This is a great tool for book club leaders and/or anyone looking to schedule great reads to review for the Spring/Summer season. I like that this book makes me aware of titles that I hadn’t heard of before. I was amazed that there were 44 extended excerpts of notable, highly anticipated emerging authors and other books that have a buzz about them. I hadn’t expected so many!

I liked that the release dates, the publisher, the authors bio and the cover along with a sneak peek (chapter excerpts) gave me a chance to get to know books I never would have picked up because I couldn’t get past the book cover.

The book is broken up into 4 part, 1.Fiction, 2, Debut novels 3. Non-fiction 4. Young Adult. If you are hooked by a book you can request most of these books through Netgalley.I liked the wide range collection. It made it easy explore genres I never would have taken a second look other wise..

Some of the well-known fiction authors featured are Brit Bennett, Mike Birbiglia, Debra Jo Immergut, Sue Monk Kidd, Veronica Roth, Jessica Anthony, Julie Clark, Brandy Colbert, Jennifer Finney Boylan, Sam Lansky, Charolette McConaghy, Amy Meyerson, David Nicholls, Anny Solomn, Kawai Strong Washburn and many more.

This is the first time I’ve read through the Publishers Lunch Buzz Books. It won’t be the last. I look forward to doing this again.

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher. I was not required to write a positive review. The opinions I have expressed are my own. I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission’s 16 CFR, Part 255 “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising”
Nora St. Laurent
TBCN Where Book Fun Begins!
The Book Club Network blog www.psalm516.blogspot.com

What a great opportunity to browse through ARCs, thank you NetGalley.! It can be hard to select titles based on the description alone and reading first chapters was exceedingly helpful. I found that the Brit Bennet book to be the most promising and a few others appealed as well. I know this is not a typical review, and just feedback, so I will keep it short. When I read the full books that were of interest, I will post those reviews on Goodreads (and here if I read them via NetGalley ARCs),

Great lists! Looking forward to the next few months of reading. Love that Netgalley puts this together.

A great list of books in this collection made me super excited about what is come this year! I look forward to accessing Buzz books more regularly now, as this has made me geeked about reading again!

This is my first seasonal 'Buzz Books' but won't be my last!

This edition lists notable books due to be published in Spring/Summer 2020 and gives an extract from 44 of the most exciting. The titles cover fiction, non fiction, debut novels and YA. Some of these you will already be aware of but many that caught my eye were by new authors or authors I hadn't read before so it's a great way to expand your reading experience.

I won't list all the ones I added to my already swollen tbr as there are too many and everyone's taste is different. Most are available on Netgalley (although depending on the publisher may be restricted to US readers), but rest assured however you get hold of new books it's going to be a great Summer!

A wonderful source for finding the best of new / upcoming releases, some of which include generous excerpts from the best-of-the-best books for release through the Spring 2020 including debut authors and highlights of well-known, best-selling authors.

Notable Fiction authors included are Anne Tyler, James McBride, Emily St. John Mandel, Emma Straub, Eimear McBride, Otessa Moshfegh, and Richard Ford, Lionel Shriver, Gail Godwin, Joyce Carol Oates, Ivy Pochoda, Christopher Moore, Michael Farris Smith, Sebastian Barry, and more.

Debut authors include Elizabeth Wetmore whose novel Valentine I’m about halfway through, and loving every second. In the past, I’ve found some real gems among these debut novels. I find Buzz Books especially helpful when checking out these debuts, since the excerpts give you enough to determine if they are something you think you’d enjoy.

There are many listed among the Commercial Fiction new / upcoming releases, among them Joe R. Lansdale, Sue Monk Kidd, Christina Lauren, C.J. Box, Elin Hilderbrand, and many others.

A large number of non-fiction books are those based on the current political landscape, both sides, as well as autobiographies and biographies. Along with those are several memoirs, as well as pages of books listed in the history and crime category.

Well worth the time to peruse, there’s a little something for everyone, no matter what you typically read.

I look forward the new Buzz Books each season. I always enjoy reading the excerpts of upcoming must reads and this one did not disappoint. It had me adding many new titles to my "want to read" list for the coming year. If you like to build the anticipation of what is to come, check this book out.

