It is that special time of year once again: that bright beachy time in which we are asked to carefully check our brains at the parking lot and carry our girlish, clothes-horse-y selves onto the sand and escape into mindless fiction of boys and bikinis and Birkin bags. Yes, that's right, it is Summer Reading time once again. I've registered my distaste for this bizarre list-making season before. I will never - ever - understand the desire to read fluffy fare simply because the weather is warmer. I just don't get it. I still contend that this is a holiday conjured by publishers to speed otherwise lagging sales before the big, "literary" books hit in the fall. But that's just me.
My documented irritation with this irrelevant season has no effect on the Summer Reading lists that are de rigeur once the first heat wave hits and this year is no exception. Every publication under the sun is now unfurling their brightly colored/SPF-inclusive beachy reading recommendations and as much as I was prepared to get snarky and annoyed and overly pious, I have to say that a few of these picks are far less flinty than I expected. A few books, in fact, seem so perfectly "summer" that they appear on several lists.
Here's the rundown so far, with more lists likely to drop in the coming weeks:
- NPR's list of '08 Summer Reads wins an early place in my steely heart with the inclusion of Samantha Hunt's The Invention of Everything Else. Other decidedly non-beachy picks include the short story collection Say You're One of Them by Uwem Akpan and Nam Le's collection (and it is here that I must remind you, in light of my own recent folly, that this is, in fact a collection), The Boat.
- The LA Times has a lengthy Summer Reading list that is more than any reader (fluffy or no) can really think about in the heat. It offers a range of essays and reflections and fiction and friction. Notable picks include: This is Their Land by Barbara Ehrenreich, All About Lulu by Jonathan Evison (bravo!), The Lemur by Benjamin Black, Real World by Natsuo Kirino, Shining City by Seth Greenland and The Road Home by Rose Tremain.
- Salon has prefaced their summer reading series of lists by defining precisely what beach reading means to them: "summer books that transport you to new places without making you go through airport security." So is that the definition, then? Summer reading = books that make you feel like you're taking a vacation even though your sorry ass can't go anywhere for months? Hmmm. Interesting. I'll skip entirely over their "chick lit" summer reading list (yes, all the usual suspects are represented) and their "true confessions" list as neither offers anything of interest to me. Their "killer thrillers" summer reading list, however, offers weightier tomes to drag around in your beach bag: Obedience by Will Lavender and Child 44 by Tom Rob Smith.
- The NYT's June 1st book review section is dubbed Summer Reading, but all of the "picks" seem to be the books they would have reviewed anyway. Call me crazy. Too bad they didn't highlight one of those beachy reads on June 3rd instead so we could be spared two separate reviews of the same damn book. A crime in my estimation, no matter how divergent the opinions (which in this case, were nil), given the dwindling space in book review sections.
Common denominators: Several lists have included Ethan Canin's America America and the completely obvious pick When You Are Engulfed in Flames by David Sedaris.
I'm with Laila on this one, though...I often like to use those beachy summer months (where, honestly, I burn so quickly there is no point for me to even go until it's at least 6pm and the BBQ and drinks are well under way) to go back in time and re-read old favorites or finally, finally get to those classics that I've not yet enjoyed. Revolutionary Road, here I come.
