley’s former girlfriend, testified during the criminal trial that she was on the phone with Haley when officers pulled Nichols over for a traffic stop. She said she heard a “commotion,” including verbal orders for someone to give officers his hands.
The call ended, but Haley later texted the photo in a group chat comprising Haley, Leake and her godsister, she testified. Prosecutors displayed the photo for the jury. It showed Nichols with his eyes closed, on the ground with what appeared to be blood near his mouth and his hands behind his back.
Leake said that when she saw the photo, her reaction was: “Oh my God, he definitely needs to go to the Med.”
The Med is shorthand for Memphis’ trauma hospital.
The fatal beating, caught on police bodycams and street surveillance cameras, has sparked protests and calls for police reform. Officers said they pulled over Nichols for reckless driving, but Memphis’ police chief said there was no evidence to substantiate that claim.
Haley, Tadarrius Bean and Justin Smith are on trial after pleading not guilty to charges that they deprived Nichols of his civil rights through excessive force and failure to intervene, and obstructed justice through witness tampering. Their trial began Sept. 9 and is expected to run three to four weeks.
George Walker IV / AP
The Memphis Police Department fired the three men, along with Emmitt Martin III and Desmond Mills Jr., after Nichols’ death. The beating was caught on police video, which was released publicly. The officers were later indicted on the federal charges. Martin and Mills have taken plea deals.
During her testimony Wednesday, Leake said she deleted the photo after she saw it and that sending such a photo is against police policy.
“I wasn’t offended, but it was difficult to look at,” she said.
Leake said Haley had sent her photos before of drugs, and of a person who had been injured in a car accident.
Earlier Wednesday, Martin was on the witness stand for a third day. Defense attorneys tried to show inconsistencies between Martin’s statements to investigators and his court testimony. Martin acknowledged lying about what happened to Memphis Police Department internal investigators, to try to cover up and “justify what I did.”
But Martin said he told the truth to FBI investigators after he pleaded guilty in August, including statements about feeling pressure on his duty belt where his gun was located during the traffic stop, but not being able to see if Nichols was trying to get his gun. Martin has testified that he said “let go of my gun” during the traffic stop.
Martin Zummach, the attorney for Justin Smith, asked Martin if he knew of any reasons why Nichols did not simply say, “I give up.”
“He’s out of it,” Martin said. “Disoriented.”
Martin testified that the situation escalated quickly when Haley pulled his gun and violently yanked Nichols from his car, using expletives and failing to tell Nichols why he had been pulled over and removed from the vehicle.
“He never got a chance to comply,” Martin said.
Nichols, who was Black, was pepper sprayed and hit with a stun gun during the traffic stop, but ran away, police video shows. The five officers, who also are Black, then beat him about a block from his home, as he called out for his mother.
Video shows the officers milling about and talking as Nichols struggled with his injuries. Nichols died Jan. 10, 2023, three days after the beating.
An autopsy report shows Nichols – the father of a boy who is now 7 – died from blows to the head. The report describes brain injuries, and cuts and bruises on his head and elsewhere on his body.
Jesse Guy testified that he was working as a paramedic for the Memphis Fire Department the night of the beating. He arrived at the location after two emergency medical technicians, Robert Long and JaMichael Sandridge.
Guy said he was not told about the medical problems Nichols had experienced before he arrived, and that Nichols was injured, seated on the ground and unresponsive.
Nichols had no pulse and was not breathing, and it “felt like he was lifeless,” Guy said.
In the ambulance, Guy performed CPR and provided mechanical ventilation, and Nichols had a pulse by the time he arrived at the hospital, the paramedic said.
Guy said Long and Sandridge did not say if they had checked Nichols’ pulse and heart rate, and they did not report if they had given him oxygen. When asked by one of Bean’s lawyers whether that information would have been helpful in treating Nichols, Guy said yes.
Long and Sandridge were fired for violating fire department policies after Nichols died. They have not been criminally charged.
The five officers also have been charged with second-degree murder in state court, where they pleaded not guilty. Mills and Martin are expected to change their pleas.
Federal prosecutors have previously recommended a 40-year sentence for Martin. A date has not been set in state court yet.
Nichols worked for FedEx, and he enjoyed skateboarding and photography. The city of Sacramento, where Nichols grew up, named a skatepark in his honor. “Tyre fell in love with skateboarding at a young age and it wasn’t long before it became a part of his lifestyle,” states the resolution approved by the city council. He had a tattoo of his mother’s name.
“Tyre Nichols’ family have been praying for justice and accountability from the very beginning of this tragedy,” Ben Crump and Antonio Romanucci, the civil rights attorneys representing Nichols’ family, said in a statement when the trial began.
Boeing’s CEO said Wednesday that the company will begin furloughing “a large number” of employees to conserve cash during the strike by union machinists that began last week.
Chief Executive Kelly Ortberg said the people who would be required to take time off without pay starting in coming days include executives, managers and other employees based in the U.S.
“While this is a tough decision that impacts everybody, it is in an effort to preserve our long-term future and help us navigate through this very difficult time,” Ortberg said in a company-wide message to staff.
Boeing didn’t say how many people will face rolling furloughs, but the number is expected to run into the tens of thousands. The aerospace giant had 171,000 employees at the start of the year.
About 33,000 Boeing factory workers in the Pacific Northwest began a strike Friday after rejecting a proposal to raise pay by 25% over four years. They want raises of at least 40%, the return of a traditional pension plan and other improvements in the contract offer they voted down.
Scott Brauer / Bloomberg via Getty Images
The strike is halting production of several airplane models including Boeing’s best-selling plane, the 737 Max. The company gets more than half of the purchase price when new planes are delivered to buyers, so the strike will quickly hurt Boeing’s cash flow.
Ortberg said selected employees will be furloughed for one week every four weeks while retaining their benefits. The CEO and other senior executives will take pay cuts during the duration of the strike, he said, without stating how deep the cuts will be.
All work related to safety, quality, customer support and certification of new planes will continue during the furloughs, he said, including production of 787 Dreamliner jets, which are built by nonunion workers in South Carolina.
Ortberg said in a memo to employees that the company is talking to the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers about a new contract agreement that could be ratified.
“However, with production paused across many key programs in the Pacific Northwest, our business faces substantial challenges and it is important that we take difficult steps to preserve cash and ensure that Boeing is able to successfully recover,” he said.
Boeing’s chief financial officer warned employees earlier this week that temporary layoffs were possible.
The company, which is based in Arlington, Virginia, but has most of its commercial-airplanes business located in the Pacific Northwest, is also cutting spending on suppliers, freezing hiring and eliminating most travel.
Despite two full days of talks assisted by the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service, the union said Wednesday that no resolution had been reached and no additional negotiations were scheduled, according to CBS Seattle affiliate KIRO-TV.
Striking workers are picketing at several locations in the Seattle area, Oregon and California. The union, which recommended the offer that members later rejected by a 96% vote, is surveying the workers to learn what they want in a new contract. The union’s last strike at Boeing, in 2008, lasted about two months.
If the walkout doesn’t end soon, Boeing’s credit rating could be downgraded to non-investment or junk status, which would make borrowing more expensive. Shortly after the walkout began Friday, Moody’s put Boeing on review for a possible downgrade, and Fitch said a strike longer than two weeks would make a downgrade more likely.
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