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A Summer Reading List [1]

by
Staff
7.1.09

In anticipation of our "Summer Reading Issue," we asked which books you, as writers who read deeply year-round, turn to in the warm months ahead. Culled from readers' responses on pw.org and our Facebook [2] page, here are the results.

 

POETRY
The Battlefield Where the Moon Says I Love You (Lost Roads, 1977) by Frank Stanford
Black Woman and Other Poems/Mujer negra y otros poemas (Mango Publishing, 2004) by Nancy Morejon
Blue on Blue Ground (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2005) by Aaron Smith
A Book of Luminous Things: An International Anthology of Poetry (Harcourt Brace, 1996) edited by Czeslaw Milosz
Collected Poems, 1947–1980 (Harper & Row, 1984) by Allen Ginsberg
The Country Without a Post Office (Norton, 1997) by Agha Shahid Ali
C. P. Cavafy: The Collected Poems (Random House, 2009) edited by Daniel Mendelsohn
C. P. Cavafy: The Unfinished Poems (Random House, 2009) edited by Daniel Mendelsohn
The Dance Most of All (Knopf, 2009) by Jack Gilbert
Dear Darkness (Knopf, 2008) by Kevin Young
Dismantling the Hills (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2008) by Michael McGriff
Endpoint and Other Poems (Knopf, 2009) by John Updike
Femme du Monde (Tia Chucha, 2006) by Patricia Spears Jones
Four Good Things (Houghton Mifflin, 1980) by James McMichael
Half of the World in Light: New and Selected Poems (University of Arizona Press, 2008) by Juan Felipe Herrera
Half Wild (Louisiana State University Press, 2006) by Mary Rose O'Reilly
How God Ends Us (University of South Carolina Press, 2009) by DéLana R. A. Dameron
If Birds Gather Your Hair for Nesting (University of Georgia Press, 2009) by Anna Journey
In Search of Duende (New Directions, 1955) by Federico García Lorca
In the American Tree (National Poetry Foundation, 1986) edited by Ron Silliman
In the Surgical Theater (American Poetry Review, 1999) by Dana Levin
Love Is a Dog From Hell: Poems 1974-1977 (Black Sparrow Press, 1977) by Charles Bukowski
Native Guard (Houghton Mifflin, 2006) by Natasha Trethewey
Next Life (Wesleyan University Press, 2007) by Rae Armantrout
One Hundred Poems From the Chinese (New Directions, 1971) by Kenneth Rexroth
The Owning Stone (Red Hen Press, 2000) by Jim Peterson
The Plague of Doves (HarperCollins, 2008) by Louise Erdrich
Poems From the Women's Movement (Library of America, 2009) edited by Honor Moore
The School Among the Ruins: Poems 2000-2004 (Norton, 2004) by Adrienne Rich
Selected Poems
(Pantheon Books, 1993) by Rita Dove
Sonata Mulattica (Norton, 2009) by Rita Dove
Sonnets (Grove Press, 1967) by Ted Berrigan
Sun Under Wood (Ecco, 1996) by Robert Hass
Take It (Wave Books, 2009) by Joshua Beckman
Tell Me (BOA Editions, 2000) by Kim Addonizio
Then, Suddenly (University of Pittsburgh Press, 1999) by Lynn Emanuel
Warhorses (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2008) by Yusef Komunyakaa

