Summer Reading from the Community!

Plus one recommendation from moi for your weekend #116

It’s Memorial Day in the US, which means 1/ the three-day unofficial beginning of summer and also 2/ the conclusion of Succession, my thoughts with all who celebrate.

…Did any of you have summer reading in high school? Honestly, I’m still salty about it and still have flashbacks about rushing to finish The Grapes of Wrath in time to write a five-page paper and still prep my first-day-of-school supplies. Let the children enjoy their unscheduled TIME already! Stop preparing us for a life of routinized PRODUCTIVITY without any space to find our bliss! OCCUPY HOMEROOM!

Which is why this week, we, the reading community, celebrate the mental spaciousness that is summer reading, where we get the delicious frisson of book anticipation, one of my top five emotions. I’ve already added a few of these suggestions to my spine-tinglingly lengthy personal to-read list (plus I’ll give you a reco of my own, like, I can’t foist ALL the newsletter work onto you, you know? This isn’t a reality show filler compilation episode before the finale! Do I look like Andy Cohen?)

Please leave a comment with the books you can’t wait to read this summer (or what you’ve loved reading so far this year). Everyone loves hearing from you, but most especially me.

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Your Books of Summer, According to You

• Charlie can’t wait to read Birnam Wood, (purportedly) a gripping and witty thriller set in New Zealand. This is #14 on my library holds - I also can’t wait.

• Chain-Gang All Stars is Jeff’s top to-be-read, and if it weren’t also on my queue (hold #12) I’d put it on so fast. Not only is Jeff a smart reader, but the “Hunger Games meets The Handmaid’s Tale” description is too, too compelling.

• Michelle is eager for A Lady’s Guide to Scandal and !!!! Y’all!!!!! How did I not know about this! Everyone needs to get ready because as you know, A Lady’s Guide to Fortune Hunting was maybe my top five-lamb delightful read last year. This promises more of the Bridgerton-with-intelligence-and-wit sameness.

• Mark is ready for Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow, which - yes I say yes. If you haven’t read it yet, you’re so lucky. A substantive but readable tale of two friends over the years, cycling through childhood and adulthood, games and illness, love and loss. Here’s why I also loved it.

• Abby, our resident romance connoisseuse, can’t wait for Happy Place, about a friends vacation where one couple has broken up but pretends they’re still together. Look, you know what you’re in for with Emily Henry, romcomedically speaking, but if that’s your jam, this is probably going to hit the spot.

• Jordan is hyped for Yellowface, a “brilliant satire” about a white author who steals an Asian author’s manuscript and passes it off as her own under a nom-de-plume. Also I am hyped for this, #6 on my library queue, let’s goooo.

• Amy has the Pulitzer-Prize winning tale of modern rural life and abandonment Demon Copperhead on her summer list but says “but I’m wondering if I will get around to it.” You and the rest of us, Amy. You and the rest of us.

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And A Gift From Me to You

If none of the above grabbed you, or even if they all did, do let me hip you to another installment in one of my v v favorite book categories, the “fun/funny mystery.”

Everyone in my Family Has Killed Someone is Knives Out meets Agatha Christie meets Finlay Donovan, where main character Ern Cunningham narrates an Australian ski resort family reunion gone very wrong. But in addition to the clever, witty writing, what makes it fun and fresh is that Ern opens and closes the mystery novel genre tropes for the reader, letting you know exactly what page a murder will happen, hinting heavily about clues, teasing that you already know the killer, etc. Smart, fun, exciting, well-done!

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The Covenant of Water, One Question

And that question is - are we going to read this? Literally I’ve had several people including some of you (hi, Jeff!) ask if I’ve read The Covenant of Water, and vice versa. Let’s break it down:

Pros: Virtually all the Very Smart People including Oprah and the entire leadership of the Sun Valley Writers’ Conference all say this is amongst the best books they’ve ever read. Which is, to be fair, a strong entry in the pro column. You know Barack is putting this on his year-end list.

Con: It’s 736 pages and I’m already middle-aged, you know? Can my rotator cuff strain handle it?

Pros: Everyone loved Cutting for Stone so it’s not like we don’t know anything about this author.

Con: I never read that so that pro doesn’t really help me personally, but I strive to be fair and balanced.

Pros: My sweetheart is currently tearing through it, which feels like a good personal recommendation.

Con: I don’t mean to be a simple-minded Pooh Bear, but I’m not super compelled by rapturous phrases in reviews like “tracing a family’s evolution from 1900 through the 1970s, in pointillist detail” (Washington Post) or “a book … that chronicles so many tragedies” (Andrew Solomon) or “frequent references to that other celebrated doctor-writer, Anton Chekhov”(NPR).

Enough about me. What do you plan to do with The Covenant for Water?

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Notes on the Syllabus

• This week’s newsletter links to Nantucket Bookworks and Mitchell’s Book Corner, two capital-C charrrrming bookstores in Nantucket. What better bookstores for our summer reading than island bookstores?

• If you have an indie bookstore you love, please send it my way and I’ll link to it in a future newsletter, plus invariably visit it when I’m in that neck of the woods. Supporting indie bookstores is such an easy way for gratification while also supporting entrepreneurs and readers!

• Hot take: I know some people are bookstore purists and dislike the stores that carry stickers and totes and Jellypets and fancy pens and other paraphernalia, but I AM NOT ONE OF THOSE PEOPLE. Congratulations on your austere art bookstore where everything is wrapped in plastic, but give me ALL of the ac-cute-rements in a bookstore, please.