It’s been a pretty great summer, friends, and you’ve been making the most of it. Hitting up your favorite local farm stands, checking out all the local events to keep FOMO at bay, supping and sipping at our East End waterside restaurants, seeing friends, getting sandy and salty, and just basically taking in all that summer fun and sunshine. But maybe all that activity has you jonesing for a little quiet time with a good plot to pore over.
Eastern Long Island is the source of much creativity, from artists to music to writers, and this year there’s been a bevy of books from authors either from or inspired by the East End. Here are our 2026 picks for plots that fit for your beach blanket this Labor Day Weekend.
When you’re ready to pick one up, consider shopping local first—try Burton’s Books in Greenport; A Book Place in Riverhead; Sag Harbor Books, Canio’s Books and BookHampton in the Hamptons; and Finley’s Fiction and Black Cat Books on Shelter Island.
RFK, Jr.: The Fall and Rise by Isabel Vincent
Investigative reporter and part-time Westhampton Beach resident Isabel Vincent was given the secret personal journals of health secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. by the friend of his deceased former wife, Mary tk. Sixteen years in the making, this riveting book leaves no stone unturned in Kennedy’s life, from his struggles with infidelity and growing up in the complicated Kennedy family, to his early days as an environmental advocate and democratic stalwart, to his strange flip into Trumplandia, science denying and, er, fascination with animal parts. It’s also an intense historical tour de force on modern politics from the Kennedy vantage point. This one is not to be missed.
A Fair Corpse: An Art of Murder Mystery by Helen A. Harrison
The former director of the Pollock-Krasner House and Study Center in Springs, art historian and journalist, Helen A. Harrison of Sag Harbor has released her sixth book in her Art of Murder mystery series. A Fair Corpse is set in 1939 as the New York World’s Fair is preparing to open. Intrigue builds as rookie NYPD officer Brian F.X. Fitzgerald investigates a series of mishaps and a murder involving mural painters at the fair, as the German-American Bund rises in popularity and war threatens.
Valley of the Moms by Hannah Selinger
Truth teller Hannah Selinger is a contribute to both Northforker and Southforker magazines, and probably best known for her James Beard-nominated food writing and tough take on the restaurant industry from 2025, Cellar Rat: My Life in the Restaurant Underbelly. You’d think she’d take a break, but instead Selinger churned out her first novel, Valley of the Moms, a chilling, clear-eyed look at the cracks, loneliness, secrets, competitiveness and complacency that plagues motherhood, all tied up in a murder mystery. Delicious and detailed, we highly recommend tearing into this addictive debut piece of fiction from one of our favorite contributors.
The Summer I Found You by Jennifer O’Brien
Home design blogger and influencer O’Brien’s latest novel is set on the North Fork, where recently divorced single mom Dahlia Newberry must handle the sale of her family’s fixer-upper beach house. She finds a summer romance with her handsome neighbor, a reality TV star, while untangling a mystery involving three generations of family.
O’Brien, the creator of the popular design platform City Farmhouse, will discuss her novel through a Zoom event with the Mattituck-Laurel Library on Wednesday, Sept. 9 at 6:30 p.m. To sign up, look here.
Single Girls by John Searles
Sag Harbor resident John Searles lovingly recreates the early years of his old friend and mentor, the groundbreaking head of Cosmopolitan magazine, Helen Gurley Brown. The blending creative-license strokes on HGB’s actual past into a fictionalized version of it do not detract in the least from this “Go get ’em, girl” tour de force. It’s also a reminder that while Cosmo might have gained a rep over the years for being the “how to please a man” mag, that’s never really what it was, and certainly wasn’t HGB’s vision for it and her largely female staff at a time when women weren’t allowed out of the advice and cooking tips ghetto of journalism. One of the best beach reads of the summer.
American Rambler: Walking the Trail of Johnny Appleseed by Isaac Fitzgerald
New York Times bestselling author Fitzgerald explores the path of Johnny Appleseed on a year-long journey from Massachusetts to Indiana in this blend of history, memoir and travelogue.
In conjunction with Riverhead’s A Book Place, Fitzgerald will discuss American Rambler with fellow writer Tom Junod at Riverhead Ciderhouse on Sept. 13 at 3 p.m. Tickets are $65 and include a copy of the book, a cider flight and a meet and greet with the authors; to reserve your tickets, click here.
