The Book Review

Issue 190: The Summer Reading List

With summer just around the corner, we put together a few books to add to your reading list, along with some recs from trusted friends. Don’t forget to hydrate and reapply every two hours.

Nicolle Yaron of Extremely Helpful

King of Ashes by SA Crosby

Imagine if a finance bro got dragged back into his deeply cursed hometown because his brother owes money to the kind of criminals who make regular mobsters seem like members of a yacht club. Violent, funny, sweaty, incredibly entertaining.

Chain-Gang All-Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah

Dystopian prison gladiator fights, but also surprisingly emotional and smart. Feels like if prestige television and the American prison industrial complex developed a reality show together.

The Shards by Brett Easton Ellis

Rich kids in 1980s LA. A serial killer who may or may not be in their orbit. Incredible descriptions of clothes, cars, status anxiety, and the feeling that everyone around you might secretly be evil. Basically, catnip for anyone interested in aesthetics, culture, and deeply damaged beautiful people.

Playground by Richard Powers

Timothée Chalamet just attached himself to the movie. Brad Pitt’s company is producing. It follows three friends from college through the tech boom in Silicon Valley and eventually to a remote Polynesian island, weaving together themes of friendship, love, and the rapid rise of AI.

East of Eden by John Steinbeck

The great American novel. I don’t say that lightly. It’s sweeping and intimate at the same time. A multigenerational saga about two families in California’s Salinas Valley, and really about good and evil and whether people can change. The Netflix series with Florence Pugh is coming this fall, so read it now while you can still be insufferable about having done so.

4000 Weeks by Oliver Burkeman

If you live to 80, you have roughly 4,000 weeks. That’s it. This book is not a productivity guide. It’s a deeply helpful reality check about how little time we actually have and why trying to optimize every second of your life is maybe the thing ruining it.

Taylor Stacey

Conquistador: Hernan Cortes, King Montezuma, and the Last Stand of the Aztecs by Buddy Levy

Buddy Levy almost single-handedly repairs the damage done by Mel Gibson.

The Art Thief by Michael Finkel

Fascinating true story of obsession and a specific madness that comes from having taste you can’t afford.

Body and Soul by Frank Conroy

A New York novel about music, obsession, and slowly becoming yourself. If you liked Stoner, this scratches a similar itch.

The Son by Philipp Meyer

Wished Lonesome Dove was darker and meaner? Start here.

Rosecrans Baldwin of Meditations in an Emergency

On the Calculation of Volume by Solvej Balle

I’m hooked on Solvej Balle’s series On the Calculation of Volume, about a French bookseller who’s fallen out of time. The fourth in the series appeared recently, though I recommend starting at the beginning. Think Groundhog Day but instead of Bill Murray’s hijinks, you get a lot of really thoughtful meditations on the nature of time, solitude, and perseverance.

Michael B. Dougherty of Mensweird

Hip-Hop Is History by Questlove

Rap’s preeminent scholar and super fan lays out a decade-by-decade history of the genre, including playlists.

Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann

Set during August in NYC, the novel’s exploration of messy human dynamics makes for a perfect summer novel.

Miles Fisher of Fisher’s Island

The Magus by John Fowles

This book came to me by way of an old friend, which feels correct for a book like this. It is not exactly contemporary, but absolutely captivating: a young Englishman on a Greek island, a mysterious millionaire, a series of psychological games that become harder and harder to separate from reality. It’s a tightly woven tapestry that is lush, theatrical, and a little maddening. A reminder that some novels are less like stories than rooms you enter and don’t entirely leave.

Michael Williams

A Short History of Nearly Everything by Bill Bryson

There isn’t an author who makes me learn and laugh at the same rate as Bill Bryson. After reading A Walk in the Woods, I went down a serious Bill Bryson rabbit hole and fell in love with his writing style and wit.

Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller, Sr. by Ron Chernow

J.D. Rockefeller was an incredible personality. Despite what you might think, Rockefeller was not into the rise-and-grind culture. In the book, Chernow describes his pace of work as “aggressively leisurely”.

Say Nothing: A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland by Patrick Radden Keefe

A moving story of “the troubles” in Northern Ireland, which, as an American, was something I wasn’t all that familiar with. Described as giving “moral vertigo,” this is a deep and haunting book. Say Nothing is a well-told work of non-fiction that beautifully tells a highly textured human story.

Home Game: An Accidental Guide to Fatherhood by Michael Lewis

Not the typical stuff from Lewis, but this book is relatable and fun. If you have kids and like Michael Lewis books, you will breeze through this with a smile.