Dear Great Book Guru, With Summer 2024 coming to an end, I am craving a “vacation” book - lots of characters, lovely setting, and quick-paced. Any thoughts? End of Summer Blues

Dear End of Summer Blues, I know the feeling – Sea Cliff summers are magical with the beautiful beach, its Cliffside Café, lots of outdoor dining in our great restaurants and shops, concerts at the Beach and the iconic Sunset Serenades! We are great fans of Emma Straub - owner of our favorite bookstores in Brooklyn, Books Are Magic, and award-winning author.  Her 2014 bestseller THE VACATIONERS is the perfect end of summer read.  Set in a spacious rental home in Majorca, the story is told from the viewpoints of its seven characters: Frannie, the matriarch and food critic, Jim, her husband who has just been fired because of a brief romance with his boss’s daughter; Bobby, their son and his much older personal trainer/girlfriend Carmen; Sylvia, their daughter who is about to begin college and wants  desperately to “reinvent” herself; and, finally, Charles and Lawrence, friends of Franny’s. All these characters arrive at the vacation home with secrets and sorrows.  Living in close proximity doesn’t make any of these problems go away and before the two weeks of vacation have ended, the reader is left wondering why anyone would want to leave home. Great fun and highly recommended!