Book Report: Summer Reading Recommendations

Reprinted from Auburnpub.com:

Memorial Day has come and gone, and now it’s time to get serious about our summer reading. Whether it’s at the beach or on the porch, you’re going to need to some good books to keep you occupied.

Elinor Lipman’s novel Good Riddance tells the story of a daughter who inherits her deceased mother’s effects, including a signed yearbook from Mom's days as a yearbook advisor. She tosses the yearbook out, and her neighbor rescues it and decides to made a documentary out it, which causes all kinds of trouble. You’ll be careful what you toss out after you read this. 

Good Riddance

Stay Up With Hugo Best by Erin Somers is about a young female writer for a late night talk show who ends up with an invitation to spend some time at the boss’ home after the show has been cancelled. It will put you in mind of David Letterman’s story, and it’s a cautionary tale. 

Stay Up With Hugo Best

Tracy Garvis Graves’ novel, The Girl He Used to Know, brings us the tale of a young woman who may be on the autism spectrum, and the romance she shares with a young man at college. It’s beautifully written and so poignant, you’re sure to shed a tear or two. 

The Girl He Used to Know

Lisa Grunwald's Time After Time is a romance of a different kind. When a young woman is killed in a crash in Grand Central Station in 1929, she ends up returning year after year on the date of the crash in the spot where she was killed. She meets and falls in love with a railroad worker, and the question becomes how can they overcome this obstacle, because it’s a big one. 

Time After Time

Jennifer Weiner’s Mrs. Everything is the book she has been waiting to write. It’s a sweeping novel about the lives of two sisters from their youth in the 1950s through adulthood. Every woman will be able to relate to Jo and Bethie (note the “Little Women” names here) as it tells the story of what it’s like to be women in a rapidly changing world. It reminded me of Irwin Shaw’s Rich Man, Poor Man, which was the story of two brothers in America told over their lifetime. It’s made many Best Books of the Summer lists. A d ve

Mrs. Everything

If mysteries are your jam, Australian novelist Sally Hepworth’s The Mother-in-Law is made for fans of Liane Moriarty’s Big Little Lies. When Lucy’s mother-in-law Diana ends up dead, she become the prime suspect, and the story goes back and forth to tell how they got to that point. The characters are richly drawn here, and I liked how complex Diana was. 

The Mother-in-Law

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If you prefer to go back in time, Lauren Willig’s historical novel The Summer Country takes place in the beautiful island of Barbados in two time periods: 1812 and 1854. Emily leaves England to travel to Barbados when her grandfather leaves her a sugar plantation. The plantation is in serious disrepair, and the family next door wants Emily to go back to England. Willig based this book on a story she heard on vacation, and her research is so impeccable, you’ll feel like you’re in Barbados as you read it. 

The Summer Country

Mary Beth Keane’s third novel, Ask Again, Yes tells the story of two Irish NYPD officers who live next door to each other in upstate New York. Their son and daughter have a relationship, and after a tragedy strikes, they are torn apart. If you like Alice McDermott’s novels, give this one a try. 

Ask Again, Yes

On the nonfiction side, if you’re looking for a good laugh, Helen Ellis’ book of essays Southern Lady Code, will have you doubled over in laughter as she recounts her life in New York with her husband and the hilarious words of wisdom from her Alabama mama. 

Southern Lady Code

Father’s Day is around the corner, and there are two great books for Dad on this list. Bill Geist’s Lake of the Ozarks is a humorous recollection of the years he spent working at his uncle’s resort in the Ozarks as a high school and college student. If your dad is nostalgic for the simpler times of the 1950s, this is perfect for him. 

Lake of the Ozarks

If your dad is a history buff, Douglas Brinkley’s 800-page opus, Moonshot- John F. Kennedy and the Great Space Race, takes a deep dive into the NASA space program as the 50th anniversary of the moon landing approaches. It’s great for the dad who loves science and history. 

