Summer Reading Plans
Dear Readers,
Two posts in a month, I know, I know. I don't know about you, but the changing of seasons always makes me want to read more. The heat waves last year got to the point where I didn't even want to leave the house during the worst of it, and I'm sure this summer will be similar, if not worse. It won't solve anything, but sipping smoothies in an air-conditioned room will be the song of my summer, and accompanying me will be all the books I hope to read. I'm under no fantasy that I'll dent even a quarter of this list, but part of the fun is having a big list to work through. It reminds me a bit of the summer reading program I used to so religiously partake in as a child. A couple of the librarians who ran the program back then still work there, and it's really sweet seeing folks who've helped you cultivate a life-long love for reading still doing the work that they do. Some of the books on this list are chosen because they scream summer, some are chosen out of a sense of nostalgia, and still others are here just because I thought I could try and tackle them. It'll be interesting to see just how much of this list I get through by the time September rolls around :D Now without further ado, here are some books I hope to read between June to August!
Anne of Green Gables series by L.M Montgomery - I have read Anne of Green Gables several times, but I have not gotten past Anne of the Island. Anne of the Island came to me at a time where my heart had been hardened and my health was at a low point, and I didn't find it in me to continue. Thankfully I'm in a much better place now, and I'm ready to renew my love for the world with her. Another part of why I want to reread and finish the rest of the books is because I met a family of Anne enthusiasts at work last week. One young woman evoked the spirit of Anne herself, she greeted her surroundings with such whimsy and she asked me questions I have never received in all my time on the job. While I don't believe I'll get through all looks up Wikipedia page 8 books this summer, I feel it'll be easier to continue through the seasons if I get started on them now.
I also want to read L.M Montgomery's journals alongside my Anne marathon. I have read selections from it in the past (she once wrote with much glee about seeing a drag troupe in Toronto!), but I want to read more. I did read a rather lacklustre biography of her back in 2024, so I'm hoping to get more from the journals.
TJ Powar Has Something to Prove by Jesmeen Kaur Deo - I'm actually rereading this right now, so if anything, I'll have finished at least one book on this list. This is a young adult novel following our main character TJ Powar. After a meme comparing her to her much hairier cousin circulates around the school, TJ decides to forego her exhaustive (and exhausting!) shaving and body hair removal rituals in an effort to convince herself that she can be hairy and worthy of love too. I read the author's second book earlier in the year and so the writing in this one reads a little younger. Not in a bad way necessarily, but the stuff TJ was going through is small potatoes compared to what her cousin goes through in Reasons We Break.
Kokoro by Natsume Soseki - Another one that I am currently reading, and I want to savour it. We follow an unnamed narrator and his recollections of a man whom he refers simply to as "Sensei". Sensei is plagued by his past and though he is very reluctant to speak of it, I know he eventually will. The character dynamic between our unnamed young man and Sensei reminds me a bit of a pair of my favourite fictional characters. This book actually opens up in the summer, though I believe it'll take a bit longer than a single season for Sensei to spill the secrets of his sordid past.
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes/The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle - Yet another title I am currently reading! The reason they're on this list is not because they evoke fun in the sun, but because the next entry, The Hounds of the Baskervilles screams 'autumnal read' and I really, REALLY want to have these two done by the time October rolls around. Compared to A Study in Scarlet and The Sign of Four, I like the short stories a lot more. Each story can be read in a single sitting, and I'm starting to flex my deductive muscles and piece together the mysteries before we see what's behind the curtain.
The Hunger Games trilogy by Suzanne Collins - Up until 2024, I would reread these books annually. I suppose I fell out of the tradition when life got too busy. I have read A Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes and Sunrise on the Reaping since then, but I could care less for them. I first read the trilogy back in middle school and no matter how many times I read them, I always find it hard to tear myself away from the pages. It'll be nice to revisit them after two years - it'll be like seeing an old friend again. Catching Fire was always my favourite of the three, and so I'm super excited to get to that again.
Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro - I don't know anything about this, but I did find a copy at the library. We shall see if something compels me enough to begin reading before the due date.
The Naive and Sentimental Novelist by Orhan Pamuk - Another instance of a title spotted at the library, this time as part of a display. It's a nonfiction piece on the craft of writing, and I am equal parts intrigued and uneasy to read it. The synopsis says that Pamuk calls upon classic works he enjoyed, and many of these are by writers I want to read someday. As silly as it sounds, I suppose I'm scared of spoiling these grand works for myself - even though they've been around for quite some time. We shall see if I get to you Mr. Pamuk. Perhaps reading this will inspire me to finally read the works he writes about so fondly.
Orlando by Virginia Woolf - I had the pleasure of reading Mrs. Dalloway for a course once, though I didn't consider it to be one at the time. Strict course deadlines and an already packed courseload have a way of doing that to you... You can't rush reading Woolf, you're meant to get swept along by her prose like a leaf on a languid river. I feel this will be a perfect summer companion for me.
Swann's Way by Marcel Proust - When I say it's fun to make ambitious lists even if you won't finish them, this is what I mean. I will return to Proust someday, but I do not know if I am feeling him this summer. Like Woolf, his writing is a treat to be savoured, not shoved down the gullet without a second glance. I feel the only way this may be possible to get to this summer is if the friend I was buddy-reading this with decides to pick it back up.
People We Meet on Vacation by Emily Henry - Now for folks who read my last post, you'll know that I am doing some spring (now summer) cleaning of my shelves and weeding titles. You may also recall how I did not care for Book Lovers upon a reread, and so as much as it pains me, I need to reread People We Meet On Vacation and see if my thoughts on it have changed. I don't like a great deal of contemporary romance and I'm somewhat belatedly having realizations as to why that is the case. I do remember really enjoying this on audio when I first listened to it. If I like it, great, and if not, I've no doubt it'll easily find a new home.
