8 Exciting Summer Reads

reading

(photo: Pedro Ribeiro Simōes, Creative Commons license)

With publishers so intent on finding the next blockbuster, it’s easy for good books, make that Very Good Books, to slip by unnoticed. I’d like to suggest that my writing coach Lauren Davis’s new book, Against a Darkening Sky, which is on top of my “to read” pile, is a book I hope escapes that fate. I also trust that the flow of good will and good media coming its way will continue.

Set in 7th century Northumbria, as Christianity sweeps the countryside, it considers issues that are universal and timeless. Says Pulitzer Prize-winning author Robert Olen Butler, it “brilliantly achieves the ideal for a historical novel: period and milieu seem utterly inextricable from characters and theme.” I’m looking forward to reading—and savoring!—it this summer.

More Recommendations

In case you missed Nancy Pearl’s “under the radar reads” segment on NPR’s Morning Edition late last week, here are her recommendations for intriguing and beautifully written works of fiction beyond the B&N front table that are well worth seeking out.

  • The Revolutions by Felix Gilman – A little steam punk, a little sci fi, a little magic and the occult—and the perils of dabbling in them. Says Pearl, “I’ve always believed that people learn from every book they read, . . . I think reading about the past in the context of the present is just fascinating.”
  • The Swimmer by Joakim Zander – in this fast-paced thriller a former spy tries to help a young woman with whom he has a strange connection. She’s seen something she shouldn’t have . . . and she’s on the run.
  • Etta and Otto and Russell and James by Emma Hooper – Says Pearl, this is another page-turner, not because of the speed of the plot, but because the characters from two time periods (around World War I and late 20th century) are so interesting. The story is set in motion when 83-year-old Etta decides she must see the ocean before she dies and sets out to walk there—from Saskatchewan.
  • Unbecoming by Rebecca Scherm – which is, Pearl says, “a novel about lying.” Not only is lying “unbecoming” in the old-fashioned sense, but the main character gradually “unbecomes” who she is. In a Paris antiquities shop she waits for her crimes to catch up with her.
  • The Half Brother by Holly LeCraw – We’ve all had strange coincidences in our lives, situations about which one says “if that were in a novel, no one would believe it!” Well, this novel takes on the issue of coincidence versus fate. How one choice would have created a totally different self—in other words, the spiraling kind of speculation that can drive you crazy.
  • The Strangler Vine by M.J. Carter – Carter is a historian, who can provide the convincing details of the exotic setting this novel uses. In 1837 India, its two British protagonists journey all over the subcontinent to find a missing writer. The first of a series, about which Pearl says, “I personally cannot wait for the second one.” (Awesome cover!)

A Sad History Tale

Morning Edition host Steve Inskeep himself has a new book out, Jacksonland: President Andrew Jackson, Cherokee Chief John Ross, and a Great American Land Grab. It’s the true story of an Indian leader who used the tools of American democracy to try to make the case for his people and their land rights. His futile legal battle continued for two decades and ended in the Trail of Tears.

Any of these books would make for memorable summer reading. Looking forward to hearing your thoughts on them and to reading at least some myself!