American Moonshot

Enjoy your summer reads, whatever they may be.rtisement (1 of 1):

Hot Reads for the Summer

Reprinted from the Citizen:

When the weather has been brutally hot like it has been recently, sometimes the best thing to do is to curl up with a good book and visit someplace new. This month’s Book Report will take you away.

Beatriz Williams takes her readers to the wealthy Long Island Sound enclave of Winthrop Island in the 1950s in The Summer Wives. Teenage Miranda Schuyler comes to Winthrop Island as her mother marries a wealthy man following the death of her husband in World War II. 

With her new stepfather comes a stepsister, wild child Isobel. Isobel is expected to marry someone of her own social station, but she becomes involved with Joseph Vargas, the son of a Portuguese fisherman.

Williams shows the readers the contrast between the lives of the wealthy summer visitors to the island and the people who live on the island full-time. The relationship is complicated, as the full-time residents depend on the summer visitors for their livelihoods, but fraternizing between the two groups causes complications.

Part of the story takes place in the 1960s, ten years after Miranda leaves the island under mysterious circumstances and returns as a famous actress. When she returns, she finds that her stepsister and mother have turned their home into an artists’ colony, and they have fallen on hard times.

She also comes home to find that Joseph has escaped from the prison where he has been held for ten years, convicted of murder. Williams takes us back and forth in time to tell us the story of what really happened the night of the murder, and how it impacted everyone on the island.

The Summer Wives is one of Williams’ strongest novels to date, and the topic of "the haves versus the have nots" is a topical one today. Regular readers of Williams’ novels will recognize the Schuyler name, as many of her novels feature characters from that family.

Ann Mah takes her readers to the Burgundy winemaking region in France in her fantastic novel The Lost Vintage. Kate is studying to take a test to become a master of wine in San Francisco when she returns to her mother’s family vineyard in France to prepare for the test. 

While there, Kate and her cousin’s wife are cleaning out a cellar and Kate finds a hidden room. There are hundreds of bottles of vintage wines in the room, where they were placed so that the Nazis wouldn’t find them during their occupation of France.

Kate also discovers that her mother had an aunt, Helene, who was accused of being a collaborator with the Nazis. Helene was shunned by the townspeople, and her family never spoke of her again.

When Kate finds Helene’s journal, she discovers the truth about Helene, which surprises everyone in the family.

The Lost Vintage is a dual timeline story, as we see Helene’s journal entries alongside Kate’s story. Frequently in dual storyline novels, one story is much stronger than the other. In this case, both stories are equally interesting.

Along with learning all about how to make wine, The Lost Vintage is great for foodies, as Mah shares the delicious meals the family eats, which will make your stomach growl. You can brush up on your French vocabulary as well as you traverse the Burgundy countryside.

In Laura Lippman’s Sunburn, we go to Belleville, a small beach town in Delaware. Polly shows up in Belleville after having abandoned her husband and small daughter after a day at a different beach. 

Polly gets a job as a waitress at the High-Ho Tavern. She keeps to herself until the day that Adam shows up as the new cook. Adam is there to keep an eye on Polly for a client. But who is his client? Is it Polly’s abandoned husband?

Adam and Polly fall into a sexual relationship, one that Polly wants to keep secret from everyone in town. Soon Adam falls in love with Polly, and he is conflicted about his responsibility to his client.

We slowly learn that Polly is a complicated woman. She has a secret past, and as Adam falls deeper in love with her, Polly has to fight her feelings for Adam or risk her future.

You get a real feel for this small beach town that comes alive with tourists in the summer season in Sunburn. This book is a homage to the novels of James Cain (The Postman Always Rings Twice, Double Indemnity, and Mildred Pierce), and if you like those noir novels, Sunburn is a must-read.

