Today I’m sharing some of the May 2026 books on my radar. These are books that are releasing in May that I’m excited about, interested in reading, or just wanting to share with others. This post contains Amazon affiliate links. If you choose to make a purchase after clicking on my link, I may receive a small commission.
The Summer of Second Chances by KL Walther (5/5) – Olivia Lupo feels stuck. All her friends have gone on to their first year of college while she’s still at home with her family. There’s a good reason though, her beloved grandmother, Annie, has dementia, and Olivia can’t bear the thought of being so far from home when Annie needs her the most.
So when her stepmother asks the family to spend three weeks of the summer on Martha’s Vineyard, Olivia plans to say no…until she discovers an old box Annie filled with photos and memories from her own time there. Olivia decides to follow in her grandmother’s footsteps and spend some time on the island that Annie describes as magical.
When she arrives, she meets Connor, a boy from her past who really wants to be a part of her present… and future. Olivia’s never thought about forever with someone until meeting Connor…and it scares her. How can she make plans when all she wants to do is keep close to her grandmother before she’s gone forever? As she recreates the memories Annie made a lifetime ago, she has to decide if she’s finally willing to give someone her heart, just when she needs it the most.
Our Perfect Storm by Carley Fortune (5/5) – Best friends have one week in paradise to fix their friendship or fall apart in this heart-stopping, utterly romantic new novel from the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Every Summer After and One Golden Summer.
Frankie and George have been best friends since they were eight years old. Both passionate, impulsive, and headstrong—they’ve always clashed . . . and come back together. Until now. It’s the eve of Frankie’s wedding weekend, and she doesn’t know where they stand or even if George will show up as her best man.
Then, at the start of the festivities, in walks George. For one glorious evening, surrounded by her loved ones, Frankie’s life is finally perfect. But it all comes crashing down when her fiancé dumps her the next morning, leaving only a note as an explanation.
Crushed and confused, Frankie returns to her family’s home to wallow. But George has a different idea and a plan for healing Frankie’s broken heart. He wants her to go on her honeymoon. With him. For one week, to the lush rainforests and misty beaches of Tofino.
Frankie agrees, seeing the trip for what it really is: one last chance to repair their friendship. Even if it means unearthing secrets and long buried feelings neither knows how to handle. Even if it means falling apart for good.
Wombat Waiting by Katherine Applegate (5/5) – From the Newbery Award-winning, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The One and Only Ivan and Odder comes a stunning middle grade standalone novel-in-verse about compassion, resilience, and surprising friendships, following a dog named Wombat in the aftermath of a catastrophic fire.
Wombat isn’t actually a wombat—but when the homeless dog is discovered, singed and ash-covered after a terrible fire destroys a community, someone tags her with the nickname and it sticks.
Wombat is a “destiny dog.” Something inside of her (she nicknames it “Voice’) keeps telling her there’s a special someone out there who is meant to be her person.
Surrounded by a devastated town, Wombat takes up residence on bench near the makeshift community center, an old brick warehouse that, for the most part, survived the flames. A small part of the community center evacuation site has been repurposed for the local wildlife rehab sanctuary that burned down. All of the animals were spared, and the temporary quarters include an elderly fruit bat and a young Northern saw-whet owl.
No matter what, Wombat refuses to move from her perch, despite the efforts of many humans. Clearly the dog is waiting for someone. But for whom? And what are the odds they survived?
Fans of modern classics like Because of Winn-Dixie, Pax, and Katherine Applegate’s own Crenshaw and Odder, and timeless tales like Charlotte’s Web, will find a friend in Wombat and her story.
Enormous Wings by Laurie Frankel (5/5) – At seventy-seven, Pepper Mills is too old to be a stranger in a strange land. She didn’t choose the Vista View Retirement Community of Austin, Texas―that would be her three grown children―but when she grudgingly moves in, she not only makes new friends, she falls in love. Then the exhaustion, vomiting, and confusion start. She fears it’s cancer, dementia, a stroke. But a raft of tests later, the news is even more shocking: She’s pregnant.
As word gets out, everyone wants a piece of her: the press and paparazzi, activists and medical researchers, belly-rubbers and rubber-neckers all descending on Vista View while Pepper struggles to determine her next move. Soon she has some hard decisions to make―and some she’s not allowed to make.
Enormous Wings is an urgent novel about female agency and bodily autonomy, morality and mortality. It’s about what happens when you don’t get to choose anymore. It’s about motherhood and family, sex and love and friendship, and how those bedrocks―even so late in the day―can still change, and then change everything.
Good Joy, Bad Joy by Mikki Brammer (5/5) – From the bestselling author of The Collected Regrets of Clover comes a vibrant, heartfelt novel about friendship over the decades, self-discovery, and what it means to have a life well-lived.
Break the rules. Find your joy.
For over eighty years, Joy Bridport has played by the rules: she’s been a devoted wife and mother, contributing to the community in her small Hudson Valley town. But her quiet existence is jolted when she learns that her best friend, Hazel, only has months left to live. Hazel has always been the more adventurous one of their duo, and she seems at peace with all that she’s squeezed out of her long life. Yet Joy realizes she can’t say the same.
Determined to live boldly and make the most of the time that she and Hazel have left together, Joy steps outside of her comfort zone―and into a bit of trouble. But as her foray into rule-breaking escalates into committing petty crime, Joy must consider what kind of legacy she wants to leave behind, and whether there’s a way for her to embrace the liberation that “Bad Joy” offers without losing all that she holds dear.
