Must-have Books for this Summer?

[Colin Dunstan]

No summer vacation can be complete without a 900-page novel to read at the beach.

I am curious to hear about the (fiction/non-fiction) books you've picked for this summer. My next book is going to be Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson. I previously read his "Snow Crash" which has quickly become one of my all-time-favorite Cyberpunk classics.

[Bob Russell]

I've picked out (so far)...

* The Second Time Around -- Mary Higgins Clark
It's a great murder mystery. The head of Gemstone company disappears in a plane crash just before his cancer vaccine is rejected by the FDA. But his body is not found. Money is found missing from the company. The story is about a magazines columnist's search for the truth. I read this while on vacation from front to back and never put it down except to eat! I bought it while on vacation because my Clie crashed and couldn't recover the ebooks I brought on it. So I actually walked into a bookstore and bought a paperback instead of buying an ebook. It was a nice change of pace reading it on paper!

* Hanna Whitehall Smith -- The Christian's Secret to a Happy Life
Some Christians are misearable because the Christian life seems to be all about rules and things you can't do anymore. This classic Christian book will liberate. It shows how in the Bible God intends a happy relationship with His people. I'm half way through it and love it, but it's not for everyone. This is freely available in electronic form.

* The Hobbit -- J. R. R. Tolkien
This book IS for everyone! I hear it's really a children's story, but I like it. If you want to read Tolkien, this is the first one to read. Then the Lord Of the Rings series would naturally come next. It's about these fantasy creatures like hobbits, dwarves, elves, goblins, etc. But it's not "dark", it's just fun. But I don't plan to read the LOTR series... even though I like the Hobbit, one fantasy book at a time will be enough for me.

Incidently, I was lucky to find an electronic version of the book. But then I found out that it was an illegal copy and the publisher doesn't have an electronic version. Well, I still read it on my Sony Clie, but I went out and bought a paperback so that I'd be "legit". I have to admit I'm not always that careful, but I do try to stay legal.

[ignatz]

Cryptonomicon is a great read. A good thrill ride all the way through and very characteristically Stephenson. If you liked Snow Crash, I think that you're sure to like Cryptonomicon. I thought that the ending was a little weak, but otherwise I adored it.

[cbarnett]

I never thought I would, but I'm reading Harry Potter fan fiction, and love it! (even though it's winter reading down here.... )

The author is Barb Purdom, and she's written an alternative book 5, and has also done her version of books 6 and 7 in the HP series. These books are seriously well written, and HUGE. If you like the HP books and are sick of waiting for JKR to release her book6, you'd do well to trot over to the Yahoo groups (what's the URL....hmmm, ah here it is: http://au.groups.yahoo.com/group/Psychic_Serpent)... you won't regret it!

Craig (reading the alternative book 7-HP and the Triangle Prophecy)

[Alexander Turcic]

* Taylor/Nightside series by Simon Green
First book: Something from the Nightside. A compact book, in which the protagonist, John Taylor, plays a private detective who has the unnatural ability of finding things, including people. The catch is that he is from a place that exists parallel to ours where magic, monsters and other fantastical things exist.

* The Diamond Age by Neal Stephenson
I read Snow Crash (same author) and I loved every bit of it! I am in general a great fan of cyperpunk and dystopian novels. The Diamond Age (a Hugo Award-winner) is set in a far-future Shanghai at a time when nations have been superseded by enclaves of common cultures.
The Diamond Age is set is a very plausable near future where nanotech has eliminated basic problems (such as starvation), but created its share of problems as well (nanotech devices which can track or kill people).

* Core PHP Programming, 3rd Ed (Prentice Hall)
Ough, could you imagine reading a computer book on the beach? I will try... and will definitely carry this one with me to my holiday location.

[Colin Dunstan]

I have some external summer-reads recommendations for you:

Laura Bush's Recommended Reading
NPR: 2004 Summer Books
Author's Summer Reading Lists
B'nai B'rith Magazine: Summer Reads
Bozeman Daily Chronicle Summer Reads
Seattlepi: Solar powered literature
Marylaine Block's Book Bytes

Feel free to extend the list

[Alexander Turcic]

Another interesting resource is Guardian's Top 10s Books section, where writers choose their top 10 books in a variety of subjects.

Then check out AcqWeb's Directory, which lists general review sites in popular, scholarly and electronic publications including The New York Times Book Review, Salon Magazine and The New York Review of Books.

[sUnShInE]

Perhaps telling for a Dem Washingtonian my two reads right now are:

Bill Clinton's "My Life"
Walter Isaacson's "Benjamin Franklin"

Both mammoth titles, I'm also reading alot of public policy stuff for my thesis, so I'm bound to be working with these all summer long.

[TadW]

Summer-time, reading-time

I just bought book 30 minutes ago; The Scar by China Mieville, which won the 2003 British Fantasy Awards.

From the book description:
A mythmaker of the highest order, China Miéville has emblazoned the fantasy novel with fresh language, startling images, and stunning originality. Set in the same sprawling world of Miéville’s Arthur C. Clarke Award-winning novel, Perdido Street Station, this latest epic introduces a whole new cast of intriguing characters and dazzling creations.

Aboard a vast seafaring vessel, a band of prisoners and slaves, their bodies remade into grotesque biological oddities, is being transported to the fledgling colony of New Crobuzon. But the journey is not theirs alone. They are joined by a handful of travelers, each with a reason for fleeing the city. Among them is Bellis Coldwine, a renowned linguist whose services as an interpreter grant her passage—and escape from horrific punishment. For she is linked to Isaac Dan der Grimnebulin, the brilliant renegade scientist who has unwittingly unleashed a nightmare upon New Crobuzon.

For Bellis, the plan is clear: live among the new frontiersmen of the colony until it is safe to return home. But when the ship is besieged by pirates on the Swollen Ocean, the senior officers are summarily executed. The surviving passengers are brought to Armada, a city constructed from the hulls of pirated ships, a floating, landless mass ruled by the bizarre duality called the Lovers. On Armada, everyone is given work, and even Remades live as equals to humans, Cactae, and Cray. Yet no one may ever leave.

Lonely and embittered in her captivity, Bellis knows that to show dissent is a death sentence. Instead, she must furtively seek information about Armada’s agenda. The answer lies in the dark, amorphous shapes that float undetected miles below the waters—terrifying entities with a singular, chilling mission. . . .

[cbarnett]

Hmm, sounds interesting...

[mikewhite314]

Originally Posted by Bob Russell

* The Hobbit -- J. R. R. Tolkien
This book IS for everyone! I hear it's really a children's story, but I like it. If you want to read Tolkien, this is the first one to read. Then the Lord Of the Rings series would naturally come next. It's about these fantasy creatures like hobbits, dwarves, elves, goblins, etc. But it's not "dark", it's just fun. But I don't plan to read the LOTR series... even though I like the Hobbit, one fantasy book at a time will be enough for me.

The Hobbit is really a children's story. It's much more like a fairy tale and is a lower reading level than the Lord of the Rings, which is a bit more dark and gory (but not as much as the movie, in my opinion).