Books for the Beach

It's rainy and mid-60s today in Boston.  Perfect weather to think about what to read on that beach vacation coming up!!  Here's a list of my top five recommendations for your next beach vacation!!

• Bossypants, Tina Fey-- This isn't just another silly memoir.  This book gives us fabulous insight into a strong, caring, and incredibly funny woman.  I laughed out loud so many times that the dogs started barking at me!  :)

• Heads You Lose, Lisa Lutz and David Hayward-- Lisa Lutz is one of my favorite authors (she wrote the Spellman Files) and here she collaborated with an ex-boyfriend to create a strange and unique experience for her readers.  She and Hayward alternated chapters in this comical murder mystery and they left in their notes to each other at the end of each chapter.  Truly an entertaining read!!

• The Lincoln Lawyer, Michael Connelly-- This was a rather poorly written book, but I'm recommending it anyway.  The story is interesting and the character is developed enough to allow us to actually develop an opinion about him.  If you can get past sentences like "he looked down the hallway and she was standing at the end of the hallway,"  then I actually think you'll find it a pretty good read.

• Slammerkin and The Sealed Letter, Emma Donoghue-- Donoghue wrote Room, which got a lot of attention earlier this year for it's unique premise.  But, long before she ripped the premise of that novel from the Jaycee Dugard case, Donoghue was using headlines as inspiration.  Both Slammerkin and The Sealed Letter are novels based on newspaper articles written in the 1860s in London.  Personally, I've never found that genre overly interesting (Jane Austen aside, of course) but Donoghue's books are really good!!  Unique, intense, gripping, and entertaining, I had a hard time putting either one down.

Not Your Ordinary Family-- THE SPELLMAN BOOKS

THE SPELLMAN BOOKS, by Lisa Lutz

The best books are the ones you can't stop reading. The ones that make you go to bed at 8 o'clock on Saturday night just so you can find out what happens next. The best books have characters that stay with you long after you finish reading. You wonder what happened to them next and you realize that they've actually become real to you. The best books come alive.

Lisa Lutz's series of books about the Spellman family have etched themselves into my mind. My mother-in-law gave me the first book, The Spellman Files, almost a year ago. I read it in 3 days, falling in love with the characters and the story! The protagonist is Isabel Spellman, the 28-year-old rebellious middle-child of the Spellman clan, a family whose private investigation business allows for many a hilarious situation. The book is a comedy of errors but with a heart. You learn early on that, as wacky as the Spellmans are, they clearly love each other and want to see each member happy.

Last week, I discovered The Curse of the Spellmans at my favorite bookstore. I then spent the next five days reading. I devoured this book in 2 days and then downloaded both The Revenge of the Spellmans and The Spellmans Strike Again to my Kindle. By Monday, I had finished the series.

My point is, these books are Fantastic!! They're funny, smart, charming and super quick reads. They're also great for book clubs or for a Saturday night. Forget about meeting people in bars; if you want to meet some real characters, read The Spellman Books!!