I just finished 28 Summers. It certainly was readable, and it was light, and there was even a bit of colleges involved. But I thought it was depressing and didn’t buy into the reasoning behind some of the major actions by the main characters. I did not like the last few chapters of the book - politics came out of nowhere (not anything to really do with the main plots), and for me it ended too abruptly.
It did paint a delightful picture of Nantucket!
I read Friends and Strangers which was an enjoyable summer read.
@Marilyn One of the interesting things (to me) about 28 Summers is that while I was reading it, I got caught up in the story and didn’t dislike the main characters, who were engaging in bad behavior. I thought the author did a good job of portraying them as real people who had flaws. I didn’t like the abrupt ending either, but I’ve read this author’s other books and she has ended other books that way. Also, didn’t mind the politics (one of the characters is running for President of the US).
Nowadays I’m comforting myself with mysteries set in London. I highly recommend “King Solomon’s Carpet” by Ruth Rendell, writing as Barbara Vine. It’s pretty grim but fascinating, set in and around the London Underground in the 1980s. It’s almost 30 years old now, but it kept coming up in various recommendation lists. I was able to find it on Amazon.
Almost as enjoyable: two by Anthony Horowitz, “The Word is Murder” and “The Sentence is Death.” A nice wrinkle is that he’s a character in the books, a successful mystery writer dealing with a brilliant but unpleasant detective.
Planning to start Mick Herron’s Slough House series tomorrow.
Love those Anthony Horowitz books - his third mystery for adults is “Magpie Murders” with a sequel due out in November. The twist in this one is a book within a book and it reads very much like an old fashioned English cosy!
I read an ARC of 28 summers right when the pandemic started. It was exactly what I needed, mindless candy about rich, well dressed people eating lovely food in Nantucket. Not pulitzer prize material at all, but that is Elin Hilderbrand’s style and hey, she is laughing all the way to the bank!
I have struggled a bit with some nonfiction books as I really find myself needing an escape type book before bed. This weekend I picked up “Saint X” and I am enjoying it. She can write well and the plot, so far, is engaging.
“Brave Girl, Quiet Girl” by Catherine Ryan Hyde
“Where the Forest Meets the Stars” by Glendy Vanderah
“The Address Book” by Dierdre Mask. If you like non-fiction this is how street addresses cam into being, their significance, etc. A blend of history, geography, city planning, sociology, etc.
Recommended this to my son. He gets some of his nerdy interests from me.
“The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo” - by Taylor Reid
“The Glass Hotel” & “Station 11” - Emily St. John Mandel
“Big Summer” - Jennifer Weiner
“When We Believed in Mermaids”- Barbara O’Neal
I may have been the last person on this train but if you haven’t read Educated you should really consider it. I had to keep reminding myself this was NOT fiction and also it was not happening in Little House On The Prairie times…
Does anyone enjoy reading Young Adult fiction??? I have found it a nice break after some longer adult fiction/nonfiction books. I also like to be tuned into what middle/high school age kids might be reading. I just read Other Words For Home about a young girl in Syria who has to make a quick move to America and the transition of learning this new country while trying to stay attached to her family/friends left behind. I believe it was a Newbery Honors book.
I like a lot of YA fiction. One of the YA authors I highly recommend is Jacqueline Woodson.
Yes, I’m very familiar with Jacqueline Woodson!
Three very good books that I’ve recently read
Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett
Love After Love by Ingrid Persaud
Lake Life by David James Poissant
“Lila: An Inquiry Into Morals” by Robert Pirsig
I have read the well-known and popular “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance” a couple of times, but it was nice to read a subsequent novel which was written almost twenty years later. In “Lila” Pirsig continues his previous theme and expands his thoughts on the ideas of “Quality” as he chronicles the main character’s journey on a private sailboat down the Hudson River.
I specifically enjoyed reading Pirsig’s thoughts on the study of Anthropology. It is a subject matter to which I had never given much thought. After having completed the novel, I now have an interest in learning more about it.
I’m just finishing Hidden Valley Road by Robert Kolker. A nonfiction look into a family with 12 children, 6 of whom are schizophrenic. Very educational regarding the thinking about and treatment of schizophrenia over the last 70 years. An Oprah book club book. An interesting and heartbreaking read.
Love Vanishing Half, Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, and Educated!
Just finished Sag Harbor by Colson Whitehead. He’s an immensely talented writer. (His Underground Railroad recently won National Book Award). It’s a novel based on his real life spending summers in upper middle class Black vacation community. He’s almost my age exactly so describing the summer of '85 was cool. Kinda a ‘guy’ book and very slice of life – not a lot of plot so slow moving, but he’s so talented that it kept my interest.
I clicked on this thread to post exactly that! What a good book. I’m about a third of the way through it and can’t put it down.
I haven’t read hardly at all since quarantine began. I guess I just couldn’t settle my attention into anything.
But DS went back to school, Little S is happy w/ his video games, and DH just wants to veg on Netflix. So yeah, I’m really bored! I picked up a book thinking I’d only read a few pages since it was late. 4 chapters later I had to force myself to put it down or I knew I’d be up all night.
Alex Bledsoe’s “The Hum and The Shiver”. Very lyrical, almost ethereal, writing. The plot hasn’t revealed too much of itself yet, but absolutely enjoying the writing so far. Highly recommend.
Has anyone here read The Most Fun We Ever Had by Claire Lombardo? Have you EVER “met” a more annoying bunch of people? And yet…I cannot put it down. Argh!! 