Summer Reads Archives - Bob on Books

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The Weekly Wrap: May 11-17

Story Keeping

We have always loved storytellers, from the stories told in oral cultures, to writers who spin stories, to historians who research and tell the stories of our past. Less glamorous, but just as important, I would contend, are those who are story keepers. Without story keepers, our stories may die within a generation or less, whether from neglect or deliberate action.

Who are the story keepers? They are the publishers who keep important stories in print. They are the librarians who keep the stories on their shelves and connect readers and books. Booksellers, who take financial risks to make books available to readers are story keeping heroes.

I believe we are entering a season where story keeping is taking on greater importance. For example, books are being removed from libraries in service academies and schools. Others have pressed for the removals of books from public libraries. It may be subjects labeled “DEI,” which may include many works of Black, or other ethnic histories. Or it may include books portraying non-traditional gender identity or sexual orientation. If it has been politicized, it has probably been challenged or removed.

I don’t necessarily agree with all the stories or how they ought to be told. It is messy because of the rich mosaic of people who make up our society. Some just think it is simpler to erase the stories that differ from our favorite rendering of the story. But when we do this, we only hear the versions of a story from those who hold power. Then dissenting stories that give a fuller perspective are silenced. Simpler but smaller is what we get.

We are all important to the work of story keeping. We can support publishers, librarians, and booksellers. Whenever we buy and read and talk about books, we are story keepers. And when we read diverse books, we help keep alive the stories of those on the margins whose stories are under attack. We should aggressively resist any effort to ban or destroy books. I hope we don’t come to the day of Fahrenheit 451, where it becomes the task of those who want to save the stories to memorize them. Ultimately, they understood that this is what it meant to save civilization.

Five Articles Worth Reading

Summer is coming and the reading is easy. The Atlantic “The Summer Reading Guide” offers recommendations of great books for the beach or those hot summer afternoons where we dive into a book while sipping our sweet tea.

Were there books that made you challenge the conventions, that opened your mind to new ways of thinking about life, relationships, society? Timothy Aubry explores this topic in “Gateway Books.” What were your gateway books?

Then, perhaps you would study philosophy to explore the meaning of life. However, Pranay Sanklecha describes how this is not what he found in his philosophy studies in “Philosophy was once alive.”

What is “close reading”? In a review of On Close Reading by John Guillory, Dan Sinykin explores how one defines “close reading” and its place in literary studies. The article is “Pay Attention!” His own argument for close reading in the penultimate paragraph made reading this one worth it for me.

Finally, Mrs. Dalloway is one hundred years old! “A Hundred Years of Mrs. Dalloway” explores how Virginia Woolf’s novel was so revolutionary both in its day and in its long-term impact.

Quote of the Week

Feminist poet Adrienne Rich was born on May 16, 1929. She observed:

“Lying is done with words and also with silence.”

It seems to me that this is a corollary to Edmund Burke’s famous statement, “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.”

Miscellaneous Musings

Ron Chernow’s Mark Twain arrived at my doorstep today. It is another massive biography, coming in at over a thousand pages of text. I’ll literally be reading that all summer. But if it is like his previous works, it should be a great ride.

I was surprised how much I enjoyed Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin. If anything, I have enjoyed The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry even more. And its main character is a somewhat cranky bookseller!

As an addendum to my thoughts on story keeping. I consider reviewing as a form of story keeping. I try to review a variety of diverse and important books and it is one of my ways to be a story keeper, making sure others know of these important stories.

Next Week’s Reviews

Monday: Wesley Vander Lugt, ed. A Prophet in Darkness

Tuesday: Agatha Christie, Third Girl

Wednesday: Jeffrey W. Barbeau, The Last Romantic

Thursday: Ezra Klein, Derek Thompson, Abundance

Friday: Michael J. Gilmour, Reading the Margins

So, that’s The Weekly Wrap for May 11-17, 2025!

Find past editions of The Weekly Wrap under The Weekly Wrap heading on this page

The summer vacation season is finally here, and with it trips to the beach, the mountains, a cabin, or just to a shady spot on your deck or in your yard with a cool drink and, if you are a reader like me, a good book.

For many people “summer reads” and “beach reads” are synonymous. Usually this is light reading–a page turner that holds your attention, or even if you doze off, memorable enough to pick up where you left off. It could be a romance (not my thing) or an action thriller or spy novel or mystery or maybe some Young Adult fiction. Some people would call this “mind candy” and look down on it. I would suggest that while you don’t want to live on candy, sometimes candy is just the right thing!

I have a few other thoughts, not so much about particular books as about types of books you might consider for summer reads. All you need to do is Google “summer reads” to find several lists of suggestions.

1. If you will be “stay-cationing” this summer, you might consider reading a travel book or other history of another country. Learning about a part of the world you can’t visit may not be as fun as going there, but sometimes the trips we take in our minds can be pretty good.

2. If you have children, check with your librarian about some age-appropriate read aloud books you can take on trips or have around for rainy days. If your family never read aloud, this might be the time to start and make some good memories around good books.

3. Pick a book in the category of “I’ve always wondered about…” This could be a book on anything from particle physics to the paintings of Van Gogh.

4. Along this same vein, you might think of reading a book in the category of “I’ve always wanted to learn how to…”

5. The last category I would suggest might be a book or two that you will read slowly because it is a great work of beauty or thought to be savored. Perhaps this is the summer to pull that impressive copy of War and Peace off the shelves and actually read Tolstoy’s masterpiece (hint: figure out a way to keep track of the names). Perhaps it might be a work of great spiritual depth like Augustine’s Confessions or Abraham Heschel’s work on the prophets.

Look for a post soon of some of the books I hope to read this summer.

Your local library probably has a summer reading program and can offer great recommendations in all these categories. As a kid, I used to come home with stacks of library books to read on our shady front porch when I wasn’t at the pool.

We often think of summer as a time of physical refreshment. A few good books can make it mentally refreshing as well. So here’s to a cool breeze, a shady spot, a comfortable chair, and a great book that is even better than it looked when you picked it up!