If you read

BOOK: “The Summer Wives” by Beatriz Williams

GRADE: A

PUBLISHER: William Morrow

COST: Hardcover, $26.99

LENGTH: 384 pages

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BOOK: “The Lost Vintage” by Ann Mah

GRADE: A

PUBLISHER: William Morrow

COST: Hardcover, $26.99

LENGTH: 372 pages

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BOOK: “Sunburn” by Laura Lippman

GRADE: A+

PUBLISHER: William Morrow

COST: Hardcover, $26.99

LENGTH: 272 pages

Diane La Rue is a member of the National Book Critics Circle and blogs about books at http://bookchickdi.blogspot.com. You can follow her on Twitter @bookchickdi, and she can be emailed at laruediane2000@yahoo.com

Summer Reading

Reprinted from The Citizen:

Memorial Day festivities are over, so now we turn our thoughts to the upcoming summer season. That means, for many of us, a time to get some sun, relax and read a good book (or two or three).

Dorothea Benton Frank’s latest novel, “By Invitation Only,” fits the bill of a traditional beach read. Single mom Diane’s son is getting married to a young woman from an uber-rich Chicago family. Diane’s family owns a small peach farm in South Carolina. While cultures collide, we get fireworks and a wonderful read filled with tasty food scenes that will make you drool. 

By Invitation Only

Eloisa James is an immensely popular historical romance writer, and her latest is the second in her fun new Wildes of Lindow Castle series. “Too Wilde to Wed” focuses on North Wilde, heir to the family dukedom, who when we last left him had been jilted by his fiancee. It’s two years later and North returns home from war to find his former fiancee working as a governess at the castle. Can he win her back? This one is sure to be a steamy read. 

Too Wilde To Wed

If you enjoyed the Broadway show “Wicked” or TV’s “Once Upon a Time,” Danielle Teller’s “All The Ever Afters” is a great read for you. We see Cinderella from the point of view of Agnes, her stepmother, who had a very difficult life before she married Cinderella’s father. It’s a unique look at the Cinderella story. 

All The Ever Afters

If your tastes run to literary fiction, Sarah Jessica Parker has a new imprint at Hogarth, and her first novel is Fatima Farheen Mizra’s “A Place For Us,” the story of a Muslim American family who come together for a family wedding. The family members deal with tradition, faith, loyalty, love, betrayal — all things that bind us together. Mirza is getting rave reviews for her first novel. 

A Place For Us

For mystery fans, Lisa Scottoline’s “After Anna” begins with a well-respected doctor on trial for the murder of his adult stepdaughter, a young woman who recently joined the family. It’s a real whodunnit. 

After Anna

Fans of Patricia Highsmith will want to try Christine Mangan’s “Tangerine.” Set in 1956 Tangiers, we meet Alice Shipley, who has moved there with her husband from England. Alice is not happy there, preferring to stay cooped up in their apartment while her husband is out and about. When her old college friend Lucy shows up out of the blue, we discover that years earlier, a man Alice dated ended up dead and the women haven’t seen each other since. What does Lucy want now? The setting here plays a key role, and you’ll find yourself sweating from the heat of Tangiers. 

Tangerine

There are some terrific books out there for people who prefer true stories. Tara Westover’s “Educated” shares her story of growing up in a poor Utah family of seven children who did not attend school, but rather worked with their father scrapping metals, a dangerous thing for young children to do. How Tara and some of her siblings ended up going to college and getting Ph.D.’s is astounding, and a tribute to the human spirit. I could not put this one down. 

Educated

Michelle McNamara’s “I’ll Be Gone In the Dark” recounts her search for California’s Golden State Killer, who murdered 12 people and raped over 50 women in the 1970s. McNamara unexpectedly passed away in her sleep, and her husband and researchers finished the book. The amazing end to the story is that the man was finally caught last month, using a DNA match through an internet genealogical website. 

I'll Be Gone In The Dark

Allison Pataki is best known for her historical fiction, but “Beauty in the Broken Places” is about how her life was upended when her 30-year-old doctor husband had a stroke on an airplane while they were on their way to Hawaii, and she was five months pregnant. Her faith, family and friends, along with her own strength, helped them through. 

