My Summer Reading
What’s on My (Belated) Summer Reading List?
So it’s late August and I’m only now really diving into some fun summer reading. Why so late? Because I’ve been writing, working, going to conferences, planning conferences, hosting family visits … and because FINALLY, it’s vacation time!
With online nicknames like the BookWorm and The InfoHound, plus my library degree, umpteen started (and not finished) Kindle books on my iPad, a subscription to a business book summary service and overflowing bookshelves, it’s not a shocker that I’m a BIG reader. Or I TRY to read a lot.
But there’s something about summer that still brings out the reader in all of us and makes us seek lists of new books to try– ‘2016 summer reading’, ‘best new books for the summer’, ‘the best beach reads of this summer’, ‘who’s who of new business books for the remainder of your year’, ‘why YOU need these graphic novels’, and so many more. Plus, that quintessential highlight of summer, your library’s Summer Reading Program – many more libraries are now including adults as well as teens and young kids.
My reading list
I’m trying to get back to reading more ‘fun’ stuff as I feel I’ve spent all winter buried in business, nonfiction and marketing books. My brain needs a break or just some different views mixed in.
Here are some of the reads I have stacked in my office or near my bed to read before fall:
Umm … I may be feeling a little ambitious thinking I can tackle all of these soon!
Show Your Work
Steal Like an Artist
Sketchnote Handbook
Everybody Writes (re-reading this AWESOME book)
Content Strategy (seminal text from Halvorson -finally found on sale; it’s more of a ‘keep near me on bookshelf’ than a summer read’)
Big Leap – reading with a new mastermind group
Uhoh. That list does NOT look fun. That’s my pseudo-work list. I AM not bringing those on vacation. Nope.
What to read for ‘fun’? Do I remember reading for fun?! I’m really trying to! I’ve promised myself days of reading by the pool and more nights of staying up late reading a mystery, romance, graphic novel or some good YA lit starting the week before vacation and lasting through Labor Day.
So here’s some fluffier fun reads in the vacation bag:
JD Robb / Nora Roberts latest and some I had missed in past 2 years [a supernatural group avenging evil trilogy; the most recent two Eve Dallas police plots; plus a stand-alone mystery]
Brene Brown – Daring Greatly
Ransom Riggs – Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children (I swear I bought this and decided to read before I knew there was a movie or saw the trailers! But now I MUST read it)
Lumber Janes – first issue in the graphic novel series – thanks to my library and Hoopla!
And if/when I finish those physical copies of books – I have ready on Kindle: Elizabeth Gilbert’s Big Magic; Dot Hutchinson’s Butterfly Garden or Kelly Cutrone’s Normal Gets You Nowhere. Among many, many others.
Oh – add Gene Luen Yang – American Born Chinese – YA graphic novel (I bought this for a library donation – and read it the same afternoon before I could give it away. Loved!)
And of course, my giant stack of coloring books are in the vacation bag. Mandalas, WWII airplanes, Star Wars, ocean themes – I’ve got ’em all.