Book review: Saturday Night at the Lakeside Supper Club by J. Ryan Stradal

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You know when you read something that describes a particular place, and you wonder to yourself: have I been in this place? That’s the question cottagers will be asking when they tuck into Saturday Night at the Lakeside Supper Club, a new novel from American writer J. Ryan Stradal.

It’s the tale of a multi-generational family that owns a beloved lakeside restaurant in rural Minnesota, the kind of place where century-old pine trees provide shade out back, where the regulars sip beer while playing a hand of cribbage, and where folks work out their problems by staring into the fire of a mid-summer sunset. The characters have big problems, but it’s clear that it’s this enduring spot that soothes them. By the end of the book, the characters felt like neighbours; people you’d trust to keep an eye on your cottage in the off-season. A delightful summer read.

This review was originally published as “Where Everybody Knows Your Name” in the June/July 2023 issue of Cottage Life.