The water temperature is perfect... not too hot, and not too cold. The sun is warm and the humidity hasn't gotten to unbearable levels. Let's go to the beach! Here's a list of our staff's favorite breezy beach reads to keep your mind occupied while you enjoy the sand and surf.
Alicia's Pick: One for the Money by Janet Evanovich. Stephanie Plum’s all grown up and out on her own, living five miles from
Mom and Dad’s, doing her best to sever the world’s longest umbilical
cord. Her mother is a meddler, and her grandmother is a few cans short
of a case. Out of work and out of money, with her Miata repossessed and her
refrigerator empty, Stephanie blackmails her bail bondsman cousin,
Vinnie, into giving her a try as an apprehension agent. Stephanie knows
zilch about the job requirements, but she figures her new pal, fearless
bounty hunter Ranger, can teach her what it takes to catch a crook.
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Angela's Pick: Daughters of the Stone by Dahlma Llanos-Figueroa.
It is the mid-1800s. Fela, taken from Africa, is working at her
second sugar plantation in colonial Puerto Rico. But
Fela has a secret. Before she and her husband were separated and sold
into slavery, they performed a tribal ceremony in which they poured the
essence of their unborn child into a very special stone. Fela keeps the
stone with her, waiting for the chance to finish what she started. When
the plantation owner approaches her, Fela sees a better opportunity for
her child, and allows the man to act out his desire. Such is the
beginning of a line of daughters connected by their intense love for one
another, and the stories of a lost land. Mati, a powerful healer and
noted craftswoman, is grounded in a life that is disappearing in a
quickly changing world. Concha, unsure of her place, doesn't realize the
price she will pay for rejecting her past. Elena,
modern and educated, tries to navigate between two cultures, moving to
the United States, where she will struggle to keep her family together.
Carisa turns to the past for wisdom and strength when her life in New
York falls apart. The
stone becomes meaningful to each of the women, pulling them through
times of crisis and ultimately connecting them to one another.
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Angelo's Pick: Promise Me by Harlan Coben. Myron Bolitar, former basketball star (Boston Celtics) turned sports and
entertainment agent and occasional knight in shining armor, is back in
fighting form in his action-packed eighth thriller. For the past six
years Myron has been leading a quiet life, much of it at his parents'
old house in Livingston, N.J. A new girlfriend, Ali Wilder, a 9/11
widow, is helping to bring him out of his shell. Concerned that Ali's
teenage daughter, Erin, and Erin's friend, Aimee Biel, might fall in
with the wrong crowd, Myron gives them his contact information in case
either of them feels she needs help. Aimee later calls him in the middle
of the night for a lift to a friend's house, on condition that her
request remain a secret. When Aimee turns up missing in circumstances
mirroring those surrounding another vanished girl, Bolitar himself
becomes a suspect in her disappearance and must use his wits and martial
arts skills to uncover the truth.
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Aukse's Pick: Let's Pretend This Never Happened: (A Mostly True Memoir) by Jenny Lawson. A mostly funny, irreverent memoir on the foibles of growing up weird. In
blogger Lawson's debut book, "The Bloggess" (
thebloggess.com) relies
entirely on her life stories to drive an unconventional narrative. While
marketed as nonfiction, it's a genre distinction the author employs
loosely (a point made clear in the book's subtitle). On the opening page
she defends the subtitle, explaining, "The reason this memoir is only
mostly true instead of
totally
true is that I relish not getting sued." Yet Lawson also relishes
exaggerative storytelling, spinning yarns of her childhood and early
adulthood that seem so unbelievable they could hardly be made up.
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Jessica's Pick: Faking It by Jennifer Crusie. A raunchy, romantic comedy about art forgery, thievery, and all manner
of con-artistry that's as hard to resist as one of Davy Dempsey's cons.
Davy comes from a long line of scam artists. He
arrives in Columbus, Ohio, to steal back his own money from ex-girl
friend Clea, a charmer whose wealthy husbands tend to die under
suspicious circumstances. Davy's plan is to go straight once he has the
money, but old habits die hard.
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Lill's Pick: My Nest Isn't Empty, It Just Has More Closet Space by Lisa Scottoline.
