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Summer Time Readin'
River, Cross My Heart
Breena Clarke
Call number: Clarke, Lge-type Clarke, Cassette Clarke
If you want excitement and non-stop action, go read "Die Another Day". But if you enjoy great characters that seem so real they leap out of the page, try Breena Clarke's first novel, "River, Cross My Heart". Written in a simple yet lyrical style, the author explores the unexpected tragedy of a little girl's drowning in the Potomac and how it affects the black community of 1925 Washington, D.C. Part coming-of-age story and part exploration of the human spirit in the midst of tragedy and racism, this book will appeal to the reader who likes things slow and contemplative.
--Laveda, DIS/Vancouver Community Library
The Turk: The life and times of the famous eighteenth-century chess-playing machine
Tom Standage
Call number: 794.17 STANDAG
The story of a chess-playing mechanical man, dressed in a Turkish costume, that delighted and perplexed audiences long before the advent of modern computers. Had an arrangement of clockwork gears really been made to "think"? A highly entertaining history of an early technological enigma and the people whose lives it touched.
--Sheri, DIS/Vancouver Community Library
The Queen of Harlem
Brian Keith Jackson
Call number: Jackson
Black preppie Mason Randolph takes a break before entering Stanford Law School and decides to reinvent himself as "Malik" and to live in Harlem, "authentically", with "real black people". He rents a room from the glamorous and mysterious Carmen and starts acting his part. Mayhem and surprises fill this book. Author Jackson's first novel won an award from the American Library Association
--Sue, DIS/Vancouver Community Library
Crossing to Safety
Wallace Stegner
Call number: Stegner
My favorite book from award winning author Wallace Stegner traces two couples and their thirty-year friendship. Larry and Sally Morgan arrive at the university where Larry will begin his first teaching job, and are grateful to find friends in the charming and wealthy Sid and Charity Lang. Charity is the most vibrant character in the novel, both the force behind the friendship and the greatest strain upon it. She is all at once vivacious, generous, arrogant, and bullying - and her attempts to steer the career of her more passive husband contrast with the Morgan's quieter marriage. Through the years, illness and failure affect both couples, but the idealism in their friendship carries on. This is a beautiful book about loyalty and survival, and how these can leave surprising legacies. Much of the action takes place during summer at the Lang's lakeside home, and this plus the focus on youthful high hopes make Crossing to Safety a good choice for summer reading.
--Lydia, Cascade Park Community Library
The Roosevelt Women
Betty Boyd Caroli
Call number: 973.917 Caroli
An enjoyable read covering the lives of many of the well known women in the Roosevelt family and several who were not so well known, but equally amazing. Along with providing a rare look at the women who shaped the lives and careers of 2 presidents, it gave some insightful glimpses of the presidents themselves. The book is a fairly quick read, each chapter covers the life of one person. By the end of the chapter, you feel as though you have experienced a full length biography.
--Lois, Ridgefield Community Library
This Heart of Mine
Susan Elizabeth Phillips
Call Number: Phillip, Lge-type Phill, Cassette Phill
When it comes to books, there's a time for the lofty, the sublime, the mentally torturous during our never-ending quest for knowledge and the answers to life. And then there's the rest of the time . . . this I call "summer reading," a phrase stolen from an essay by the outdoors humorist Patrick McManus. (Even if you're not an outdoorsman, read McManus--he's beyond hilarious). Anyway, I have to admit that I like the occasional romance novel and I discovered one a few years back that was so good I had to buy it. It's about Molly Sommerfield, a brainy ex-co-ed children's book author who falls for the City's most celebrated Quarterback--everything she shouldn't be attracted to, but. . . . How about this for an opening line: "On the day Kevin Tucker almost killed her, Molly Sommerfield swore off unrequited love forever."? The story may sound fairly cliched in the romance genre, but Phillips is a gifted writer. The book is very funny and also has parts that will tear your heart out. Happy ending, though, because that's always a requirement of Romance! Take it to that summer beach, throw your towel out on the sand, soak up the sun, smell and feel the crashing surf--and prepare for a good time! Oh, and the Library also has it on tape--you can listen to it in the car on the way to the Beach!