NOVELS AND NOVELLAS
1984 (Harcourt Brace, 1949) by George Orwell
2666 (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2008) by Roberto Bolaño
After Dark (Knopf, 2007) by Haruki Murakami
All Hallow's Eve (Faber & Faber, 1945) by Charles Williams
The Animal People by Henry Oso Quintero
Atlas Shrugged (Random House, 1957) by Ayn Rand
Aztec (Atheneum, 1980) by Gary Jennings
Balún-Canán by Rosario Castellanos
Blue Water (Morrow, 2006) by A. Manette Ansay
Brideshead Revisited
(Little, Brown, 1945) by Evelyn Waugh
Bridge of Sighs (Knopf, 2007) by Richard Russo
Caramelo (Knopf, 2002) by Sandra Cisneros
Castle (Graywolf Press, 2009) by J. Robert Lennon
The Children's Hospital (McSweeney's Books, 2006) by Chris Adrian
The Chronicles of Narnia by C. S. Lewis
A Confederacy of Dunces
(Louisiana State University Press, 1980) by John Kennedy Toole
The Conqueror
(Open Letter Books, 2009) by Jan Kjaerstad
Crash
(Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1973) by J. G. Ballard
Deep Rivers (Waveland, 2002) by José María Arguedas
Dune (Chilton Books, 1965) by Frank Herbert
Empire Falls (Knopf, 2001) by Richard Russo
Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
(Random House, 1971) by Hunter S. Thompson
Fire in the Blood (Knopf, 2007) by Irène Némirovsky
The First Man (Knopf, 1995) by Albert Camus
The Garden of Last Days (Norton, 2008) by Andre Dubus III
God Says No (McSweeney's Books, 2009) by James Hannaham
The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Society (Dial, 2009) by Mary Ann Shaffer and Annie Barrows
Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas (Bantam, 1994) by Tom Robbins
Home (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2008) by Marilynne Robinson
The House on Coliseum Street (Knopf, 1961) by Shirley Ann Grau
House on Mango Street (Arte Publico Press, 1983) by Sandra Cisneros
El Juego del Ángel (Vintage, 2008) by Carlos Ruiz Zafón
Kafka on the Shore (Knopf, 2005) by Haruki Murakami
Killer Karma: A Father Ananda Mystery (Silkworm Books, 2008) by Nick Wilgus
Landscape in Concrete
(Open Letter Books, 2009) by Jakov Lind
Lottery (Berkley Trade, 2008) by Patricia Woods
Lowboy (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2009) by John Wray
The Mambo Kings Sing Songs of Love
(Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1989) by Oscar Hijuelo
The Mariposa Club (Alyson Books, 2009) by Rigoberto González
Mr. Mendoza's Paintbrush (Cinco Puntos Press, 2009) by Luis Alberto Urrea, illustrated by Christopher Cardinale
A Mercy (Knopf, 2008) by Toni Morrison
Moloch: Or, This Gentile World (Grove Press, 1992) by Henry Miller
The New Valley
(Grove Press, 2009) by Josh Weil
The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency (Pantheon Books, 2005) by Alexander McCall Smith
Normal People Don't Live Like This
(Persea Books, 2009) by Dylan Landis
Norwegian Wood (Vintage International, 2000) by Haruki Murakami
Novel Without a Name
(Morrow, 1995) by Duong Thu Huong
Odd Thomas (Bantam Books, 2004) by Dean Koontz
Only Revolutions (Pantheon Books, 2006) by Mark Z. Danielewski
Oscar and Lucinda (Harper & Row, 1988) by Peter Carey
A Person of Interest (Viking, 2008) by Susan Choi
A Posturing of Fools (River City, 2004) by Brewster Milton Robertson
A Prodigal Summer
(HarperCollins, 2000) by Barbara Kingsolver
A Proper Knowledge
(Bellevue Literary Press, 2008) by Michelle Latiolais
Prospero's Cell
(Dutton, 1960) by Lawrence Durrell
Pygmy (Doubleday, 2009) by Chuck Palahniuk
The Reader (Pantheon Books, 1997) by Bernhard Schlink
The Riddle of the Traveling Skull (McSweeney's Books, 2005) by Harry Stephen Keeler
Ruins (Akashic Books, 2009) by Achy Obejas
Saints in Limbo (WaterBrook Press, 2009) by River Jordon
Sag Harbor (Doubleday, 2009) by Colson Whitehead
The Secret of Hurricanes (MacAdam/Cage, 2002) by Theresa Williams
The Selected Works of T. S. Spivet (Penguin Press, 2009) by Reif Larsen
Shark Dialogues (Atheneum, 1994) by Kiana Davenport
The Signal (Viking, 2009) by Ron Carlson
Sinners (HarperCollins, 1971) by Jackie Collins
Specimen Days (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2005) by Michael Cunningham
The Story of Edgar Sawtelle (Ecco, 2008) by David Wroblewski
The Summer Book (Pantheon Books, 1974) by Tove Jansson
The Tapestries (Little, Brown, 2002) by Kien Nguyen
Technology as Symptom and Dream (Routledge, 1989) by Robert D. Romanyshyn
The Temple of Wild Geese (Dalkey Archive Press, 2008) by Tsutomu Mizukami
To the Wedding (Pantheon Books, 1995) by John Berger
Underworld  (Scribner, 1997) by Don DeLillo
The Vagrants (Random House, 2009) by Yiyun Li
Vampire Chronicles by Anne Rice
Voyage Along the Horizon (McSweeney's Books, 2006) by Javier Marías
Watchmen (DC Comics, 1995) by Alan Moore
The Women (Viking, 2009) by T. C. Boyle
Yarwar Fiesta (Waveland, 2002) by José María Arguedas
The Year of Fog (Delacorte Press, 2007) by Michelle Richmond

CLASSICS
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
Dracula by Bram Stoker
The Golden Bowl by Henry James
The Great Gatsby
by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Julian by Gore Vidal
Les Misérables by Victor Hugo
On the Road by Jack Kerouac
Ulysses by James Joyce
Winesburg, Ohio by Sherwood Anderson
The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins

SHORT STORY COLLECTIONS
"A Dog Heaven" from Sweet Talk (Random House, 1990) by Stephanie Vaughn
Don't Cry (Pantheon Books, 2009) by Mary Gaitskill
Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2009) by Wells Tower
How It Ended (Knopf, 2009) by Jay McInerney
Legends of the Fall (Delacorte/S. Lawrence, 1979) by Jim Harrison
Lord Peter: The Complete Lord Peter Wimsey Stories
(Harper & Row, 1972) by Dorothy L. Sayers
The Magic of Blood (University of New Mexico Press, 1993) by Dagoberto Gilb
Oh, Don't You Cry for Me (Jefferson Press, 2008) by Philip Shirley
Olive Kitteridge (Random House, 2008) by Elizabeth Strout
Reckonings: Contemporary Short Fiction by Native American Women (Oxford University Press, 2008) edited by Hertha D. Sweet Wong, Lauren Stuart Muller, Jana Sequoya Magdaleno
Romancer Erector (Dalkey Archive Press, 2001) by Diane Williams
The Stories of John Cheever (Knopf, 1978)
Tunneling to the Center of the Earth (Harper Perennial, 2009) by Kevin Wilson
The View From Castle Rock (Knopf, 2006) by Alice Munro
Woman Hollering Creek (Random House, 1991) by Sandra Cisneros

NONFICTION
An Altar in the World: A Geography of Faith Taylor (HarperOne, 2009) by Barbara Brown
Crossing Waters, Crossing Worlds: The African Diaspora in Indian Country (Duke University Press, 2006) edited by Tiya Miles and Sharon P. Holland
Dark Sun: The Making of the Hydrogen Bomb
(Simon & Schuster, 1995) by Richard Rhodes
Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal (Houghton Mifflin, 2001) by Eric Schlosser
Fearless Confessions: A Writer's Guide to Memoir (University of Georgia Press, 2009) by Sue Silverman
God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything (Twelve, 2007) by Christopher Hitchens
Hell's Angels: A Strange and Terrible Saga (Random House, 1967) by Hunter S. Thompson
In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto (Penguin, 2008) by Michael Pollen
Letters to Poets: Conversations About Poetics, Politics, and Community
(Saturnalia, 2008) edited by Jennifer Firestone and Dana Teen Lomax
The Letters of Vincent Van Gogh (Touchstone, 2008) edited by Mark Roskill
Life After Death: The Burden of Proof (Harmony Books, 2006) by Deepak Chopra
Life List: A Woman's Quest for the World's Most Amazing Birds (Bloomsbury, 2008) by Olivia Gentile
Native American Literatures (Continuum, 2004) by Suzanne Evertsen Lundquist
On Photography (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1977) by Susan Sontag
Origins of the Specious: Myths and Misconceptions of the English Language (Random House, 2009) by Patricia T. O'Conner and Stewart Kellerman
Out of Order, Out of Sight
, Vol. 1 and Vol. 2 (MIT Press, 1996) by Adrian Piper
Ozark Magic and Folklore
(Dover Publications, 1964) by Vance Randolph
Ozarks Fiddle Music
(Mel Bay Publications, 2008) by Drew Beisswenger and Gordon McCann
A People's History of Christianity: The Other Side of the Story
(HarperOne, 2009) by Diana Butler Bass
Queer Eye for the Straight Guy (Clarkson Potter, 2004) by Ted Allen et al.
The Rose Metal Press Guide to Writing Flash Fiction (Rose Metal Press, 2009) edited by Tara L. Masih
Simón Bolívar: A Life (Yale University Press, 2006) by John Lynch
Sister Nations: Native American Women Writers on Community (Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2002) edited by Heid E. Erdrich and Laura Tohe
Twilight of the Clockwork God: Conversations on Science and Spirituality at the End of an Age (Council Oak Books, 1999) by John David Ebert
Underground America: Narratives of Undocumented Lives (McSweeney's Books, 2008) edited by Peter Orner
Words Overflown by Stars: Creative Writing Instruction and Insight From the Vermont College MFA Program
(Story Press, 2009) by David Jauss
The Writer's Mind: Interviews With American Authors (University of Arkansas Press, 1989) by Irv Broughton

MEMOIR
All I Need is Jesus and a Good Pair of Jeans (Revell, 2009) by Susanna Foth Aughtmon
Baghdad Burning: Girl Blog From Iraq (Feminist Press, 2005) by Riverbend
Burro Genius (Rayo, 2004) by Victor Villaseñor
Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight: An African Childhood (Random House, 2001) by Alexandra Fuller
A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius (Simon & Schuster, 2000) by Dave Eggers
The Mistress's Daughter (Viking, 2007) by A. M. Homes
Off the Road: My Years With Cassady, Kerouac, and Ginsberg (Morrow, 1990) by Carolyn Cassady
The Other Side of Paradise
(Scribner, 2009) by Staceyann Chin
The Prince of Frogtown (Knopf, 2008) by Rick Bragg
Unlikely Disciple: A Sinner's Semester at America's Holiest University (Grand Central Publishing, 2009) by Kevin Roose


Source URL:https://www.pw.org/content/summer_reading_list

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