Is it ever too late to become who we’re meant to be? With laugh-out-loud hijnks and emotional heft, Good Joy, Bad Joy is a heartwarming and wise celebration of the choices we make, the friendships we cherish, and the lengths we go for love.
Caller Unknown by Gillian McAllister (5/5) – How far would you go to rescue your child? A mother races against the clock—and finds herself on the wrong side of the law—in a desperate fight to save her teenage daughter in this pulse-pounding thriller from the author of Reese’s Book Club Pick and New York Times bestseller Wrong Place Wrong Time.
There is nothing that Simone won’t do for her daughter, Lucy. The two have always been close, and with Lucy about to leave home for university, they depart the UK for a vacation to Texas to spend some quality time together. But when Simone awakens on their first morning in the desert, Lucy is gone, missing from their rental cabin. In her place is a cell phone, and a voice on the other line issues a shocking ransom demand. Don’t tell the police. Come to this location. And be prepared to do a deal…
Though Simone’s husband urges her to bring in the authorities for help, she knows she can’t take any chances. The kidnappers might kill Lucy if she tells anyone. No mother would take that risk. Instead, that night, she drives to the isolated meet-up.
What she finds there changes everything. The mysterious kidnapper doesn’t want money. They want Simone to do something. The unthinkable.
A catastrophic chain of events is set in motion, with chilling consequences that extend beyond Simone and her family. What follows is a heart-pounding journey through the small towns and punishing deserts of remote Texas, in which Simone’s courage—and morality—is pushed to the brink as she discovers what it truly means to be a mother.
First and Forever by Lynn Painter (5/12) – From #1 New York Times bestselling author Lynn Painter comes an utterly irresistible romantic comedy about a football star and his team’s die-hard fan who find themselves entangled in a PR stunt that only one of them knows is fake.
Duffy Distefano loves three things: her dad, the family cat, and Minneapolis Coyote football. So after she gets booed out of a game and becomes the internet’s villain following an awful encounter with the team’s beloved mascot, she is disgruntled, to put it mildly. Eager to clear the air, Duffy agrees to an interview on a hit morning show. She doesn’t expect a co-guest to join her—especially not the Coyotes’ star tight end.
When MVP Connor Cunningham gets tasked with damage control to help his team out of a PR nightmare, he finds himself in a highly amusing verbal sparring match with a recently wronged fan on live TV. The interview instantly goes viral, and the public is obsessed with them. Despite his distaste for PR stunts, a strong push from the Coyotes’ PR team to ride the wave results in Connor asking Duffy out. But he quickly discovers being with Duffy is much easier than he anticipated, and somehow it doesn’t feel fake to him. This secret can only blow up, but all he knows is that if he messes things up with Duffy, it’ll be the greatest fumble of his life.
Oozing with chemistry that feels like fireworks and banter that makes you swoon, Lynn Painter delivers her signature blend of heart and humor in this love story that you won’t soon forget.
The Shippers by Katherine Center (5/19) – She wants him to help her woo someone else.
Genius. Foolproof. Can’t go wrong.
DELUXE EDITION―a gorgeous hardcover edition featuring beautiful sky blue sprayed edges!
After a lifetime of being bad at love, JoJo Burton vows to solve her intimacy issues once and for all at her sister’s destination wedding on a cruise ship. Armed with pop psychology, she diagnoses herself with a fixation on the neighborhood guy who was her first crush and first kiss (and who just happens to be a newly-divorced wedding guest). Determined to woo him for closure, she ropes in her childhood bestie, Cooper Watts, as her wingman. Cooper: who RSVPed no, but showed up anyway. Cooper: who moved to London without a word four years ago. Cooper: who broke her heart.
Shipboard antics abound in this witty, heart-tugging, childhood-friends-to-lovers romance, as JoJo and Cooper team up, fake flirt, slow dance, share a cabin, sing duets, get jealous, answer long-held questions, and finally, at last, discover truths about each other that will change everything.
Soon By You by Dahlia Adler (5/19) – 27 Dresses meets The Intimacy Experiment in this sexy, emotional, opposites-attract rom-com set in New York City’s Modern Orthodox community.
Arielle Becker is one hora away from a meltdown. After one too many bridesmaid gigs―complete with Spanx, heels, and hideous dresses―she’s officially over love and its overpriced trappings. Especially when they keep coming with the same smug, judgmental wedding singer.
Judah Klein is New York’s go-to Modern Orthodox wedding singer and most eligible bachelor. Years of failed setups have left him jaded, until repeated clashes with a fiery bridesmaid wake him right up. But when snarks turn to sparks, and fights turn to feelings, things get complicated.
Arielle is not a girl who settles down. And Judah is not a guy who hooks up. So why does walking away feel impossible?
Dolly All The Time by Annabel Monaghan (5/26) – If they start by pretending, can they end with something real?
Dolly Brick has never met a problem she couldn’t solve. Not when her mom left when she was twelve, and not at thirty-nine when she moves with her son back to Whitfield, Rhode Island, for the summer to keep her dad and brother from losing the family home.
So when she comes across Stewart Whitfield—annoyingly handsome scion of the Whitfield family—with a flat tire and at the wrong end of a very public, very humiliating breakup, it’s in her nature to help. But Stewart’s proposed arrangement ends up being more than either of them bargained for, because as public dinners and high-society benefits turn into sunset boat rides and kisses that hit her bloodstream like a ghost pepper, Dolly starts to feel something more than helpful. She’s never relied on anyone besides herself—can she really start now?
Will you add any of these to your to be read list?
