Friday, June 1, 2007

More Summah Reading

In The New York Times round up of more beach reading books, there is a sentence that best describes the differences between winter reading and summer reading:
....it’s clear that “winter reading,” or “that endless blizzard of pages flecked with the blown soot of words,” isn’t really what they’re after. Summer reading has more to do with charmed lives, blue skies and location, location, location.

Janet Maslin reviews 11 books, some she likes, some she doesn't:
Hilma Wolitzer's Summer Reading gets a nod of approval, as does
David Shallack's travel memoir Mediterranean Summer: A Season on France's Cote d'Azur and Italy's Costa Bella.
The Prince of Nantucket by Jan Goldstein wasn't one of her favorites, but she liked The Savage Garden by Mark Mills a bit more (he also wrote Amagansett--a book that I think was a great summer beach read--so I'll buy his new one, no matter what the NYTimes thinks). She calls the novel alluring and mysterious. Oh Goody.
Ms. Maslin is favorably disposed to Bill Geist's Way of the Road, a travel book about rural America and sometimes its cuisine. He's a pretty funny guy and the book looks to be pretty entertaining.
Michael Tolliver Lives by Armistead Maupin features a character from Tales of the City (not a bad summer series in case you need more good stuff to read) and is judged to be as endearing as that series.
Elmore Leonard's Up in Honey's Room reviews well, but I'm not sure I'll be reading it. It's set in Detroit in World War II and the premise is that a bunch of German spies (including Himmler's twin brother) are trying to fit into the American Midwest.
Dream When You're Feeling Blue by Elizabeth Berg "becomes humdrum much too quickly," but Frank Deford's new novel, The Entitled is a baseball novel, featuring the Indians examines the morals of today's athletes and "transports the reader to a world of athletes whose constant traveling leaves them in true limbo."
She calls Anthony Gagliano's Straits of Fortune a memorably crisp debut and gives a positive nod to City of Fire by Robert Ellis.

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