Survey: What Makes a Good Beach Read?

For the second year in a row, I'm writing a beach reads round up for the Philadelphia Inquirer (check out last year's article here).

These are always fun but tough to write. You've only got a sliver of space to cover the gamut of what will be available this summer to accompany you and your beach chair. I just sent an email out to my book PR contacts. Last year when I did this, I found about 40 books on my doorstep within two days. I feel like I should tip my UPS man now instead of at the holidays.

So here's my question for you: What makes a good beach book? And what have been your absolute favorite summertime reads?

And if you're looking for suggestions right now, most of the books I put in last year's article are in paperback now, or soon will be:

The Department of Lost & Found: A Novelby Allison Winn Scotch
Black Hats: A Novel of Wyatt Earp and Al Caponeby Patrick Culhane
Mr. Dixon Disappears: A Mobile Library Mystery (Mobile Library)by Ian Sansom
French By Heart: An American Family's Adventures in La Belle Franceby Rebecca S. Ramsey
The Clarks of Cooperstownby Nicholas Fox Weber
Rules for Saying Goodbye: A Novelby Katherine Taylor

Comments

Trish Ryan said…

Laura Dave has a new book coming out in May called THE DIVORCE PARTY that I'll be buying in advance for my summer beach reading.

March 27, 2008 at 6:51 AM

Champion of My Heart said…

Karen Quinn's newest book "Holly Would Dream" comes out in June 2008. Her stuff cracks me up. I love a good laugh in the summer. Plus, there's just enough driving plot, just enough (ahem) sex, and just enough underlying smart stuff. It may seem like chick-lit, but she does some really clever things with plot that pay homage to classic novels, movies, etc.

And, well, she's a really nice gal from CO (where I live), so I've got to love her.

March 27, 2008 at 11:03 AM

Book 12 of 52: Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood by Marjane Satrapi

Marjane Satrapi is an author and graphic novelist who grew up in Iran and, as a tween and teen, lived in the country through the Iranian Revolution before her parents sent her to Europe for school, and for her safety. As an adult, she wrote Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood , a nonfiction graphic novel, originally in French. I read the English translation, which was published in 2003, three years after the original. It was a critical success, won a slew of awards, and became a movie . I haven't read the sequel, Persepolis 2 , but I hope to (you can also buy them in a set . I found Persepolis in a Little Free Library, or I'd have bought them combined). In the tradition of Art Spiegelman's Maus , which is about the author's father talking to him about the Holocaust, Persepolis is a memoir of trauma told through a mix of images and words that when combined, combust into powerful, beautiful and soul cracking art. For example, Satrapi portrays the 1978 Cinema R

Book 23 of 52: Because of Miss Bridgerton by Julia Quinn

More romance? Of course! The world is on fire, and I can't ingest all the fires all the time. Sometimes I want to turn to genre fiction as an escape, even if an escape is into a patriarchal society where it's SCANDAL that a woman sometimes, when riding a horse, wears pants. Because of Miss Bridgerton is the first book in Julia Quinn's Rokesbys Series , which are prequels to her enormously popular Bridgerton Series (and now a Netflix show ). These books are similar, of course, but instead being set in the Recency era of the 1810s, these books take place at the same time as the American Revolution (though still in England). Here we meet Sybilla "Bille" Bridergton, who is stuck on the roof of a building because she chased a cat up there. She climbed up herself (scandalous woman!) but also twisted her ankle in the process, which is why she needs help to get down. That help comes from George Rokesby. Their families are neighbors, and they've known each other

Book 26 of 52: The Palace Papers: Inside the House of Windsor — the Truth and the Turmoil by Tina Brown

I'm not going to write a long review of Tina Brown's The Palace Papers: Inside the House of Windsor — the Truth and the Turmoil for two reasons. First, it's been hashed to death already, as anything about the royals is, by people who are far more invested in this whole thing than I am. And second, I'm in the frantic "do I really need a jean jacket AND a windbreaker" level of packing before a long trip. I can say that I didn't mind listening to this nearly 18 hour audiobook while the rest of the world is on fire, although of course they are not insulated. We can pretend that the Royal Family lives in a bubble, but they are enormously influential; touched by the same issues of race, class and gender; and Queen Elizabeth II is one of most influential politicians of modern times — and she is a politician, no matter what anyone says. Her death will be a global, cultural moment. Same thing with the Pope, on both fronts. I listened to Brown's The Diana Chro

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