I love these books, I think it is a great concept for people to see what books they may of may not be interested in reading.
I have read quite a few books I wouldn't have thought I would be interested in because of Buzz Books.
Having said that, the books featured in the 2020 Spring and Summer left a lot to be desired, there were only a couple that I was really into.

The rating for this book is based on the premise of Buzz Books and not necessarily the actual content.

Buzz Books does it again! Clearly, Spring/Summer 2020 promises a wealth of fabulous reading! Thanks for the preview!

It was so wonderful to read some excerpts from upcoming books. Reading this book made me so excited for what's to come in 2020! I've added many of the included books to my must read this for this spring/summer.

This is my first introduction to Buzz Books and Netgalley. This book was amazing. I wasn't expecting to read it entirely through, but the samples and excerpts were great. Definitely peruse this book if you want to add to your TBR and keep abreast of upcoming hit books!

Another fabulous sampling of new books on the 2020 horizon. I appreciate this array of new and diverse voices and wide range of styles and stories.

As always, great recommendations. Most of the authors I read tend to have releases in March/April and September/October so this is always helpful for me to find new authors for the summer.

Books I’m looking forward to:

Hello, Summwr by Mary Kay Andrews
The Boy from the Woods by Harlan Coben
A Week at the Shore by Barbara Delinsky
28 Summers by Elin Hilderbrand
The Vanishing Half by Britt Bennett
The Last Flight by Julie Clark
The Familiar Dark by Amy Engel
You Again: A Novel by Debra Jo Immergut
Seven Lies by Elizabeth Kay
The Imperfects by Amy Meyerson
Of Literature & Lattes by Katherine Reay
The Orphan Collector by Ellen Marie Wiseman
The Party Upstairs by Lee Conell
True Story by Kate Reed Petty
The Lion’s Den by Katherine St. John
Valentine by Elizabeth Wetmore
The New One by Mike Birbiglia

I love BuzzBooks! For a book lover, it is a great preview of upcoming books to add to my to-be-read list. I always look forward to this publication. Thank you!

This just made by want to read shelf so much bigger. I thoroughly enjoyed a sneak peek into some of this years most anticipated books. I also requested ARCs of several of this in hopes to get my hands on them early! I think this is a great way to find new and interesting books. Thank you to NetGalley for the opportunity to have a sneak peek into these books.

This is only the second Buzz Books edition that I’ve read. I so love seeing the lists and reading excerpts from some upcoming new releases!

5★
“A month is too long to talk online. In the time we have been talking, my imagination has run wild. Based on his liberal use of the semicolon, I just assumed this date would go well. But everything is different IRL.”

You think? This is an excerpt from Luster by Raven Leilani. A black English girl, 23, flirts online with a white married man twice her age, and they do meet In Real Life in the sample provided by Buzz Books. I always enjoy these samplers. Fiction, non-fiction, debuts, Young Adult, plenty of choice. I read some, skim some, skip some. No matter what, I always find something I really want to read.

My favourite this time is an Irish debut, The Ghost Factory by Jenny McCartney, told in the first person by a boy from Belfast. He describes an uncle.

“He was a tame man, really. Any rebellious sinews in him had long ago been replaced with a convenient machine-washable stuffing.”

His father: “You could relax in the expanses of Big Jacky’s silence. It was the mental equivalent of an endless highway stretching out of sight, carrying within it peace and possibility.”

I loved the whole thing and wish I could have kept reading!

A very different book is Migrations by Charlotte McConaghy about a woman who is tracking the fast-disappearing arctic terns. She's put bands on three, and I left her cajoling fisherman into taking her to sea with them by promising the terns will show them where they can still find fish (also fast-disappearing). I can see some interesting relationships developing in this one, and it's also a topical story.

The Last Flight by Julie Clark promises to be a real page-turner. It's about two women switching identities, but one misstep, and it's curtains for someone! A good plot and it seems well-written, too.

The Book of V. by Anna Solomon shows second wife Lily dealing with constant comparisons to her husband's first wife, Vira, who didn't want children. He and Lily have two children, and Lily is struggling in her mind to compete with what she imagines Vira's life is like now. Could be a good one.

