your summer fiction recommendations

As is often the case, sometimes the best of this blog gets buried in the comments. Last week I asked for your suggestions for a good summer novel. I’ve done my best to grab all the suggestions that fit the fiction criteria and list them here. I will bring at least one of these with me to our family reunion in California in July. But which one?

Aubrey-Maturin series of novels, Patrick Obrian.
The Brothers Karamazov, Fyodor Dostoyevsky.
Crime and Punishment, Fyodor Dostoyevsky.
Dark Tower series of novels, Stephen King.
Discworld novels, Terry Pratchett.
The Far Pavilions, M M Kaye.
Foundation, Isaac Asimov.
Kristin Lavransdatter, Sigrid Undset.
And Ladies of the Club, Helen Hoov Santmyer.
Little Bee, Chris Cleave.
Neuromancer, William Gibson.
Peace Like a River, Leif Enger.
Snow Crash, Neal Stephenson
A Tale of Two Cities, Charles Dickens.
Till We Have Faces, C S Lewis.

Are there any additional summer novels you’d add to the list?

Finally, I’m not sure what this list of books says about this blog’s readers, but it must be good! Thanks for your recommendations.

David Swanson

June 10, 2009

book

6 responses to “your summer fiction recommendations”

OtakuDad

June 10, 2009 at 9:08 pm

Well, if you choose the Foundation novels, Neuromancer, or Snow Crash, I will be happy to lend them to you, so you don’t have to buy before you try! 🙂 Let me know, and we’ll figure out some way to meet up and hand off.

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JoshStock

June 10, 2009 at 9:19 pm

DiscWorld novels are light reads, and funny to boot. Start with Discworld, or The Color of Magic.
If you like them, I would highly recommend The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams (and vice versa if you’ve already read THGTTG).

I’d also recommend
The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver
Jack Ryan series by Tom Clancy

All good summer fiction!

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Browning

June 10, 2009 at 11:06 pm

as long as you’re going with The Brothers Karamazov why not “The Brothers K” by David James Duncan (maybe my favorite novel of all time)… Baseball, family, war, brokenness, hope… all in there.

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DAN

June 11, 2009 at 7:41 pm

If you are looking for some real light but good reading or know a middle schooler that is looking for a good fiction book try
Frindle by Andrew Clements or anything else he has written he was a Chicago public school teacher
Rules by Cynthia Lord about a girl with a brother who has autism
Tangerine by Edward Bloor some racism issues
Al Capone Does My Shirts by Gennifer Choldenko has some powerful insights into how mental illness was perceived in the 30’s
When you start reading to your son you might check out just about anything by Robert Munsch
Iam currently reading Gang Leader For A Day nonfiction but still an easy read about a student that befriends a gang leader in the Robert Taylor Homes in Chicago and tells about some of the insights he gained.

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stanford

June 12, 2009 at 9:37 am

Brother’s Karamazov is the greatest piece of fiction I have ever read…but it is not exactly a light sort of vacation read. It is honestly a slog at some points. C&P moves much faster (it actually has a plot around which FD does the stuff he is good at – contemplation on the human predicament).

Can we throw this back at you? What are some fictional works you’d recommend?

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cathy

June 23, 2009 at 12:21 pm

Wow, a lot of sci-fi! What’s up with that? 😉

Two of my favorite books are White Teeth and On Beauty by Zadie Smith. Smith is a Londoner of mixed-race background; her mother is of Afro-Carribean descent (I believe) and her father is a white British man, and multicultural/bi-racial coming-of-age experiences feature prominently in both of these novels.

White Teeth revolves around two generations of two families in London, an Afro-Carribean/white British couple, and (if I remember correctly) a Bengali immigrant couple who are all friends. It’s a sprawling story that obviously deals with multiculturalism and the “generation gap” between immigrants and their children but also touches on imperialism and class issues (hard to escape when you’re reading a British author).

On Beauty takes place in the Boston area and involves a bi-racial family — the father is a white Brit, an art history professor at a small liberal arts college, the mother is an African-American hospital administrator from the South, and there are three high school/college age children. Race is an issue in this book as well, but there’s also a lot about American political/cultural wars, academia, and family life. It’s interesting to see how the author observes American culture through her British point of view.

Smith is an outstanding author — sharp, witty, observant, and often hilariously funny. I have both of these books if you’d like to borrow them. On Beauty is an easier, quicker read than White Teeth, but I’d recommend starting with White Teeth.

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