Beauty in the Broken Places

And finally, for a good laugh, David Sedaris is back with “Calypso,” about his vacation home and the hilarity and insanity that happened there when he invites family to visit. 

Calypso

Diane La Rue is a member of the National Book Critics Circle and blogs about books at http://bookchickdi.blogspot.com. You can follow her on Twitter @bookchickdi, and she can be emailed at laruediane2000@yahoo.com.

New in Paperback- Same Beach, Next Year by Dorothea Benton Frank

Same Beach, Next Year by Dorothea Benton Frank
Published by William Morrow ISBN 9780062390790
Trade paperback, $15.99, 374 pages

It's almost a shame that Dorothea Benton Frank's books always have such gorgeous covers because every year when I buy the newest one, I inevitably mar up the pretty covers with sunscreen. I guess she shares some of the blame, after all, her books are a summer right of passage. Summer has not officially arrived until I have the latest Dorothea Benton Frank book in my beach bag.

This summer's book is Same Beach, Next Year set in her beloved Lowcountry of South Carolina. Each year Adam and Eliza and their young twin boys Luke and Max spend a few weeks at a vacation condo not far from home. Adam is a hardworking successful construction business owner and Eliza is a fabulous cook, who yearns to write a cookbook.

One year, a new couple takes the condo next door and it turns out the woman is Eve, Adam's first love. Eve is married to Carl, a hardworking, successful pediatrician and they have a young daughter, Daphne, about the twins' age, and they are joined by with Eve's mother Cookie.

The two couples get along famously, and although Eliza has her antenna up a bit about Adam and Eve, the fact that Carl is extremely handsome and shamelessly flirts with her distracts her somewhat.

The four become fast friends, and along with Ted, Adam's father, and Ted's girlfriend Clarabeth, it's one big happy family as they meet every year for two weeks and swim together, golf together and eat together.

Cookie likes to stir trouble, and she is hyper-critical of her daughter, which literally drives Eve to drink. Time flies by and Eve turns to Adam when she fears that Carl has been cheating on her. That sets in motion an incident that threatens two marriages and their friendship.

One of the things I love best about Frank's book is that she makes her characters relatable. Eliza has two sons (so do I), her dog Rufus is her best friend (mine was Malcolm, my late beloved basset hound) and Eliza loves to cook, as do I (well, most of the time).

This book is written from the perspectives of both Eliza and Adam, and I found it intriguing how Frank got into Adam's mindset. I have to say, though, I found his behavior and rationalizations puzzling, although I think each character makes some head-shaking choices here.

Since Eliza is a cook, we get some wonderfully descriptive foodie scenes, from Eliza's trip to the Piggly Wiggly grocery store to Eliza's family Christmas breakfast (I could almost smell the cinnamon on the page) to the feast that Eliza has with her Greek family in Corfu.

Same Beach, Next Year is another Dorothea Benton Frank winner, it's got everything you want in a summer beach read- great characters, sassy dialogue, interesting family and friend dynamics and a road trip to Greece. Maybe I should try covering my book in plastic so the sunscreen doesn't ruin the beautiful cover.

You may recognize the book's title- an homage to the Alan Alda-Ellen Burstyn movie, Same Time, Next Year, which if you haven't seen, you should. The IMDB link is here. (It was a play first.)

Summer Reading Suggestions

Reprinted from the Citizen:

Another Memorial Day has come and gone and we now turn our thoughts to summer reading. It seems to be a good time to escape from the weather, our jobs, current world events and read a good book (or two or three). 

Dorothea Benton Frank’s annual summer book is set during summers at the beach in the Lowcountry of South Carolina. “Same Beach, Next Year” tells the story of a couple who while vacationing at their usual summer condo discover that the wife of the new couple at the complex is the former high school love of the husband. 

