It’s beach reading season!
Where I live in central Italy, the 1 May holiday tends to kick off the season for beach-going.
Yes, it’s great to go to feel the soft sand beneath your feet, to breathe the clean, sea air and to feel the repetitive ebb and flow of the waves, but really, the beach is primarily a great excuse for me for lazy weekend days divided between swimming and reading an annual stack of books.
Of course, I read all year, but there’s something about the summer season that brings out the inner kid in me. Remember those long summer holidays as kids when you could spend lazy stretches of time reading? Alas, I no longer have those, but I do my best to replicate the formula in my weekend beach outings.
And you, readers, are you summertime beach readers (even if it’s in your backyard garden)? Do you read more in the summer? What’s on your recommended reading list this summer?
Happy May!
May 1 is the beginning of our garden/Sunday barbecue season and yesterday was spent cleaning up/mowing/urging reluctant teens to participate! We spend many weekends here entertaining, rather than going to the beach, although I did my first reading session on the hammock yesterday afternoon. I’m rereading Th Emperor by Rycard Kapuchinski an account of the last years of Haile Selassie’s royal court – one of my favourites!
Ooh, hammock reading is ideal, too! Hope these weekend plans don’t hinder your (promised) trip to Rome. We’re all waiting for you!
Not warm enough for beach reading here yet 🙁 Reading rate definitely increases once the kids escape school-term though. Have a stack of 30 books on bedside and many more on ipad – can’t wait!
Hang in there. It’s May, summmer is around the corner. Wow – an impressive stack, Grace. I’ll want to hear favorites.
I always save a chunkster for summer and this year it will be The Goldfinch, but now I’m about to join the August #WomenInTranslation challenge so I think I will be reading Elena Ferrante, Hanna Krall, Tove Jansson and whoever else I can gather before then.
Ooh, interesting, Claire. Will check out #WomenInTranslation. Haven’t seen this yet. Thanks for the tip! Yes, I want to read The Goldfinch, too. Alway love your book tips!
I just heard/read about it on twitter this morning, and having just finished two books by women that had been translated and now reading a third, I thought why not. 🙂
Definitely summer is also for me the season of reading. I will leave home with many books, my loaded Kindle (I still prefer physical books but ebooks are great for travel), and over summer I will borrow many books at the library and buy more than I do the rest of the year. I still don’t know which books I will read this summer, but it will be a mix of YA and adult literature, mostly written by women. Great post that triggers my desire to pack and leave.
By mistake I replied to Claire. Actually I wanted to tell Claire that The Goldfinch is the best book I read this year. Absolutely perfect and not too long like so many people have said. I swallowed the whole book in days. That’s how good I find it. Enjoy!
Thanks, Evelyne – for the comment and your views on The Goldfinch. A book on my to-read list! Happy travels (and reading!)