--Dawn, Van Mall Community Library
Five Quarters of an Orange
Joanne Harris
Call Number: Harris, Lge-type Harris
Set in the Loire valley of France during WWII, Framboise Simon recalls the days of her childhood. Back then she and her brother traded on the black market with the Germans, developing a friendship with a German soldier. This relationship led to a violent series of events that still torment the aging Framboise.
--Julie, Van Mall Community Library
Eva Moves the Furniture
Margot Livesey
Call Number: Livesey
A coming of age novel about a young girl who's mother died when she was born and who first sees her "companions" when she is six years. The companions, who no one else can see, follow her throughout life, twice saving her from harm, and keeping her from intimacy with a man she loves. Set in Scotland during WWII, Eva works as a nurse in a Glasgow infirmary. The companions' purpose is finally revealed.
--Julie, Van Mall Community Library
Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress
Sijie Dai
Call Number: Dai
Two hapless teenage boys are sent to a remote village for "re-education" during China's Cultural Revolution. Work in the fields and a coal mine is hard and dangerous, broken only by hikes to a town for showings of North Korean movies that can be retold to the villagers. Then they meet a young seamstress, and discover a secret stash of forbidden European novels.
--Linda, Vancouver Community Library
Outlander
Diana Gabaldon
Call Number: Gabaldo, Cassette Gabal
I recommend the Outlander series for some engaging summer reading, especially if you like historical novels. Just make sure you have a lot of time, because they're long and you won't want to put them down!
--Naomi, Goldendale Community Library
Fashion Victim
Chloe Green
Call Number: Green
Fashion stylist Dallas O'Connor is hired to create the "look" for an all-girl band shooting their first music video. The band is on location on a Caribbean island and staying in a luxurious castle. Gorgeous men roam the place, including the knockout chef Oscar. But this paradise is deceiving. Previous stylists have been fired and one has disappeared. Then Dallas finds a body on the beach and starts to notice that there are some odd things going on.
--Sue, Vancouver Community Library
Class Reunion
Rona Jaffe
Call Number: Jaffe
My favorite "junk" novel. It follows 8 best friends-four men and four women through the trials and tribulations of the college years--and catches up with all of them 20 years later. You won't be disappointed. There's a sequel--After the Reunion.
--Lorraine, Vancouver Community Library
Stones from the River
Ursula Hegin
Call Number: Hegi, Lge-type Hegi
First, it's the story of Trudi, a dwarf, and the human desire to be accepted as "normal" and fit in. She's the kid outside the circle, wanting to be included, resenting the others, but showing indifference. It's also the story of the impact of Hitler and the Nazi party on a small town in Germany where loyalties become defined and divided. Hegi's composition of Trudi's character was one of the book's best appeals. Trudi is an amazing storyteller who can pull the listener in, sense what they want to hear, get them to expose themselves and then draws on that information for her next story.
--Vikki, Accounting Dept.
Modoc: The True Story of the Greatest Elephant That Ever Lived
Ralph Helfer
Call Number: 791.3209 Helfer
A story of an elephant and his man who were born in the same hour on the same farm to an elephant trainer for a small circus in Germany. The story covers a fascinating life, including being a circus performer, elephant napped, sunk on a freighter in the Indian Ocean and cast adrft for several days, murdering a human, working as a teak hauler in the forests of Burma, being shot by machine guns and forced to march through a mountain pass in tortuous conditions, becoming a roadside attraction in America. And that's just the elephant's story!
--Meg, Vancouver Community Library
Over His Dead Body
Leslie Glass
Call Number: Glass
Dutiful wife Cassandra Sales has a face-lift in the hope of reviving the interest of her husband Mitch. But Mitch comes early home from Europe unexpectedly and finds Cassandra not only looking horrible but also unknowingly wearing his mistress's pajamas. Mitch has a stroke on the spot and ends up in a coma. Cassandra starts to discover his hidden life: his mistress, an IRS audit, his shady dealings, and his plan to divorce and swindle her. Meanwhile the investigating IRS agent is very attractive, and her two troublesome adult children are trying to protect her by keeping her ignorant of their dad's doings. Should Cassandra pull the plug on Mitch?
--Sue, Vancouver Community Library
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