Another "V" which looks promising is Valentine by Elizabeth Wetmore.

“Because Gloria Ramírez might not know much on this morning, February 15, 1976, but she knows this: if he hadn’t passed out before he sobered up enough to find his gun or get his hands around her throat, she would already be dead.”

Odessa, Texas, 1976, the wee hours of the morning after Valentine's. Gloria, 14, had been hanging around bored and took a ride in a truck with an oil-worker for something to do. Now she’s stranded in the desert while he’s asleep (maybe?) propped up next to his truck with his gun handy. Can she get to the farmhouse she sees off in the distance?

The Book of Rosy: A Mother's Story of Separation at the Border is Rosayra Pablo Cruz's first-person account, co-authored by Julie Schwietert Collazo, about Rosy’s fleeing Guatemala with her sons. She has borrowed a lot of money to make the trip, and she’s anxious to get out of American detention so she can begin earning money to repay them.

“Every day that I am in here, is a day that puts them at risk, for unpaid debts can mean a death sentence in my country. This is the reality for nearly every migrant from Central America who flees to the United States.”

She and the other women being held in cells rely a lot on prayer. She has a dream while in detention.

“Then, I turned to the back of the Bible, where there are blank pages for notes, and I wrote the dream down. I knew immediately what I had to do. I had to let go. I had to be a believer who has great faith. I had to be someone who gives without asking. I had to surrender fully to God, to stop asking for what I want. I had to say, simply, ‘God, let Thy will be done.’”

I’m a great fan of American Dirt, which caused a lot of controversy about a white woman telling the story of a Mexican migrant woman fleeing from a cartel boss to the U.S. I will be interested to see if Rosy’s own story will have as much impact as the Lydia’s fictional one. My review of American Dirt is on Goodreads. https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/2892939917

Another story of an undocumented family in the States is The Son of Good Fortune, the debut novel of Lysley Tenorio who has won awards for his short fiction. Here we have a Filipino mother who makes her living scamming men on the internet (convinced she is still overseas and needs airfare to the U.S. to meet them). Her teen-aged son, Excel, has apparently left home and returned more than once, but this time he's determined to get out. Interesting premise and the writing makes me want to read more.

I must also make mention of Sand Talk: How Indigenous Thinking Can Save the World, by Aboriginal author and Senior Lecturer at Monash University Tyson Yunkaporta. I am fascinated by memory 'systems' and the oral traditions that we're losing in the digital age.

It concerns me that we are headed to George Orwell's famous Nineteen Eighty-Four where history is erased in the Ministry of Truth and replaced by whatever Big Brother would like history to look like now. I'm happy to listen to Yunkaporta's opinions in spite of his 'apology' for not having a full traditional education in the law and the lore.

“. . . in fact, I’m uninitiated, which means that at the age of forty-seven I still only have the cultural knowledge and status of a fourteen-year-old boy. A swimming pool was built on the initiation ground back home, so those rites of passage don’t happen anymore.”

I’ve just grabbed a few that caught my eye, but there are heaps more, so grab a copy of this issue. They are free from their website. http://buzz.publishersmarketplace.com/

Many are available for NetGalley reviewers to request (no guarantees), and many already have some reviews on Goodreads already to help you decide.

So many books, so little time!

Buzz Books is the perfect way to help you decide which books to request. With so many available, it's great to be able to read so many excerpts to narrow down which books you want to read. I look forward to the next issue!

This was an interesting collection of previews! I definitely found a few that I have now requested! Thanks so much for the oportunity to preview these upcoming titles!

I love Buzz Books because I learn something new each time I pick one up! These books offer such a great guide to forthcoming titles. There's a list at the front, with titles, their authors, publishers, and publication dates listed by genre. This is followed by several excerpts from upcoming books.

Of those excerpted, I'm most excited for Luster by Raven Leilani and The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett. But Of Literature & Lattes by Katherine Reay also looks right up my alley. And I bet David Nicholls could make me cry all over again, with Sweet Sorrow (I'm still not over One Day!). I also bet Mike Birbiglia's The New One will be funny and worth a read.

One thing's for sure: We're lucky to have so many great books on the horizon!