Same Beach, Next Year

The couples become fast friends, vacationing every summer, and their families become close as well. But when the old attraction between high school sweethearts appears rekindled, and their respective spouses also become close, trouble ensues. There’s a real beach-y feel to this book, and part of it is set in beautiful Greece, so you get to travel there as well.

Karen White’s “The Night The Lights Went Out” is a romantic suspense story about Merilee, a woman whose husband leaves her for their daughter’s 4th grade teacher. She relocates her two children to a smaller home with a cranky landlady, a hunky contractor, and a fellow mom who is a little too eager to help. When a man is found dead, Merilee’s past comes back to haunt her.  Fans of Lianne Moriarty’s “Big Little Lies” will enjoy this one, and the landlady is fantastic character. 

The Night The Lights Went Out

Cozy mystery and cruise fans will welcome aboard Ellie Alexander’s latest Bakeshop Mystery, “A Crime of Passion Fruit” . Jules and her mom own a lovely bakery in a small town near Portland, Oregon. When Jules’ estranged husband Carlos, a chef on a cruise ship, asks Jules to come back and work as a pastry chef for a week, she agrees and brings her mom and her mom’s boyfriend, a police detective, along. 

A Crime of Passion Fruit

A murder occurs and Jules and company are on the case to find the killer. You don’t have to have read any of the previous books in this series to enjoy this one, and you get a peek at life below deck on a cruise ship, along with great food descriptions.

Adriana Trigiani’s newest family saga, “Kiss Carlo” brings us from Roseto Valfotore, Italy to Roseto, Pennsylvania as a young man yearns to become an actor in a post-WWII world. The characters here are fantastic, from the big, loving Italian Palazzini family to Calla Borelli, trying to keep her father’s theatre alive, to my favorite, Hortense, the wise and wise-cracking taxi dispatcher. 

Kiss Carlo

It’s a big, beautiful family story, and whether you yearn to be in a big family or are from your own big family, “Kiss Carlo” is for you. (And soap opera fans should keep an eye out for a cameo from superstar producer Gloria Monty.)

Julia Fierro’s “The Gypsy Moth Summer” drops the reader in 1992 Avalon Island, a stand-in for Long Island. The island is home to an aviation factory with long-term military contracts, and a wealthy enclave of people with ties to the factory. 

The Gypsy Moth Summer

When Leslie’s returns to her the large family estate after a years-long estrangement with her parents, she brings her African-American husband, teenage son, toddler daughter, and a determination to right past wrongs. It’s a beautifully written emotional story, and sure to be one of the most discussed books of the summer. Fierro gets the 1992 atmosphere pitch-perfect.

If your taste runs more to nonfiction, Sally Mott Freeman’s “The Jersey Brothers”, about a navel officer missing in WWII and the quest of his two brothers also serving in the military to find him, is a gripping read. All three brothers ended up in the middle of the most important events of the war, and Hillary Clinton recently raved about the book at the annual Book Expo in New York City. 

The Jersey Brothers

David Grann, author of the classic “The Lost City of Z” has a new book out, “Killers of the Flower Moon” about the murders of members of the Osage Indian nation in Oklahoma and how the investigation led to the rise of the FBI.  In the 1920s, the Osage discovered oil on their land and became overnight millionaires, the richest people in the world per capita. 

Killers of the Flower Moon

When some Osage were murdered, new FBI director J. Edgar Hoover sends one of his best men in to unravel what has been happening there. This one is a page-turner.

Enjoy your summer reading!

Summer Reads 2015

Reprinted from auburnpub.com

Summer is right around the corner (isn’t it?), and that means it’s time to search out books for the beach, lake, pool deck, summer cottage or back porch. Click on the title below each book to get more information.