352 pages, $32.00 hardcover; $14.99 eBook
In the Days of my Youth I Was Told What It Means to Be a Man, by Tom Junod
Family. We can’t even help how we define ourselves from it — be it from inside the clan’s embrace or by rejecting it. Shelter Island resident Tom Junod’s memoir about his charismatic, womanizing father is at once as unsettling as it is settling. Through his personal journey to find out exactly who “Big Lou” was after he died, Junod finds the darkest of dark places (the things we both want to know and don’t want to know about our families) where his father dwelled and the pain and beauty of what was left in the wake of it all — and what, exactly, that meant for who the writer became in this world, in and out of Lou’s shadow. Beautifully written, if you’ve ever found yourself wondering and struggling with your own family’s secrets and truths (so, basically, everyone reading this), this tome is well worth the hardcover price of admission.
Precious Friends, Murder in Sag Harbor by Frank Spinelli
Sag Harbor resident Spinelli is a physician, health coach and author who has written several non-fiction books about trauma and recovery and is an advocate for adult survivors of sexual abuse, people living with HIV and rescue animals.
Precious Friends is the third book of fiction in his Angelo Perrotta mysteries series —a psychological thriller where a professor’s crumbling marriage results in scandal and a murder in the Hamptons.
278 pages, $17.95 paperback; $6.99 eBook
Unhinged: A Jennifer Caine Novel by Marlene Tully
Marlene Tully, a former detective with the Suffolk County Police Department, was the first female police officer in the department to be shot in the line of duty. Now retired, she’s written a detective novel, the first in a trilogy published by Lightning Tower Press.
Set in the Catskill Mountains, the book draws on Tully’s extensive policework experience and touches on themes of police corruption and PTSD in first responders. The novel’s protagonist, Jennifer Caine, is a disgraced Suffolk County detective who sets out on the hunt for a killer in her rural upstate hometown.
320 pages, $30 hardcover; $18.99 paperback
Vengeance: the Last Stands of Custer, Crazy Horse and Sitting Bull by Tom Clavin
Set in June, 1876, at the Battle of the Little Bighorn, Sag Harbor resident and #1 New York Times bestselling author Tom Clavin takes a dramatic Lt. Col. George Armstrong Custer’s Last Stand, fought between the combined forces of the Lakota Sioux, Northern Cheyenne and Arapaho tribes against the 7th Calvary Regiment of the United States Army. Clavin not only includes the points of view from those who fought, predominantly the two Native American leaders of the Sioux and Cheyenne — Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse, respectively — but examines the impact the battle had on the Plains Indians while exploring Custer’s intense desire for media attention, fame, and to some degree infamy.
Hollow Bones by Jodi Picoult
There’s a Chinese proverb that says, “luck favors the prepared.” Set to be released on Sept. 15, Jodi Picoult’s latest riveting novel follows Molly Fitzgerald, a woman who lost her mother in the World Trade Center attacks on Sept. 11, 2001 when she was only a few months old. Now an adult, Molly runs the Rhode Island Department for Emergency Preparedness, habitually mapping out ways to save lives during storms, epidemics and airplane crashes. This epic story moves between past and present, explores the idea of planning to protect ourselves, particularly at life’s worst possible moments, the unyielding ties that bind mothers and daughters together forever.
The Paper House by Barbara Josselsohn
Essayist and best-selling novelist Barbara Josselsohn may have just singlehandedly brought letter writing back with The Paper House, her just-released-book that showcases the power a place can hold when it serves its community primarily takes place on Celestine Island, a fictional, quaint coastal island nestled in the Long Island Sound of New York, a location heavily inspired by her own trips to Shelter Island. Following a dual timeline, with part of the historical narrative taking place overseas in England, the story follows Tilly, a woman who opens a paper store after returning to the states after World War II, without her lost love, and then later, Kayla, her great niece who inherits the store after her death.
Kings of the Coast by David Cataletto
This young adult, coming-of-age historical novel — the first penned by David Cataletto, an East Hampton Middle School teacher and environmentalist currently serving as a town trustee — explores the history of the Montaukett during the time of struggle between Dutch and English settlers for control of the land in the mid-17th century. Conveyed through a fictional story, the plot follows the kidnapping of young native Princess Storm Lily and the subsequent impending threat of a coast-wide war.
Madoo the Making of an American Garden by Alejandro Saralegui and Kendell Cronstrom
When the late impressionist painter Robert Dash purchased the not-even-two-acre property in Sagaponack his eventual Madoo (Scottish for “my dove”) Conservancy would sit upon back in 1967, the intention was clear: create a haven where art and the garden coexist. Madoo’s evolution from a bucolic private residence for Dash to its present day role as an open-to-the-public garden series is captured beautifully in book format, with photography by Tria Giovan, and serves as a gentle reminder that our natural world is a constant, ever-changing masterpiece.
