There’s something about the hot weather that makes me want to pick up a book or three. Maybe it’s that leftover feeling from childhood that summer will last forever, that there’s time enough for everything, even reading for pleasure.

So at the last NJNA chapter meeting I asked some of our brilliant, talented NJNA members for their summer reading “picks.” They were generous enough to share the following recommendations.

If you have favorite books to share, let us all know by commenting below.

Happy reading!  Mally Becker

• Carol King is reading Robert Crais, who writes thrillers. “You never guess ‘who did it,’” she said. She also recommends Michael Connolly’s books, whih feature Harry Bosch.

• Sue Chadwick gives a “thumbs up” to the “Goddesses Anonymous” series by Emilie Richards. These novels take place in Asheville, NC, and Sue likes that each story features women helping other women.

• Carol Friedman recently read The Lady in Gold by Anne-Marie O’Connor, the true story that inspired the film “The Woman in Gold.” Carol then visited the painting at the center of the story, Gustav Klimt’s “Portrait of Adele Bloch-Bauer,” which hangs in the Neue Galerie in New York City.

• Heidi Kelleher enjoyed A Man Called Ove by Fredrick Bachman. People Magazine called this book: “A charming debut …You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, you’ll feel new sympathy for the curmudgeons in your life.” Heidi also recommends All Over But the Shoutin,’ a memoir about growing up dirt-poor in Alabama by Rick Bragg, a Pulitzer-Prize-winning reporter.

• Nancy Brighton is in the middle of Havisham, by Ronald Frame. This prequel to Great Expectations tells the story of how and why Miss Havisham came to stalk the halls of her mansion in the tattered wedding dress she wore in Charles Dickens’ masterpiece.

• Jill Williams enjoys the bibliophile mysteries by Kate Carlisle, featuring bookbinder Brooklyn Wainwright. She also recommends: the Gregor Demarkian series by Jane Haddam; Jeffrey Sigar’s mysteries, which are set in Greece; L.B. Hathaway’s Posie Parker series spanning the 1920s, Joseph Kanon’s thrillers, which are set primarily in post-WWII Europe; and, Susan Elia MacNeal’s spectacular Maggie Hope series, which begins with Churchill’s Secretary.

• Cathryn Curia recommends The Bregdan Chronicles, a sprawling series of historical fiction novels that take place in the shadow of the Civil War. She also enjoys Adriana Trigiani’s stories, which include The Shoemaker’s Wife, and Jeffrey Archer’s historical family drama, The Clifton Chronicles.

• Diane Burgess also enjoys Jeffrey Archer’s novels and those by Robert Galbraith (a.k.a. J.K. Rowling) featuring British detective Cormoran Strike.

• Nancy Winterbauer likes Jacqueline Winspear’s series of mysteries featuring psychologist and investigator Maisie Dobbs, which takes place in Great Britain between WWI and WWII.