July Reading
Novels
The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath
On a Night Like This by Ellen Sussman
A Lesson Before Dying by Ernest J. Gaines
Freshman Lies by Linda A. Cooney
Freshman Guys by Linda A. Cooney
Someone Like You by Sarah Dessen
Alternatives to Sex by Stephen McCauley
Short Stories
Notable Nonfiction
Billy the Kid: The Endless Ride by Michael Wallis
The Writer’s Desk by Jill Krementz
“The Lion and the Mouse” by Jill Lepore
Hibernating
Twilight by Stephanie Meyer
I have a couple of great novels to recommend this month. I really enjoyed On a Night Like This and Someone Like You. The latter is a YA book that made me wish that someone was writing YA like this when I was a teen. I think I would have read more.
On the other side of that coin, I tried Twilight and I simply could not finish it. It didn’t help that I kept playing Buffy DVDs as I was reading it. I really wanted to like it because I’ve been getting more into YA lately (more on that later) and I’m usually up for a good vampire tale, but this book lacked the character development that I need to really pull me into a story. And so, permanently hibernating it is.
Laura said,
August 7, 2008 at 12:19 am
I actually managed to make it through the first three books. The first book only got interesting at about page 500. Most of it tended to be “I love him, I love him”. The second book has got to be my favorite because there actually was some character development (through the use of another love interest) and actual plot. But that was quickly diminished by the second half of the book. If you want to read a good Stephanie Meyer book, read the host. The story was actually interesting and there really was a plot. It still is very character driven (a lot of emotions, etc.) but the overall story held up much better.