With the humidity upon us, we thought it was time to find out what to read this summer.
A quick poll of Nation editors and writers produced an eclectic reading list: The magazine’s literary editor John Palattella is currently digesting Dreyfus: Politics, Emotion and the Scandal of the Century by Ruth Harris, The Quickening Maze by Adam Foulds and Absence of Mind: The Dispelling of Inwardness from the Modern Myth of the Self by Marilynne Robinson. Assistant literary editor Miriam Markowitz recommends Chalcot Crescent by Fay Weldon, Visitation by Jenny Erpenbeck, and Quantum Enigma: Physics Encounters Consciousness by Bruce Rosenblum and Fred Kuttner. Washington editor Chris Hayes, citing the imperatives of researching his own forthcoming book, is deep into both The Challenger Launch Decision by Diane Vaughan and Cadillac Desert by Marc Reisner. Columnist Katha Pollitt is enjoying Easy, a new collection of poetry by Marie Ponsot. Senior editor Richard Kim is loving China Mielville’s "brilliant" Kraken. Managing Editor Roane Carey just started Horacio Castellanos Moya’s short novel Dance With Snakes. Investigative reporter Jeremy Scahill is reading Zeitoun Dave Eggers’ non-fiction work. Laura Flanders couldn’t speak more highly of Elizabeth Streb’s How to Become an Extreme Action Hero. Blogger and former Crawdaddy editor Greg Mitchell has set aside When the Rough God Goes Riding: Van Morrison by Greil Marcus and The Ninth: Beethoven and the World in 1824 by Harvey Sachs. Political writer Ari Berman strongly recommends Rafe Bartholomew’s Pacific Rims about the basketball craze in the Philippines. Internship director Max Fraser is devouring The Heat’s On by Chester Himes, a seasonally-appropriate tome detailing New York City in the summertime, "in all its scorching depravity." Web editor Emily Douglas finally cracked open David Mitchell’s Cloud Atlas. Web intern Melanie Breault took her uncle’s suggestion and is reading Terror and Liberalism by Paul Berman. Fellow web intern Carrie Battan recently finished The Harvard Psychedelic Club by Don Lattin. Ari Melber, our netroots correspondent, is taking in The Emperor’s Children by Claire Messud. Copy editor Mark Sorkin is grappling with Bill McKibben’s Eaarth, and ActNow blogger Peter Rothberg is wildly enthusiastic about Rosanne Cash’s memoir Composed.
These are all interesting suggestions by literate people but we really want to know what you’re reading! Where better to turn for book suggestions than Nation readers, whom surveys tell us read, on average, one book a week! We’re excited to tap this collective literacy and publish a recommended reading list of reader selections.
Whether it’s light beach reading or dystopian sci-fi more appropriate for a penniless staycation, please tell us what you’re reading this summer.