First up, there are the so-called beach reads. The Fifty Shades of Grey fans may have to wait for the next installment Grey, but in the meantime they may want to check out the latest chapter in Jackie Collins’ ‘Lucky’ series, titled The Santangelos. Once again she blends a cocktail of sex, violence, and general mayhem amongst Lucky and her extended family. It’s a real page-turner, and there are graphic sex scenes, so fair warning. 

The Santangelos

Dorothea Benton Frank returns to the Lowcountry of South Carolina for her summer novel, All The Single Ladies, the story of a nurse caring for a patient who becomes good friends with her patient’s best friends. There’s lots of female bonding here, and this is aimed at women who have lived life, and have to deal with adult children, and mothers and grandmothers too. 

All The Single Ladies

Shelley Noble’s novel has an actual beach setting. In her novel Whisper Beach, Vanessa left her home there at age seventeen when she became pregnant. Fifteen years later, she returns home for a funeral, and ends up staying for awhile to help a old friend with her failing restaurant. This one is also about friendship, lost love and coming home. 

Whisper Beach

If fast-paced thrillers are more your style, Jessica Knoll’s novel Luckiest Girl Alive has been favorably compared to Gone Girl. Ani FaNelli has a glamorous job, a handsome, wealthy fiance, and the world on a string. But a secret from her past has threatened to derail all that she has worked for. Critics have been praising this debut novel from Knoll, a Hobart and William Smith Colleges graduate. 

Luckiest Girl Alive

Author Charles Dubow's followup to his novel Indiscretion is Girl In The Moonlight, about Wylie, a young man who has been enchanted by Cesca, a wild, spirited, beautiful young woman. Cesura toys with Wylie over the years, destroying him in the process for any other woman. Their passionate relationship over the years takes the reader from the East Hamptons to the Upper East Side of Manhattan to Paris and Barcelona. 

Girl In The Moonlight

Judy Blume, best known for her iconic children’s books like Are You There God, It’s Me Margaret? and Forever, has written an adult novel this year, In The Unlikely Event. Taking place in Elizabeth, New Jersey, it tells the story of Miri, who returns to her hometown thirty-five years after a series of plane crashes occurred there (which actually happened). We see how all these years later, people in the town are still haunted by the plane crashes, and Blume brings to vivid life the feelings of growing up in that place at that time in history. 

In The Unlikely Event

If you prefer to read non-fiction, Los Angeles Times reporter Jill Leovy’s Ghettoside- A True Story of Murder in America takes a look at murder in Los Angeles. Los Angeles has almost one murder every day, and many of them go unsolved because no one seems to care about the victims. 

Ghettoside

Leovy writes about the case of Bryant Tennelle, a young black man who was murdered and doomed to be an unsolved and forgotten homicide until detective John Skaggs caught the case. Skaggs doggedly pursued justice for Tennelle, and by telling this story Levy shares how the epidemic of young black men killing each other exists and how it could be stopped. 

Joseph J. Ellis, who won the Pulitzer Prize for his book Founding Brothers, returns with The Quartet- Orchestrating The Second American Revolution, 1783-1789 about the four men- George Washington, Alexander Hamilton, John Jay and James Madison- who, after the American Revolution, worked to draft the Bill of Rights and ensure that the states would accept the powers of the federal government in order to create a strong national union. 

The Quartet

Actress Kate Mulgrew has been working on TV for over thirty years, best known as Mary Ryan on the ABC soap Ryan’s Hope, as the first female captain of a Starfleet vessel on Star Trek-Voyager and can currently be seen as tough prison inmate Red on Orange Is The New Black, and she recounts her life’s story in the brilliantly written memoir Born With Teeth. It’s honest and fascinating, but fans looking for gossip will be disappointed. 

Born With Teeth

Whatever you read this summer, I hope you enjoy it.

Some Great Summer Beach Reads

Every year I devote my June Book Report column in the Citizen to summer beach reads. Here is this year's edition.
 Reprinted from auburnpub.com.

June has arrived and that means it’s time to plan our summer beach reads. Whether you read on vacation, by the pool, or on your front porch, here are some suggestions for great summer reads.

