June 2025: A New Side to Toni Morrison, Black Gatsby, and It's Britney, Bitch.

June Books on Deck

We’ve made it to summer, party people, and I for one can’t wait. I am a summer baby, and a lover of the heat, the sweat, and the snacks. I personally observe extended summer dates, starting at Memorial Day Weekend and ending on the true last day off summer, September 22nd. I do not let school calendars harsh my vibe.

Even though I identify as as summer enthusiast, I am not a summer/beach reader. At least in the sense that I do not read summer/beach reads. In the summer, I go dark. I read my most intense reads of the year during the season. If you’ll accept that any book you read on a beach is a beach read, then lather me in sunscreen and send me to coast¹.

If you too like to get intense in the summer, or just lock into some great nonfiction when it is hot out, I shared my Nonfiction Reading Guide last week. I got you.

Since today is May 30th, and I am still very much hoping to finish one more book between now and the end of the day tomorrow, I decided to push my ranked reading mini-pod to next week. Today you’re getting a quick roundup of The Stacks episodes from May, and then I’ll tell you about the books I’m most excited about releasing in June². It is a lot of books.

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The Stacks May Recap

One of my original dream guests for the podcast was Kara Brown, I finally met her at a party, told her how much I loved her, asked her to come on the podcast. And that, my friends, is how you check off your bucket list!

Daria Burke

hopped on the podcast with me to discuss her debut book, a memoir about trauma and healing, Of My Own Making. We talked about success, white supremacy, and the illusion of perfection.

You all have let me know

Frederick Joseph

is a new instant fave guest and I couldn’t agree more. Frederick came on to talk about his first foray into fiction, This Thing of Ours, as well as sad boy music, reading the classics, and his choice to remove his books from Target.

My favorite friend to go deep with on pop culture, Sam Sanders, came on for a bonus episode about Beyoncé’s Cowboy Carter tour and the age of poptimism.

Unabridged: Poptimism in the Age of Beyoncé with Sam Sanders

Kara Brown returned to the show to book club Devil in a Blue Dress by Walter Mosley. We had a blast trying to parse exactly what happened in the novel, the twists and turns, and why this book still matters 35 years later.

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June Books On Deck

There are a lot of books coming out in June that I am curious and excited about, a lot. My spreadsheet I use to stay on top of book releases I think I would like (or at least like to read) has 24 titles. For perspective, in April I only had 10. I really hate lists that are all “look out for these 379 books coming out next month”. Please be serious, book list makers. I did my best here, I whittled the 24 down to the books I legit couldn’t imagine making a June list without including.That means I left off a few bigger buzzier titles³. Which, I am okay with for two reasons:

1. I know other folks are talking about and posting about them.

2. I likely won’t read them unless they get end of year buzz because I want to read all this other stuff.

All that being said, I got my June list down to 12 books. That feels close to manageable. The books are listed here in publishing order, and anything I’ve already read (or started) appears in bold.

• Baddest Man: The Making of Mike Tyson by Mark Kriegel (June 3)
  Is there such thing as a millennial sports fan who isn’t at least a little fascinated with Mike Tyson? If such a person exists, I do not know them. A Mike Tyson biography? Feels like a must read, right?

• I’ll Tell You When I’m Home: A Memoir by Hala Alyan (June 3)
  Hala Alyan was on The Stacks last year for her poetry collection The Moon That Turns You Back. She referenced having a forthcoming memoir, and now it is here. It is about her journey to motherhood through surrogacy. In case you missed Hala on The Stacks, I got you.

• Roadside: My Journey to Iraq and the Long Road Home by Dylan Park-Pettiford (June 3)
  I’m a sucker for a modern war book. I don’t read a lot of “military memoirs” but this one caught my eye because it is about a mixed kid (Black and Korean) from California who enlists after 9/11.

• Bad Company: Private Equity and the Death of the American Dream by Megan Greenwell (June 10)
  The story of the ways private equity is ruining America and the economy as told through the narratives of four employees who had their lives and communities destroyed when PE firms took over. Reported. Investigative. My kind of shit⁴.

• The Great Mann by Kyra Davis Lurie (June 10)
  A retelling of The Great Gatsby set in Black Los Angeles in 1945. Black. Los Angeles. Classic retelling. They got me with this one.

• King of Ashes by S. A. Cosby (June 10)
  Another violent thriller from a (newish) superstar in the genre. Obsessed with vengeance and a family tragedy, the Carruthers brothers take on some bad dudes when their dad is in a life threatening car accident. It’s a wild ride and graphic as hell.

• Waiting for Britney Spears: A True Story, Allegedly by Jeff Weiss (June 10)
  The one liner on this from the publisher reads as follows “A frenetic, gonzo account of Britney Spears’s historic rise and equally tragic fall told by an iconoclastic music journalist.” Did they get you with that? They sure as hell got me!

• Human Nature: Nine Ways to Feel About Our Changing Planet by Kate Marvel (June 17)
  I was introduced to Kate Marvel through reading What If We Get It Right? by

  Ayana Elizabeth Johnson
  last year. At the end of 2024, when I asked Ayana what book she was most excited to read in 2025, she said Human Nature. That earned it instant placement on my spreadsheet. In Human Nature, Marvel uses nine feelings (fear, hope, joy) to talk about the science of climate change. I am so intrigued by the premise.

  The Best Things We Read in 2024

• Next to Heaven by James Frey (June 17)
  I fear I am a James Frey apologist. I know he lied in his memoirs, but like… they were so good. I liked them enough to go on to read his first novel⁵. So yeah, I’m going to read this novel about rich people behaving badly in the suburbs. I’m the problem.

• These Heathens by Mia McKenzie (June 17)
  In 1960 Georgia, a teen girl must get an abortion and she enlists the help of her teacher. It takes her into the world of the civil rights movement. This will either be a book I love or something that feels a little too Forrest Gumpian, but I am hearing such good things about it, I will be giving it a try.

• Toni at Random: The Iconic Writer's Legendary Editorship by Dana A. Williams (June 17)
  Everyone knows and respects the brilliance of Toni Morrison as a writer, but this book looks into her profound impact on literature from her days as an editor at Random House. I am so hyped!

• The Girls Who Grew Big by Leila Motley (June 24)
  I am looking forward to Motley’s second novel after her smash debut Nightcrawling, its about a group of teenaged moms in Florida and that premise is calling my name.

Your turn, what books coming out in June are you excited about?

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1. I actually am more of a pool girlie. Sand? Not my thing.

2. For those who like to know my thinking process, I like to share my “books on deck” before the first pub day of the month, which for June is Tuesday the third. If I wait to post the mini-pod with the on deck list you’d miss out on the first pub days of June. That’s why sometimes I break these up. If the first pub day of the new month is after the the first Friday, then you’ll get both together in one post. The more you know.

3. Because I know you’ll ask, here are a few of the buzzy books I am interested in but had to leave off because I am not itching to read them.

• The Dry Season by Melissa Febos

• Flashlight by Susan Choi

• Great Black Hope by Rob Franklin

4. Should also be noted that when Brian Goldstone (author of There Is No Place for Us) was on The Stacks, I asked him to write a book about how fucked Blackstone is and he said, that Bad Company was coming and basically does just that. So, yeah. I am hella hyped for his one.

5. Which came out after his lies were exposed.