Even with being at home most of the day, it’s so hard to actually get into reading the books that you have on your list, but I have committed myself to read at least once a day to get me off social media for a while and it is something I really love to do.

Below are a list of books that are on my “need to read lists” for at least the rest of the year.

1. Midnight Sun by Stephenie Meyers

Need I say more? If you are a fan of the series, I know you will be dying to read this book. I have been dying to read this book for years and it is finally out. It’s the Twilight Series in the perspective of Edward Cullens. In the previous books, the story was told in Bella’s perspective. It will be interesting to see the story through his eyes.

2. The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett

From The New York Times-bestselling author of The Mothers, a stunning new novel about twin sisters, inseparable as children, who ultimately choose to live in two very different worlds, one black and one white.

The Vignes twin sisters will always be identical. But after growing up together in a small, southern black community and running away at age sixteen, it’s not just the shape of their daily lives that is different as adults, it’s everything: their families, their communities, their racial identities. Many years later, one sister lives with her black daughter in the same southern town she once tried to escape. The other secretly passes for white, and her white husband knows nothing of her past. Still, even separated by so many miles and just as many lies, the fates of the twins remain intertwined. What will happen to the next generation, when their own daughters’ storylines intersect? (www.bookshop.org)

Not only does this book have amazing reviews all over, the story is just interesting and intriguing. I am so interested in getting to know the characters. If you like books with a psychological twists this will be a great book for you. Honestly, if a book doesn’t have some type of psychology twist to me its just missing something for me. A story of twins separated and live different lives. 

3.All Boys Aren’t Blue by George M. Johnson

In a series of personal essays, prominent journalist and LGBTQIA+ activist George M. Johnson explores his childhood, adolescence, and college years in New Jersey and Virginia. From the memories of getting his teeth kicked out by bullies at age five, to flea marketing with his loving grandmother, to his first sexual relationships, this young-adult memoir weaves together the trials and triumphs faced by Black queer boys.Both a primer for teens eager to be allies as well as a reassuring testimony for young queer men of color, All Boys Aren’t Blue covers topics such as gender identity, toxic masculinity, brotherhood, family, structural marginalization, consent, and Black joy. Johnson’s emotionally frank style of writing will appeal directly to young adults. (www.booshop.org)

A book with so many important themes that we are starting to alter our thinking about is so important to read this year. 2020 has definitely being a crazy year, but it has also been a time of reflection for all of us. I would recommend this book if you are looking to read about a personal account of a young man’s life that happens to be black and queer. 

4.PushOut The Criminalization of Black Girls in Schools by Monique W. Morris

In a work that Lisa Delpit calls “imperative reading,” Monique W. Morris (Black Stats, Too Beautiful for Words) chronicles the experiences of Black girls across the country whose intricate lives are misunderstood, highly judged–by teachers, administrators, and the justice system–and degraded by the very institutions charged with helping them flourish. Called “compelling” and “thought-provoking” by Kirkus Reviews, Pushout exposes a world of confined potential and supports the rising movement to challenge the policies, practices, and cultural illiteracy that push countless students out of school and into unhealthy, unstable, and often unsafe futures. (www.bookshop.org

This is a must read if you are an educator, and if you are not. It’s so important to be aware of social issues that affect people around us. You never know the different you can make when you change a few things about your life and the way you treat others.

5.The Last of The Moon Girls by Barbara Davis

Lizzy Moon never wanted Moon Girl Farm. Eight years ago, she left the land that nine generations of gifted healers had tended, determined to distance herself from the whispers about her family’s strange legacy. But when her beloved grandmother Althea dies, Lizzy must return and face the tragedy still hanging over the farm’s withered lavender fields: the unsolved murders of two young girls, and the cruel accusations that followed Althea to her grave.

Lizzy wants nothing more than to sell the farm and return to her life in New York, until she discovers a journal Althea left for her–a Book of Remembrances meant to help Lizzy embrace her own special gifts. When she reconnects with Andrew Greyson, one of the few in town who believed in Althea’s innocence, she resolves to clear her grandmother’s name.

But to do so, she’ll have to decide if she can accept her legacy and whether to follow in the footsteps of all the Moon women who came before her. (www.bookshop.org)

I love a book with a great story, a hint of family secrets, and add a magical touch to it, and I’m sold. I can’t wait to read this story. I have a good feeling about it. I am so curious about the Moon Girl Farm.

What’s on your to read list for the rest of 2020? Comment down below.