Tell Me What to Read: Summer 2017 Edition
It’s been too long since I did one of these!
Which might be because I got so stalled on Peter Nimble and His Fantastic Eyes, the book I was supposed to finish in. . . September . . . from the last round of Tell Me What to Read.
I finally just gave up.
So now, it’s clearly time for a new edition of Tell Me What to Read.
You know the drill – suggest something fun (although that doesn’t need to mean chick-lit – I’m up for non-fiction, memoirs, young adult, middle grade, AND chick-lit), and I’ll pick three to read in May, June, and July!
Your job: Comment with the title of a book you think I should read.
My job: Choose three from the suggestions and announce which ones I’ll be reading.
I’ll read one a month (ish) between now and the end of July (hopefully). Feel free to read along and check back every month for my reviews.
And, as always, even if I hate the book, I will not hate you.
And go!
I’m just going to speak in support of some of the previously mentioned books: The Girl Who Drank the Moon (although I’m sure it’s already on your radar since it won the Newbery Medal. It 100% deserved it! I devoured it in less than three days), Talking As Fast As I Can on audio, and Navigating Early. All excellent!
The Year of Living Danishly (Helen Russell) soo funny and insightful.
Also I’m so excited to read At Home in the World (Tsh Oxenreider) a memoir about a family of five and their trip around the world.
The Arrangement by Sarah Dunn. I’m seeing it all over Instagram and excited to read it.
Ditto Ally’s recommendation of My Mrs Brown. It was fantastic. I also just finished Love Anthony by Lisa Genova. I really enjoyed it too.
I am almost finished with Hillbilly Elegy, which I started based on a recommendation from one of your previous posts. Another great memoir is Born a Crime by Trevor Noah. I highly recommend the audiobook. Listening to Trevor Noah retell his childhood growing up in South Africa is by turns eye-opening and hilarious.
You may have read these already but I just read Boys in the Boat by Daniel James Brown and The Hiding Place by Corrie Ten Boom and they were both incredible books.
I’m not a sports player, or watcher. This book still inspired and moved me to tears. It was well written and a captivating story. Even while knowing the ending, I couldn’t stop reading.
I suggested a ” Hillbilly Elegy”.You won’t believe this young boy’s story, and reading it made me feel happy for so many things that I barely think about. Love it!!!
How not to hate your husband after kids – very enlightening! Ha! Also, I reread The Help – gah! So good.!
I enjoyed This is How it Always Is sooo much. The writing is fantastic as is the family. It is so much better than it sounds and I think you will fall in love with the characters. For YA, I highly recommend either of Nicola Yoon’s books if you haven’t read them yet. And non-fiction/ memoir : Year of Yes or Anna Kendrick’s book if you are a fan. Happy reading! Can’t wait to see what you pick. I can’t recommend the first book enough.
The Summer Before the War by Helen Simonson
Wonderland Creek by Lynn Austin
Ruby Holler by Sharon Creech
Trevor Noah: Born a Crime is an amazing memoir. It’s sad, funny, and alarming, I loved it! Ready Player One was one of the most exciting creative books I’ve read. It’s a sci-fi, dystopian novel about people living in an alternate reality where their lives are basically video games. I don’t even like video games but this was so fun and a great page turner!
I’ll third (I think?) Station Eleven, I just finished yesterday and it was so different from anything else I’ve read (although, to be fair, I don’t read much sci-fi).
Loving my Actual Life by Alexandra Kuykendall, similar to The Happiness Project or Happier at Home, but less scientific
Sugar by Kimberly Stuart – just a nice, foodie-ish contemporary novel
The Wife, the Maid, and the Mistress by Ariel Lawton – based on a real unsolved disappearance in the 1930s (I think?), it was a lot harder to put down than I expected!
The Futures by Anna Pitoniak – contemporary fiction (2008-ish) set in NYC, following a couple as they go through their early career and lives together.
I love reading other comments when you do these! Always gives me some more ideas!
Per my usual M.O. I’m going to recommend a really long one about American history – The Hemingses of Monticello by by Annette Gordon-Reed. It’s super long (like 35 hours on audio), but it is so detailed and thorough. I have loved listening to it. It provides so much context, and it’s just incredibly well-done.
The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle by Avi. Young adult fiction, published awhile ago so maybe you’ve already read it? A tale of adventure and intrigue on the high seas with a strong female protagonist.
Yes! I read that one when I was in middle school and it’s always been one of my favorites.
The Red Queen by Victoria Aveyard. Its the first book in the YA series. Just finished the third book in the series. Loved all of them.
I wanted to like this one more than I did…tell me something awesome that will make reading the next two books a must for me…I’m so in the middle right now on reading the second one!
I finished A Mother’s Reckoning by Sue Klebold not long ago. This is the memoir of one of the mothers of the Columbine shooters. I listened to the audiobook, which Klebold reads herself. While this is a heavy book, I could not stop listening and am still thinking about many of the issues she raises about mental health and parenting teenagers.
Where the Light Gets in: Losing My Mother Only to Find Her Again by Kimberly Williams-Paisley. This book was my favorite read from last year. Absolutely beautiful.
I loved “Where the Light Gets In” too. My dad has Alzheimer’s and I could totally relate…but I think that even if you didn’t have that connection you would enjoy it.
I recently read The Girl Who Drank the Moon by Kelly Barnhill and thought it was excellent!
You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me by Sarra Manning, Best fake dating story I’ve read. Also would recommend Unsticky by Manning (it’s like Pretty Woman meets The Devil Wears Prada, with a dash of Confessions of a Shopaholic)
The Thief by Megan Whalen Turner. Newbery winner, and the first in a series. The second and third books are two of my absolute favorites (I own them in both paperbook and ebook versions). Don’t read the back cover copy for the second book if you want to remain unspoiled for a major plot point.
The Enchanted April by Elizabeth Von Armin. I love this book so much. The first time I read it, I was on tenterhooks near the end, wanting things to work out happily for all the characters
Lilac Girls by Martha Hall Kelly. This is my favorite read of 2017 so far.