15 of Our All-Time Favorite Beach Reads
This surfside canon offers an immersion so total, you won't even notice the Channing Tatum–like lifeguard pulling on his cargo pants and calling it a day.
By Leigh Haber
1 of 15
Mama Day
By Gloria Naylor
312 pages;
Vintage
Naylor's prose is electrifying, provocative, intricate and unlike anyone else's. In this 1988 novel, she introduces us to the inhabitants of Willow Springs, a Sea Island off Georgia populated solely by descendants of slaves—among them Mama Day, who can summon lightning storms and see the future in her dreams. What we hope to see? A Naylor renaissance.
— Leigh Haber
Published 06/20/2014