If you are looking for a traditional juicy summer novel, Stephanie Evanovich follows up last year’s big beach read “Big Girl Panties”, with a sassy, sexy prequel “The Sweet Spot” about a Derek Jeter-like baseball star who pursues a restaurateur wary of his reputation. It’s perfect for the baseball lover, and it publishes July 8th. 

The Sweet Spot

South Carolina native Dorothea Benton Frank returns with another Southern family novel about a four women: 80 year-old feisty Maisie, her middle-aged daughter Liz, Liz’s artist daughter Ashley and Ashley’s roommate Mary Beth, all trying to come to grips what life has in store for them- oh yeah, and there is a hurricane heading their way. I love the humor and humanity in Frank’s novels. 

The Hurricane Sisters

If you like your summer reading to have a little more meat, Patry Francis’ 500 page “The Orphans of Race Point” takes place over thirty years in the lives of three friends who grew up together on Cape Cod. It’s a big, wonderful story with heartbreak, love, and family- those who are related by blood and those you choose to be your family. This is my favorite book so far this year. 

The Orphans of Race Point

Another big book is Greg Iles’ “Natchez Burning”, the first in a trilogy. This one tells the story of a son out to save his father, a beloved doctor accused of murdering an African-American nurse he worked with years ago. This one has been getting rave reviews, including one from Stephen King. 

Natchez Burning

Those of you who were addicted to HBO’s “True Detective” should check out Laura McHugh’s “The Weight of Blood”. When a teenage girl is found brutally murdered and left under a tree, her friend tries to find out what happened, and wonders if it could be tied to her mother’s disappearance when she was a just a baby. The story is told from the mother’s perspective and the daughter’s perspective, and has lots of scary, creepy atmosphere.  

The Weight of Blood

If historical fiction is your pleasure, Jacqueline Winspear, author of the WWI private investigator Maisie Dobbs series, checks in with a stand alone WWI novel, “The Care and Management of Lies” about Tom, a farmer in England, his sister who protests for peace, and his wife, a teacher-turned-farmer’s wife who must keep the farm going when Tom goes to war in France. I loved the look at what being a farmer’s wife at that time entailed. 

The Care and Mangement of Lies

If the Civil War interests you, Jennifer Chiaverini’s “The Spy Mistress” fictionalizes the true story of Richmond, Virginia aristocrat Elizabeth Van Lew who spied for the Union, putting herself and her family at great personal risk to help Lincoln’s generals win the war. It was a story I didn’t know and found so interesting. 

The Spy Mistress

Maggie Shipstead’s second novel, “Astonish Me” is very different from her first novel, “Seating Arrangements”, but just as good. Joan studies to be a ballerina and becomes involved with a Russian dancer who defects to the US in the 1970s. She marries a childhood friend, has a son, and moves to California. Her son becomes a ballet dancer and his idol is the Russian whom Joan was in love with years ago. The writing is gorgeous and if you love ballet, this insider’s look is fascinating.

Astonish Me

For non-fiction readers, Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner follow-up their hugely successful book “Freakanomics” with “Think Like A Freak”. They combine terrific storytelling with their unique analysis to help people be more creative and productive. They show us how a hot dog eating champion came upon his winning strategy (it involves soaking the bun in water), why an Australian doctor ingested dangerous bacteria, and why e-mail scammers say they are from Nigeria. If you didn’t get Dad a Father’s Day gift yet (and if you didn’t, shame on you!), go get this. 

Think Like A Freak

Everyone is talking about Hillary Clinton’s book, “Hard Choices”, which published this week. She talks about the difficult decisions she has faced in her life and how she came to them. It covers much of her time as Secretary of State in the Obama administration and people will no doubt be parsing the sentences for clues as to whether she will run for president in 2016.

Hard Choices

Whatever you read this summer, I hope you enjoy it and that the weather is good wherever you go.