<p>“Literary” books need not apply.
We’ve had several great threads on good books, where everyone has shown their erudition, and discussed the good or great books they are reading.</p>
<p>Now it is time for true confessions - what are you all really reading?? What do you recommend for vacation/beach reads???</p>
<p>I recommend Lauren Willig’s Pink Carnation series - look what else you can do with a degree from Harvard - and The Name of the Wind by Patrick Rothfuss, for all you closet fantasy readers.</p>
<p>Jodi Picoult - Change of Heart … awesome book. Last week, on vacation I read 6 books… this was by far the most memorable… If you haven’t read the Janet Evanovich Stephanie Plum series (each book has a number in the title), it’s great beach reading!!!</p>
<p>I’m about to read Lois McMasters Bujold’s latest - The Sharing Knife - Passage. She’s written some fun books that cross the genres of sci fi, fantasy and romance. Great characters. Though her best books are her Vorkosigan series books.</p>
<p>I can’t help laughing out loud at Stephanie Plum. Jersey color is right on point…</p>
<p>I read “The Jane Austen Book Club” – unlike the real Jane, you can speed read this. I zipped through it in 2 hrs sitting in Borders, cramming right before my book club meeting. It was fun and has enough literary references to lend a quasi-intellectual feel…</p>
<p>An enthusiastic second for astrophysicsmom’s choices - Jodi Picoult and the Stephanie Plum books are great vacation reading. </p>
<p>I took Change of Heart, a Rumpole book (an older one I hadn’t read), and a couple of other mysteries along on our college visit trip/break last month. I really love packing along mysteries set in the places I’m going to, when we travel, so Gaudy Night (ancient Dorothy Sayers) did universal service, since it’s set in a college.</p>
<p>Somebody from another forum I participate on recommended this book and it had me laughing out loud several times. Definitely not high brow reading, but entertaining, which sounds like your criteria ;)</p>
<p>Stop Dressing Your Six-Year-Old Like a Skank</p>
<p>I’m currently reading ‘Free Food for Millionaires’. I picked it up on clearance, and it’s pretty good. It’s a fat book though, not sure I’d want to tote it to the beach.</p>
<p>Definitely great reading!!! Also suggest the No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency series by Alexander McCall Smith–the latest in the series just came out.</p>
<p>Redeeming Love by Francine Rivers. It’s a very emotional book…a re-telling of the biblical book of Hosea. Great reading whether you’re a Christian or not.</p>
<p>Fun? Some of the above titles still sound pretty heavy to me…</p>
<p>What I’m reading right now:
“My Life As A Furry Red Monster” - by Kevin Clash, “Elmo” from Sesame Street. A light, fun, but interesting story of his childhood love of puppets and how he came to be on Sesame Street. Wonderful!</p>
<p>DrDrewsmom–I read part of that collection of essays in Borders one day (“Stop Dressing Your Six Year Old…”) I laughed so hard. Maybe especially since I have a six year old.</p>
<p>Another huge fan of the Stephanie Plum novels – my hubby and I read these and laugh out loud everytime.</p>
<p>Surprisingly, we both enjoyed reading the Hornblower series (read one of the books in high school and hated it)</p>
<p>I love anything by Elizabeth Lowell and Amanda Quick/Jayne Ann Krentz. Romance and mystery – I can finish the book in a couple of hours and enjoy every minute.</p>
<p>Recently read The Bean Tree by Barbara Kingsolver and thought it was a great, quick read.</p>