New York Times bestselling author Lisa Scottoline struck a chord with readers, book clubs, and critics with her smash-hit essay collection,
Why My Third Husband Will Be a Dog.
This time, Lisa teams up with Daughter Francesca to give their
mother-daughter perspective on everything from blind dates to empty
calories, as well as life with the feistiest octogenarian on the planet,
Mother Mary, who won’t part with her thirty-year-old bra. Three
generations of women, triple the laughs—-and the love.
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Lyn's Pick: Virals by Kathy Reichs. Tory Brennan, niece of acclaimed forensic anthropologist Temperance Brennan (of the
Bones
novels and hit TV show), is the leader of a ragtag band of teenage
"sci-philes" who live on a secluded island off the coast of South
Carolina. When the group rescues a dog caged for medical testing on a
nearby island, they are exposed to an experimental strain of canine
parvovirus that changes their lives forever. As the friends discover
their heightened senses and animal-quick reflexes, they must combine
their scientific curiosity with their newfound physical gifts to solve a
cold-case murder that has suddenly become very hot--if they can stay
alive long enough to catch the killer's scent.
Fortunately, they are now more than friends--they're a pack. They are
Virals.
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Mary's Pick: The Lion's Paw by Robb White. Sister and brother, Penny and Nick, live in an
orphanage on Florida's east coast. The siblings, afraid they will be
adopted and separated, run away. They meet an older boy, Ben, whose
mother died in childbirth and whose father is missing in
action in the South Pacific. Ben lives with Uncle Pete, who wants to
sell dad's beloved sailboat. No way, Uncle Pete! After dark Ben sails
the boat away and takes along Penny and Nick. The
orphanage wants Nick and Penny back. Uncle Pete wants to find
his nephew and the sailboat and offers a reward for their return. All
manner of strangers, dangerous and mean like the bad preacher in
Night of the Hunter,
go hunting for the feral children. They endure storms and mosquitoes,
snakes and alligators. It's
The African Queen set in Florida — for kids.
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Michelle's Pick: Size 12 is Not Fat by Meg Cabot. Heather Wells used to be a teen pop sensation...until her label dropped
her for gaining a few extra pounds. Now Heather's walked out on her
famous ex, moved in with his brother (but will things stay platonic with
Cooper forever?), and found a job in a freshman dorm at New York
College...who knew it was nicknamed Death Dorm?
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Nicole's Pick: Are You There, Vodka? It's Me, Chelsea by Chelsea Handler. In this hilarious, deliciously skewed collection, Chelsea mines her past
for stories about her family, relationships, and career that are at
once singular and ridiculous. Whether she's convincing her third-grade
class that she has been tapped to play Goldie Hawn's daughter in the
sequel to Private Benjamin, deciding to be more egalitarian by dating a
redhead, or looking out for a foulmouthed, rum-swilling little person
who looks just like her...only smaller, Chelsea has a knack for getting
herself into the most outrageous situations.
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Rita's Pick: The Tower, the Zoo, and the Tortoise by Julia Stuart. Set in the popular tourist attraction in present-day London,
The Tower, the Zoo, and the Tortoise is an exquisite story of love, loss, and a one-hundred-eighty-one-year-old pet. Balthazar
Jones has lived and worked in the Tower of London for the past eight
years. Being a Beefeater is no easy job, and when Balthazar is tasked
with setting up an elaborate menagerie of the many exotic animals gifted
to the Queen, life at the Tower gets all the more interesting. Penguins
escape, giraffes go missing, and the Komodo dragon sends innocent
tourists running for their lives. Still, that chaos is nothing compared
to what happens when his wife, Hebe, makes a surprise announcement.
What’s a Beefeater to do?
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Terri's Pick: The Mermaid Chair by Sue Monk Kidd. What inspires the yearning for a soul mate? Few writers have explored,
as Kidd does, the lush, unknown region of the feminine soul where the
thin line between the spiritual and the erotic exists.
The Mermaid Chair
is a vividly imagined novel about the passions of the spirit and the
ecstasies of the body; one that illuminates a woman’s self-awakening
with the brilliance and power that only a writer of Kidd’s ability could
conjure.
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