I powered through Ask Again, Yes by Mary Beth Keane so I could leave it with our vacation hosts. This wasn’t a hard task because it was such a good book, but we did so many fun activities while at said vacation that there wasn’t much time for reading! This is the story of two neighbor families and the tragedy that comes between them even as the children are best friends through it. I enjoyed this one, but felt that the characters weren’t elucidated enough, or I didn’t feel like I knew them well enough. However, I liked the development of the characters’ lives over time and the general premise of this one. It’s worth picking up.

Apologies for posting a bunch at a time – I didn’t take a computer on vacation and have a backlog of good books to post about…for those new followers (somehow I have 12 new ones from the past two weeks – weird), I normally post once every few days or once a week or so.

I loved The Lager Queen of Minnesota by J Ryan Stradal. It’s about two sisters whose lives diverge and then, at the end, come back together. Through the story, you learn about beer and beer making. I had enjoyed his first book, Kitchens of the Great Midwest, and this one was not a disappointment. This is definitely one to add to your summer list!

Forever is the Worst Long Time by Camille Pagan was a wonderful read. It reminded me of Me Before You by Jojo Moyes. And, while the ending wasn’t what I had hoped, the story was a great one and a quick, easy read. When James meets Lou, he falls instantly head-over-heels. Unfortunately, Lou is James’ best friend’s fiance. You can imagine how things go from there, but there is some unexpected, some sadness, and some life-truths to go along with the more predictable. I would grab this one for the summer. I’ll bet you enjoy it.

The Lightest Object in the Universe by Kimi Eisele had the feel of The Road, which was a very disconcerting read (followed by the eerie experience of watching the movie one night and having an earthquake wake us up – yikes). So, in some ways, I felt like I had read this story before. In The Lightest Object, rather than a father and son pair, the two main characters are on different sides of the US and working toward finding one another again. Overall, despite the spooky feeling as I read, I liked this book and having a love story embedded in the post-apocalyptic tale. In addition, as the book progressed, while you were still on the edge of your seat, there were fewer terrible things and, indeed, hope. I really enjoyed this book, particularly the last third.

Evvie Drake Starts Over was a wonderful and quick summer read. Evvie is packing up to leave her husband when she learns that he has died in a car crash. Dean, a pitcher for the Yankees, can suddenly no longer pitch and comes to live in Evvie’s basement. While the story doesn’t provide much mystery, it’s well-written and an enjoyable read. And, it takes place in mid-boast Maine, which means the backdrop is one that I love. It’s perfect for a day at the beach.

You would be hard-pressed to find someone who hasn’t heard about Nickel Boys by Colson Whitehead. It’s been written up everywhere and garnered high praise. Like Underground Railroad, however, I liked this novel, but I didn’t love it. This book centered around Elwood who was sentenced to a reform school in Florida (based on the real Dozier School for Boys where bodies were found by University of South Florida graduate students in 2012. It details the brutalities as well as the friendships he formed. The book was well-written and interesting, but I expected more.

There probably isn’t a perfect book. For me, however, The Housekeeper and the Professor by Yoko Ogawa comes pretty darn close. It was certainly the best book I have read this year and definitely a top 20 lifetime read. It’s a short novel about exactly what the title describes and I read it last night with time to spare. None of the characters are named except the housekeeper’s son whose nickname is Root (like square). The Housekeeper comes to work for the math Professor who has already gone through nine other housekeepers. He was in a car accident in 1975 and only has 80-minute chunks of short-term memory. I can’t even adequately describe this wonderful story and how much I loved it. If I gave more than five stars, this book would get them!

The Person You Mean to Be: How Good People Fight Bias by Dolly Chugh was one of our faculty/staff summer reading choices. It’s a good, entry-level exploration of bias and offers tools to be a better person, colleague, friend, etc. If you haven’t read much on equity or done much anti-bias work, this is a good starting place. If you have done some of this work already, you will find this to be review work. Nevertheless, it’s an approachable text with interesting stories, real-life scenarios, and things to ponder. I enjoyed it.

As you know, I am a sucker for a memoir. Once More We Saw Stars by Jason Greene has garnered five stars for 119 reviews on Amazon, which seemed like a good barometer. While it was a really tough read, it was a very well-written one. Jayson’s two-year-old daughter was on a walk with her grandmother and was killed when a brick fell of a building. The book tells both of this event, the aftermath, and how the Jayson and his wife cope with the unspeakable. It was heart-wrenching, but beautiful and worth picking up.

The Huntress by Kate Quinn has been on a number of recent booklists. I never did read Quinn’s previous book, The Alice Network, having grown tired of WWII, but I thought I would pick this one up anyway, since it’s been a while since I delved into that era. This is a great choice, though far too long (500+ pages). It took me a while to get through it, but I really did enjoy it. I might have liked it more, had it been not quite so long and dense. It tells three stories of Nina, Ian, and Jordan, and weaves all these stories together, both past and present. Of course, I liked the historical fiction-aspect, and the bringing together of all the characters, but I also liked the WWII without the gore and depression (though those are undercurrents for sure). If you have time and patience and like Kate Quinn, I would definitely grab this one. If you are looking for a lighter, breezy read, put this on a list for later.