june book & movie releases i'm excited about
handpicked anticipated releases for the first month of summer
Happy summer! Here are some movies and books I am very excited to watch / read in June. I went through all of my favorite publishers (NYRB, New Directions, FSG, Knopf, Vintage, Picador), as well as the advanced copies I got sent and read and loved. And full transparency, I don’t judge a book by its cover but I will absolutely click on books that have good covers first.
Also, I only read literary fiction and essay collections these days, so there won’t really be any other genres in this list. All of the summaries are from the book itself. I’ve linked the Goodreads page and listed the publication date and publisher for your convenience! And the trailers for the movies are also linked as well.
The list includes 12 new books and 6 new movies coming out this month.
BOOKS
The Catch by Yrsa Daley-Ward
June 3 | Norton | Literary Fiction
Twin sisters Clara and Dempsey have always struggled to relate, their familial bond severed after their mother vanished into the Thames. In adulthood, they are content to be all but estranged, until Clara sees a woman who looks exactly like their mother on the streets of London. The this version of Serene, aged not a day, has enjoyed a childless life. Clara, a celebrity author in desperate need of validation, believes Serene is their mother, while Dempsey, isolated and content to remain so, believes she is a con woman. As they clash over this stranger, the sisters hurtle toward an altercation that threatens their very existence, forcing them to finally confront their pasts—together.
Lili is Crying by Helene Bassette
June 3 | New Directions | Literary Fiction
The book explores the fraughtness and depth of the troubling relationship between Lili and her mother Charlotte. With a near-mythic quality, Bessette’s stripped-back prose evokes at once the pain of thwarted love—of desire run cold—and the promise of renewal. The novel is moving and maddening in turns—the characters trapped in their own cruelty and sorrows—but in its spareness it feels true: “Show me a woman who has actually chosen something.”
Culture Creep: Notes on the Pop Apocalypse by Alice Bolin
June 3 | Harper | Essay Collection
In seven stunning original essays, Alice Bolin turns her gaze to the myriad ways femininity is remixed and reconstructed by the pop culture of the computer age. The unlikely, often insidious forces that drive our popular obsessions are brilliantly cataloged, contextualized, and questioned in a kaleidoscopic style imitating the internet itself.
Bonding by Mariel Franklin
June 12 | Picador | Literary Fiction
Mary is single, jobless, and on her way to Ibiza. There, at a party, she meets Tom, a brilliant chemist on the verge of launching a new drug that claims to cure the anxieties of modern life. Back in London after a heady trip, Mary begins going out with Tom and working for her sort-of-ex Lara, who has created innovative dating app designed to revolutionize the industry. As tech and pharma collide, she is forced to question what love and success mean in a world that is hurtling out of control.