Best Summer Reads
This month the Guardian has once again offered up its list of the Best Summer Reads, assembled by the editors, members of the reading public and English celebs.
Here are just a few:
Richard Eyre, director
The Girl With a Dragon Tattoo – Stieg Larsson
My favourite beach read would have to be this novel (and its sequel The Girl Who Played With Fire) by the Swedish writer Stieg Larsson, who died in 2004. A middle-aged man (financial journalist) teams up with a young woman (sociopathic computer expert) to investigate a wealthy family devoured by its secrets. It's an intelligent thriller that never disappoints: complex plot, inspired sleuthing, social comment, violence, sex and almost credible characters.
Simon Schama, historian and TV presenter
The Leopard – Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa
There must be some people who when parked on a beach feel they should be in the permafrost with Ivan Denisovich, but I'm not one of them. No, give me the sumptuous, wistful, sensual, warm-blooded Leopard any day. It may be Sicily in the 1860s but everything is in there: appetite, love, history's cruel laughter, lamplit Palermo, the rustle of silk. You live the Prince of Salina's life and revisit your own with an almost unbearably sharpened awareness of the texture of life.
Grayson Perry, artist
The French Lieutenant's Woman – John Fowles
It's about a woman who becomes a scandalous figure in Lyme Regis because she had an affair with a French soldier. He leaves and she spends her days gazing out to sea, and becomes an object of fascination for the hero. I loved the way the opening of each chapter is presented as documentary evidence. I was about 20 and working in the kitchens of an army camp in Cornwall, and was surprised to find this on a rack among the usual seaside trash. I devoured it.
Enjoy the rest of the list…
What book to you recommend as your BEST SUMMER READ?
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