I just finished a very disappointing book that was released last month--Maine by J. Courtney Sullivan. It was touted by an author I generally enjoy as the "perfect summer read" on her blog. I am a sucker for perfect summer reads, and I even pre-ordered the book and dug right in as soon as it arrived on my Kindle. It took me nearly a week to finish this book and I was left disappointed. I found the characters mostly lacking positive attributes and I am still wondering about all of the loose ends the author failed to tie up. I am annoyed that a week of summer reading was sacrificed to something so falsely advertised when I could have been spending my precious reading time with something better.
To counter my bitterness, I am posting my own summer reading list, with books that I would classify as "perfect summer reads."
Mammoth Cheese by Sheri Holoman. Exactly what it sounds like. Small town makes giant cheese for a cheese contest and has to transport it to be judged. Well-written and hefty. You will get lost in another world. That is, unless you are a small town dairy-farmer, then it might hit a bit too close to home.
The Dirty Parts of the Bible by Sam Torode. No, this is not Bible porn. It's a whitty adventure story set in 1936 when 19-year-old Tobias is sent from Michigan to Texas to find a bag of money his father, a newly ousted baptist-pastor, hid many years ago as a teenager himself. The characters are complex and fantastic in a way that cannot really be described. I liked this book so much that I emailed the author after reading it. Bonus, it is only $2.99 for the Kindle Edition, although I would gladly pay more for it.
Angry Housewives Eating Bon-Bons by Lorna Landvick. Women's literature at its finest. This book completely enraptures you in its characters while touching on serious issues, spanning generations and having moments of all-out hilariousness.
Abraham Lincoln Vampire Hunter by Seth Grahame-Smith. Voted best book of the year for 2010 by my book club, which is saying a lot because it had a lot to compete with in 2010, including the book below. Historically accurate with some vampire, it is a great balance of intellect and straight up fluff. And I generally dislike vampire books.
The Hunger Games series by Susan Collins. If you have not already jumped on the bandwagon, please do. You will not regret it. And no, it is nothing like the Twilight series which I could never understand the hype behind. See comment above regarding my general feelings on vampire books.
Books on my summer reading list include (note, the large amount of Young Adult science fiction/adventure is due in large part to the current obsession of the genre by many of my coworkers, whom I get a lot of my book recommendations from. Lawyers reading teenager books en masse. We all get our brain breaks somehow.):
- Switched and the next two books in the Trylle trilogy by Amanda Hocking
- Maisie Dobbs by Jacqueline Winslow
- The Weird Sisters by Eleanor Brown
- Matched by Allie Condie
- Then Came You by Jennifer Weiner (available July 12, 2011)
- Girl in Translation by Jean Kwok
Did you get the change to read The Hunger Games this summer? I did. It was nothing like I expected, but still an amazing read. I need to get back into reading in my free time.
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