9 Beautiful Books That Carried Me Through the First Half of 2026

Read time: 10 minutes

The first half of 2026 was a lot. It started intense, in a way I’m still making sense of, and by the time June ended the notes had shifted so completely that if the beginning and the end had happened side by side, I think my head would have spun clean off my shoulders. None of it was expected. I’m still slowly finding my footing again, and a huge part of that credit goes to the books that carried me through it. So this post isn’t really a wrap-up. It’s a thank-you. These are the nine books that stayed with me from January to June, the ones I’d hand to anyone without a second thought, and honestly, the ones that helped put me back together one page (or one audiobook hour) at a time.

The Wedding People by Alison Espach

There are books you stumble into, only to wonder how you went so long without them existing in your life, and this was one of them. Phoebe’s story hits hard: divorced, depressed, and at a crossroads that feels painfully real, with emotional depth that sneaks up on you and turns what could’ve been just funny wedding mishaps into something about relationships, self-worth, and finding reasons to keep going. What surprised me most was how funny this book could be without undercutting its emotional weight, Espach walks that line beautifully. The dialogue occasionally slips into recounting a scene instead of letting you live in it, which pulled me back a step here and there, but the characters feel authentic and the open-ended conclusion lingers beautifully. Read this if you want a book that makes you laugh and then blindsides you with how much it understands grief, because Phoebe will stay with you long after the wedding’s over.

The Guncle by Steven Rowley

I laughed, I cried, and I paused the audiobook just to sit in my feelings more times than I can count. Patrick is an absolute triumph of a character, sharp-tongued, theatrical, deeply loving, but painfully human, and his bond with Maisie and Grant’s mother feels more sibling than in-law. When she dies, his grief doesn’t explode, it settles, heavy and unresolved, and caring for her kids becomes both an act of love and a new way to grieve. Steven Rowley narrating his own book adds a layer of intimacy you can’t fake, every pause and crack in his voice feels earned. Read this if you need a reminder that showing up wildly unqualified is still showing up, because The Guncle will make you laugh out loud on one page and ache on the next.

The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V.E. Schwab

This was my second attempt at Addie LaRue, and the difference four years and an audiobook can make is honestly staggering. First time around, in print, I couldn’t get past the slow start, and it landed in my DNF pile without much ceremony. This time Julia Whelan’s narration pulled me in like a whisper that turns into an obsession, and Addie’s 300 years of being forgotten slowly seeped into my own thoughts until I started wondering if I’d passed her on the street once myself. What destroyed me, in the best way, was Henry. When he remembers her, the world pauses. Read this if you’ve ever wondered whether you’d still matter if no one remembered your name, because Addie will answer that question in a way you won’t shake off for weeks.

The Last Devil to Die by Richard Osman

This book broke me. I was expecting the usual, sharp wit, a murder that shouldn’t be funny but somehow is, Joyce’s diary entries making me snort-laugh, and a tidy resolution wrapped around smuggled goods and suspicious antiques. What I didn’t expect was how deeply it would hurt. The mystery is solid, art forgery, heroin, an execution-style murder that kicks everything off, but let’s be honest, nobody reading book four of this series is here purely for the whodunit. The beating heart of this story belongs to Stephen and Elizabeth, and when his dementia storyline comes full circle, it doesn’t happen loudly, it happens quietly, like a light being turned down on a dimmer switch. Read this if you’ve ever loved someone through the slow theft of memory, because Osman will make you laugh right up until the moment he wrecks you.

Theo of Golden by Allen Levi

This book has a way of reaching in and rearranging something in you without asking permission. Theo doesn’t arrive in Golden with a plan or an agenda, he arrives with attention, the rarest gift anyone can offer another person, and watching him sit with each person’s story like it’s the most important thing he’s ever heard is quietly convicting. The giving in this book isn’t loud or performative, it happens in small, almost invisible ways that build into something intimate and expansive. David Morse’s narration adds an extra layer of warmth that makes Theo feel like someone you’ve met, or wish you had. Read this slowly, out loud if you can, because it doesn’t try to be fast, and somewhere along the way, without you noticing, it’ll soften you too.

I Hope This Finds You Well by Natalie Sue

I picked this up on a whim because the premise sounded deliciously chaotic, access to all your colleagues’ emails would be so much drama, and it pulled a fast one on me. I expected a breezy workplace romp with email scandals and office politics, and Jolene’s curmudgeonly inner monologue is comedy gold, but underneath it Natalie Sue sneaks in something much heavier. Loneliness hums under the surface of almost every character, and the story stops being about what people are saying about each other and becomes about what they’re not saying out loud. Watching Jolene’s walls crumble as she realizes her coworkers are actual humans with their own pain is devastating in the best way. Read this if you’ve ever assumed you knew someone from the outside, because it’ll close with an ache that makes you want to look up and pay a little more attention to the people around you.

Hot Chocolate on Thursday by Michiko Aoyama

This is yet another beautiful example of Japanese translated fiction, capturing a single snapshot in time: a group of strangers gathered by happenstance in a neighborhood cafe. Aoyama moves through the point of view of every patron in that moment, the weight of their morning, what they’re dreading later, the long threads of the past that pulled them to this specific chair at this specific time. Nothing explosive happens, it’s simply a day in the life of a cafe, but much like sitting with your own cup of cocoa and observing the room, this book unveils the hidden depths of the people around you. Japanese literature has this unique gift for magnifying a fleeting moment until it becomes an entire world, and it’s a breath of fresh air in fiction. Read this with an actual cup of hot chocolate in hand, because it’s a short one, you’ll probably finish before your mug is empty, and you’ll be wishing for more time with both.

Mad Mabel by Sally Hepworth

I almost DNF’d this one early on, old lady with a killer past felt like well-trodden territory, but the reviews whispered in my ear and I’m so glad I listened. What starts as a quiet mystery about secrets and suburban suspicion becomes a gut-wrenching meditation on empathy, bias, and who we decide deserves compassion. Hepworth builds Elsie Mabel Fitzpatrick like a master architect, letting the eight-year-old and the eighty-one-year-old bleed into each other until you’re holding your breath between chapters, and the dual timeline is the engine of the entire emotional punch. The narrators brought such tenderness and grit to both timelines that I found myself tearing up in a grocery store parking lot more than once. Read this if you want fiction that holds a mirror up to your worst instincts and best possibilities, because you’ll come out the other side with a heart three sizes bigger.

The Borrowed Life of Frederick Fife by Anna Johnston

I queued this up expecting something gentle, the kind of story you fold laundry to and feel vaguely good about humanity afterward. What I did NOT expect was to be stopped cold, ugly-crying into a throw pillow at one of the most quietly devastating scenes I’ve encountered in years. Tim Carroll doesn’t just narrate Frederick Fife, he IS Frederick Fife, the gentle cadence, the old-world warmth, the quiet dignity of a man who gives everything and asks for nothing back. I have a very specific policy about perfect endings (change so much as a comma and I will find you), and this one earns every single thing it asks you to feel. Read this if you want to be undone in the best way, and listen to it if you can, because the voice IS Frederick Fife.

And so…

Nine books, six months, and not one of them let me down. Looking back at this list now, what gets me isn’t just how good these books were. It’s how much they overlapped with everything else going on, how Frederick Fife found me right when I needed someone gentle, how Mad Mabel showed up when I needed to be reminded that people are more than what they look like from the outside. Books have a way of arriving exactly when you need them, even when you didn’t know you needed anything at all. If the second half of 2026 is even half as good as the first, reading-wise, I’ll count myself lucky. What did you read in the first half of the year that you’re still thinking about? Drop it in the comments, I’m always looking for the next one to fall into.