Chances are you’re flocking to the sand this summer. Perhaps you prefer to perch under a tree near the riverbank or roll out your towel on the small grassy patch at your local pool. No matter where you’re dipping, I hope you’ve packed a book!

It’s officially “beach read” season and, as I prepare to switch off socials and close the laptop for a few weeks, I’m turning my attention to the precarious tower of novels on my bedside table.

Days without plans stretch out in front of me and, while I do have four children, they’re old enough to make their own lunch and navigate their own boredom. If they need me, I’ll be languid with a hat on my head and my face in a book.

My small local beach – which is more of a bay – is quiet. We venture there daily, the six of us and the dog trundling down the street with towels slung over shoulders and a basket full of drink bottles and sunscreen. My partner carries the umbrella, I tuck a paperback under my arm.

There are no lifeguards here and nothing you’d refer to as “surf” but when the sun is out and the wind is low, it’s a postcard.

I’ll inevitably bump into a neighbour and recognise the person in the distance who’s hunched over looking for sea glass at low tide. Bodies lie on striped towels dotted along the sand, some prefer a picnic blanket under the pine tree. I will wander past my fellow beachgoers and subtly check out their literary preferences. Don’t worry, I won’t judge, but I will have to refrain from suggesting what they should read next.

Summer is for reading all the books you didn’t get to throughout the year. The doorstops and shortlists that require a certain level of concentrated attention. Or perhaps you want to frolic in a story that requires absolutely nothing but your ability to scan, turn the page and deeply enjoy the lightness and frivolity it provides. I get it; fantasy-romance is in high demand and for good reason; when end-of-year weariness hits, a pleasurable read is the only way. And when your budget doesn’t allow for oysters, smut fiction may be your aphrodisiac of choice.

New releases are definitely appealing and will no doubt feature heavily under the tree but sometimes you’re called to return to the bookshelf, nostalgic for stories that don’t feature text messages or mention the pandemic. Those dusty paperbacks that line the op shop shelves and are guaranteed to feature in the street library; The Shipping News, Pachinko, The Bonesetter’s Daughter. Preloved paperbacks with a name scribbled on the front page, a yellowing receipt and a forgotten bookmark.

If you’re heading away, I envy your chance to peruse the curated bookshelves of your chosen Airbnb because whatever you read in that holiday home will probably weave itself into the memories of the season. If the book is good enough, the characters will sit like people around the table as you clink glasses, peel prawns and add another dollop of cream to your berries.

Celebrity biographies and crime thrillers are always popular with the beach crowd and the current bestsellers will be as ubiquitous as sandy toddler tantrums. But have you ever considered a short story collection for your balmy afternoon by the sea? They don’t garner quite the attention they deserve but if you’re intrigued you can’t go past Jhumpa Lahiri, Georgia Blain, Lily King or Katherine Heiny. One story before your swim, one after. Perfect.

But sometimes an intriguing multi-generational saga is just what you need as you embark on your annual getaway with the whole crew. When the bickering starts and the tutting over whining kids and parenting choices becomes a daily chorus, you can escape into the pages of someone else’s family drama and ignore your own.

Of course there’s always the possibility that the book you choose to read this season will become one of your favourites; a cosy comfort, a moral compass, a galvanising mandate. Sometime in the future you’ll pull that beloved paperback from the shelf, a few grains of sand will fall to the floor and you’ll remember exactly where you read it and precisely how it felt.

There’s only two rules for summer: every body is a beach body; any book will do.

• Jodi Wilson is the author of three books including Practising Simplicity and The Complete Guide to Postpartum: a mother-focused companion for life after birth, which will be published in July 2025. She writes weekly on substack