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I have read them all. IMO, the last one Land of the Painted Caves was not as good as the previous ones, but I enjoyed it.</p>
<p>Just finished Bossypants and loved it. Next one is that Henrietta Lacks book (title) so many of the colleges listed on their Freshman Reading Assignment. Has anyone read it?</p>
<p>^^^ D is reading this now and says it’s excellent. It’s on my list.</p>
<p>I’m currently reading the 2nd book in the “Girl With the Dragon Tatoo” series – i.e. “Girl Who Played With Fire.” I’m enjoying the books – not the most well written books out there, but the story line is pretty good. I’ve actually found this 2nd book harder to get into than the 1st.</p>
<p>Read Zeitoun last year (off the list) and loved that too</p>
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Wow. I read her first book when I was in high school. I didn’t even know the series was still current. I’ll have to get to the library and catch up!</p>
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<p>I’ve read all Sarah Addison Allen’s books and like them all. I remember starting Garden Spells and thinking “Okaaay … different” and then getting hooked. I read her latest The Peach Keeper a week or two ago and it just might be my favorite. (Claire from Garden Spells caters a luncheon in The Peach Keeper. :)) Perfect suggestion for the OP - quick, fun, and engaging.</p>
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<p>Both my daughter and I read The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks last spring. (The author was speaking at her university.) Neither of us list nonfiction as our genre of choice yet both of us gave the book an unqualified thumbs-up. My husband the nonfiction reader has since read it and really liked it. I recommend it all the time.</p>
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<p>I think the second book might have been my favorite. I had heard to have the third book on hand because you’d want to start it as soon as you finished the second one. True, in my case. I finished the second book late one night and had to force myself not to start the third book until the next evening.</p>
<p>Another Sarah Addison Allen fan here.
I usually read mysteries/crime, but when they get too dark & I can’t deal with one more murder or kidnapping, I head for the lighter stuff:
Jayne Ann Krentz writes romance-y novels with a woo-woo factor. They’re pretty well written, too.
I recently read a couple of suspense books by SJ Bolton. They take place in England and were good weekend on the patio reads.
More beach-read authors: Hester Browne, Sarah Strohmeyer, Cathy Kelly, MaryKay Andrews, Jill Mansell, Harriet Evans</p>
<p>“Nightwork” by Irwin Shaw.</p>
<p>Zeitoun I enjoyed that also.</p>
<p>I read Bossypants on my vacation to a beach. like all the other posters who mentioned it, i highly recommend it. very laugh out loud funny - if you enjoy tina fey’s humor. it was a quick and easy read and i very much enjoyed it.</p>
<p>I’ve been recommending Inherent Vice by Thomas Pynchon to people who want something light but not a waste of brain function. Inherent Vice is basically an award-winning literary master slumming with a trashy detective novel. It’s funny, interesting, accessible, intelligent, goofy, and intriguing, and unlike Pynchon’s other novels, you’d actually read this one even if you weren’t getting college credit for it.</p>
<p>Carl Hiassen’s novels are light and funny. Much like Janet Evanovich, but a bit less girly.</p>
<p>Are you a dog lover? I LOVED “A Dog’s Purpose” by W. Bruce Cameron.</p>
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<p>I’ll have to “see” about Inherent Vice. I did wade through previous novels and made a bet with my now college graduate two years ago to see if he could finish Gravity’s Rainbow which came out when I was a college freshman. He did. I lost. I am reading Rule of the Bone by Russell Banks which my aforementioned college graduate finished the day before graduation and tucked into my luggage. Got to keep up with these young people…</p>
<p>NorthMinnesota-suggested a book I’m reading now, and zipped through it, after my sister suggested it ----Kristin Hannah’s— Firefly Lane. (You will relive the 70s, 80s and 90s )
I cared more about the main characters in Firefly Lane than Elin Hilderbrand’s - new book The Island, which I also recently read. </p>
<p>The Secret Garden, was a delight- and, 1/2 of the next book selected for the CC book discussion in August .</p>
<p>Ignatius and Zeebamom- Which Sarah Allison Adam’s books should I start with ? Never read anything by her.</p>
<p>Another plug for the Outlander series by Diana Galbadon…once you start you cannot stop.
It’s an older series so there are lots of used ones floating around out there. Be sure you read them in order.</p>
<p>Thanks to this thread and the other book thread I have a small stack of library books to read. Today I picked up Night Road by Kristin Hannah, The lake of Dreams by Kim Edwards and Garden Spells. I just returned This is Where I leave you. I recently read The Island by Elin Hilderbrand. It was the first one of her books I have read. I picked it randomly at the library. I enjoyed it as a summer read. I requested The Castaways and recently finished it. I did not like it at all.
Does your library charge you when you request a book hold? Our library is raising the request price to $1 a book starting next week up from 50 cents. Still a bargain versus buying.</p>
<p>Our library doesn’t charge to request a book. I’ve had great luck finding books at Goodwill.
They are really cheap and I don’t have to worry about damaging them at the beach or out on the boat. Also don’t have to worry about getting them back if I don’t get through them quickly enough. When I finish them, I donate them back to Goodwill for someone else to buy and enjoy sort of like book recycling with the small cost of the book helping out Goodwill.</p>
<p>Agree, I picked up the first of the Outlander series at Goodwill because so many had mentioned it before on this forum. I wasn’t terribly fond of book although it wasn’t one I “quit reading” but it’s defintely more of the bodice ripping historic romance genre. It definitely would make a beach read book list and if you like those historic romance books it’s better than many.</p>
<p>I agree that Outlander series is a historical/fantasy romance- but my H loves it, he even has read all the books, whereas I couldn’t read the most recent. ( the historical bits are well researched)</p>
<p>I am reading Anna Karenina for my IRL book group, but I think it shares many features of a good beach read!</p>