Summer: The Season of Reading

Over here, on the East Coast (South end thereof), there are three big bookstore chains: Borders, Barnes and Noble, and Books-A-Million. Of which, in Atlanta Books-A-Million bowed out of the market almost 10 years ago. Therefore inside the city limits and immediate metro environs, one can only find Borders and Barnes & Noble locations. With readerships going down and the publishing industry less inclined to take risks, I've never thought that the market could bare two huge book chains competing for the same demographic. So as everyone seems to be aware, the inevitable has occurred: Borders is going through "restructuring." This process has involved in a large number locations closing down which means SALES.

Coupled with my natural tendency to occasionally go on book buying rampages, and added to the middling number of books that people lend me, I am currently awash in books and need to make some headway. This is a state I find enjoyable even if it does make it difficult to move through the living room around all the towers of books. While, I doubt it is possible to read them all over the course of the Summer, I'd like to make a good sized dent in my unread masses. What follows is a list of "candidates" for summer reading. This list does not represent every unread book in the house, but is a subsection created lest I get too overwhelmed by options. The key will be at bottom.

1. Love and Ghost Letters by Chantel Acevedo
2. And Only to Deceive by Tasha Alexander
3. The Teahouse Fire by Ellis Avery
4. American Fuji by Sara Backer
5. Eating Mammals by John Barlow
6. The School of Essential Ingredients by Erica Bauermeister
7. The Stories of Richard Bausch by Richard Bausch
8. The Feast of Love by Charles Baxter
9. Blood Music by Greg Bear
10. A Continuous Harmony by Wendell Berry (NF)
11. Stories by T.C. Boyle
12. I'm a Stranger Here Myself by Bill Bryson (NF)
13. Dawn by Octavia E. Butler
14. Adulthood Rites Octavia E. Butler
15. Imago by Octavia E. Butler
16. Invictus by John Carlin
17. Manhood for Amateurs by Michael Chabon
18. Candy Girl by Diablo Cody (NF)
19. George's Marvelous Medicine by Roald Dahl
20. James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl
21. The Twits by Roald Dahl
22. The BFG by Roald Dahl
23. Matilda by Roald Dahl
24. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl
25. Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator by Roald Dahl
26. Fantastic Fox by Roald Dahl
27. For the King by Catherine Delors
28. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz
29. Desert Flower by Waris Dirie (Rec Brianne)
30. Florida Road Kill by Tim Dorsey
31. The Idiot by Fyodor Dostoevsky
32. The Memory Keepers Daughter by Kim Edwards
33. The Best American Non-Required Reading 2008 edited by Dave Eggers
34. The Unvanquished by William Faulkner
35. World Without End by Ken Follett (Rec Mom)
36. Hot, Flat, and Crowded by Thomas L. Friedman (NF)
37. All the Sad Young Literary Men by Keith Gessen
38. Jump and Other Stories by Nadine Gordimer
39. Jesus Is Sending You This Message by Jim Grimsley
40. Real Murders by Charlaine Harris
41. High on the Hog by Jessica B. Harris (NF)(LTR)
42. The Island of Lost Maps by Miles Harvey (NF)
43. Catch-22 by Joseph Heller (HR)
44. The Story Sisters by Alice Hoffman
45. Lulu in Marrakech by Diane Johnson
46. The Metamorphosis and Other Stories by Franz Kafka
47. Don't Open This Book selected by Marvin Kaye
48. The Fair Fold edited by Marvin Kaye
49. The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver
50. Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer
51. Get Shorty by Elmore Leonard
52. Blue World by Robert R. McCammon (HR)
53. Stinger by Robert R. McCammon (HR)
54. Swan Song by Robert McCammon (HR)
55. Books by Larry McMurtry (NF)
56. The Host by Stephenie Meyer (Rec Brianne)
57. Parsival or a Knight's Tale by Richard Monaco
58. Fool by Christopher Moore
59. A Few Short Notes on Tropical Butterflies by John Murray
60. Sorceress of the Witch World by Andre Norton
61. Spell of the Witch World by Andre Norton
62. Wraiths of Time by Andre Norton
63. Facing Unpleasant Facts by George Orwell (NF)
64. In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan
65. Disquiet, Please! edited by David Remnick and Henry Finder
66. Terminal World by Alastair Reynolds
67. Another Roadside Attraction by Tom Robbins
68. The Stars Dispose by Michaela Roessner
69. What I Was by Meg Rosoff
70. The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
71. The Best American Short Stories 2009 by Alice Sebold
72. White Teeth by Zadie Smith
73. At the Same Time by Susan Sontag (NF)
74. Ghost Train to the Eastern Star by Paul Theroux (NF)
75. First They Killed My Father by Loung Ung (Rec Brianne)
76. Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne
77. Journey to the Center of the Earth by Jules Verne
78. Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas by Jules Verne
79. Contemporary Fiction: 50 Short Stories Since 1970 edited by Lex Williford and Michael Martone
80. The Tomb by F. Paul Wilson (HR)
81. How I Learned to Cook edited by Kimberly Witherspoon and Peter Meehan (NF)

(LTR)LibraryThing Review book (HR)Husband Recommendation (NF)non-fiction (Rec)Recommended *followed with the origin if remembered*