The Summer Book by Tove Jansson - I am familiar with the author's Moomin stories, but I must confess I have very little idea what this one is about. It's a rather slim volume, and so I feel it would be a nice one to knock out in a day.
The Sailor Who Fell with Grace from the Sea by Yukio Mishima - Depending on who you ask, I have had the (mis)fortune of reading a Mishima before. He's quite the figure (seriously, take a look at his Wikipedia page). I did start this one sometime after 2020, but library deadlines and a lack of urgency to continue at the time had me return and forget all about it. It's only when I was going through my general TBR did I stumble across this title again.
American War by Omar El Akkad - I read this back when it was first published in 2017 (oh god I was such a baby then...) and I don't think I understood or appreciated it as much as I can with my knowledge now. It's a dystopia that imagines a second American Civil War, it imagines America turning its global terror inwards. We follow a young girl, Sarat, as she and her family are displaced. Once displaced, she meets a man who grooms her to become a weapon. I have not read El Akkad's other works of fiction, but I did read Perfect Victims and the Politics of Appeal (highly recommend) last year and he wrote about what events inspired certain scenes in American War. As curious as I am to see how I read it armed with the knowledge I now have, part of me dreads it because it is set in 2074, and with the current trajectory of US politics, the future El Akkad envisions does not seem all that implausible.
The Thirty Names of Night by Zeyn Joukhadar. This would be a reread for me as well. When I read it, I had a less complicated relationship with my gender, and so it's one that I want to revisit.
Lighthousekeeping by Jeanette Winterson - I just want to read more by this author, and this is a title that seems fit the season.
Ties That Bind: Familial Homophobia and its Consequences by Sarah Schulman - For the life of me I cannot recall who recommended and shared excerpts of this with me, but I do remember reading passages ages ago and having them resonate with me. If on the off-chance you recommended this to me, please let me know!
Kamouraska by Anne Hebert - The library creates these recommendation lists and I found this one on a list spotlighting books set in Quebec. I have no idea if this is an accurate comparison, but the synopsis reminds me a bit of Edith Wharton's Ethan Frome (a title more suited to the colder months).
The Expert of Subtle Revisions by Kirsten Menger-Anderson - I want you to open a new tab and search up the cover for this book. Is it not the most delightful thing? I know very little about this one, but from the synopsis, it deserves a spot on this list.
The Dawnhounds by Sascha Stronach - I feel it's been too long since I've properly sunk my teeth into science fiction, and this has been on my TBR for some time since I saw it at a bookstore a couple of years ago. The synopsis reminds me a bit if A Master of Djinn met Disco Elysium, though I could be totally off-base with that.
You Are Eating an Orange. You Are Naked by Sheun-King - I'll sometimes see a book and instinctively feel it is my brand. This was one such title I came across at a literary festival last year. I would've brought it back then, but I told myself that I would limit myself to a single purchase and had already made said purchase ;~; This one also seems like a nice one to read over the course of several summer evenings.
El Ghourabba: A Collection of Queer and Trans Oddities edited by Samia Marshy. From the same literary festival, I came across this anthology of queer Arab writings. Again, I had made my single purchase, but I have thought of it a lot since then, so I may pick it up in June.
Tell Me How to Be by Neel Patel - I came across another work by this author lately and I kept turning the name over in my head, certain I had heard of the author before. Thankfully for the internet, I was able to look him up and I remembered that I had wanted to read this book. I have found myself disappointed by some multigenerational stories as of late, but I'm really hoping this breaks that curse of DNFs.
Catch-22 by Joseph Heller - I started this back in high school and I really liked what I read, then just kept putting it off. I don't know that this is necessarily a summer book, but by putting it here, think of me as a student doing my assigned summer reading.
The Watsons Go to Birmingham, 1963 - Christopher Paul Curtis. This is one of the most nostalgic picks on this list. I first read it at the wee age of 11, and I remember of it quite fondly. We follow Kenny Watson as his family through shenanigans and serious times. The book is set during the height of the US Civil Rights Movement, and while it's certainly a part of the text, especially the latter half, I appreciate now that the author chose to depict the day to day going-ons of a Black family. It's all well and good to share the struggles that activists and civil society organizations were making to end Jim Crow, but the stories of average folks living through the time often aren't heard. I read this title alongside a unit on the movement, and it's the first time I remember feeling the weight of history so keenly on my shoulders. I certainly had read historical fiction before then, but this was the first time I was able to explicitly connect the real things I was learning about with the fictionalized depictions of the time. I will be listening to this on audio, and if you're able to, I highly recommend the audiobook - it's narrated by none other than LeVar Burton.
The Curse of the [] by Rick Yancey - Now the final title on this list is the furthest thing from fun in the sun. Now I'll make a dedicated in-depth post about this trilogy* someday, but what you need to know is that this is the second book in the series. Shortly after the events of the first book, Dr. Warthrop is tasked with finding a former flame's husband. Though he is dubious as to whether the man is even alive, he sets out to Canada in the dead of winter with everyone's favourite indispensable assistant in tow. I pray that this book makes me forget that I'm living through the hottest summer on the books, though my blood will definitely run hotter whenever Warthrop is mean to Will Henry.
That is it for my ambitious summer reading list. Hopefully I'll be able to update folks at the end of June to see how far I've gotten. Until then, take care.
Signing off, memoria
*There is no fourth book in The Monstrumologist series. Trust me