Past and Present Summer Reading Guide favorites
Readers, returning to the show today is our Modern Mrs. Darcy Book Club community manager, Ginger Horton.
Ginger made her What Should I Read Next? debut in 2021 in Episode 283: Don’t save the good stuff , and today she’s back to catch up on what’s changed and what hasn’t in her summer reading life since that conversation.
I had a blast talking with Ginger about a whole bunch of Summer Reading Guide books—past and present—and recommending titles that speak to what she’s seeking for this summer’s reading experiences. I hope our conversation will inspire you to think about what you want from your summer reading, and point you in the right direction for your own stellar summer of reading.
If you got your 2023 Summer Reading Guide last week (and perhaps joined us for our Unboxing party as well), we hope you LOVE it, and that you had as much fun with it as we did! If you haven’t yet gotten your guide, you can do that right here. (Psst—your guide comes with access to our delightful and empowering Unboxing party replay, you don’t need to take extra action to take advantage of that.)
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Ginger Horton [00:00:00] I am not a horse girl myself either. I think maybe that's it—growing up in Kentucky it's kind of a given so you don't have to have that identity. I'm not a mom, and spoiler alert, I'm not a murderer, but I want to read about all those things immediately.
Anne Bogel [00:00:12] Thank you for clarifying that.
Hey readers, I'm Anne Bogel and this is What Should I Read Next?. Welcome to the show that's dedicated to answering the question that plagues every reader, what should I read next? We don't get bossy on the show. What we will do here is give you the information you need to choose your next read.
I suspect many of you have spent the past few days deciding which of the titles in our 2023 Summer Reading Guide that just dropped on May 18th you want to read the season. Today I'm talking with one specific reader about what the coming season holds for her reading life and what specific books in this year's Summer Reading Guide I suggest she prioritize based on her taste and what she wants from her reading life right now.
My guest today is someone many of you already know and love and that I already talk books with all the time, our Modern Mrs. Darcy Book Club community manager, Ginger Horton. Ginger has been on our team for it feels like forever, really it's since 2016, but she didn't make her What Should I Read Next? debut until 2021 when she came on to talk about her longtime struggle with summer reading.
Today we are here to catch up on what's changed and what hasn't in Ginger's summer reading life since that conversation. And along the way, we talk about a whole bunch of Summer Reading Guide books, both past and present.
Ginger has a good handle on the types of books she's looking for more of this summer to keep her reading life feeling satisfying and fulfilling. And I'm especially excited to recommend a few titles that speak to her specific and current interests.
Like every title selected for the 2023 guide, the titles I recommend to Ginger today will appeal to a broad range of readers, whether you know your taste intersects with Ginger's or you're looking for something entirely different, I think today's conversation will help inspire you to think about what you want from your summer reading and go make that happen.
Now, I've said we're going to talk about what is in store for Ginger's summer reading this season, but we don't talk explicitly about what's happening in book club this season in this episode. So I want to tell you a few titles that are on Ginger's summer reading list and mine because we're reading these books together in book club and talking with the authors.
That starts today. If you're listening, when this episode drops, May 23rd, we are talking with author Dolen Perkins-Valdez about Take My Hand. But this summer we have twice the author talks as usual, fitting with our summer book club theme. And the authors we are chatting with are Curtis Sittenfeld of Romantic Comedy, Patti Callahan Henry of The Secret Book of Flora Lee, Erica Bauermeister of No Two Persons, translator Tina Kovar with The Postcard, Thao Thai, author of Banyan Moon, and for Austin and August, we're chatting with Claudia Gray about The Late Mrs. Willoughby.
This summer in book club we'll also have our best books of summer event, that Austin and August Day I referred to, we have a Readers Weekend for I think the third year running, a read-along week. We're so excited about what you have planned. And if you join us in our community, you will be hearing a lot more from Ginger and from me. We have a good time together and we have a good time with all of you, as you will here today. Now, let's get to it.
Ginger, welcome back to the show.
Ginger Horton [00:03:30] I am so excited and honestly so nervous to be here because I'm not often over in this space. But I am a staunch listener. I have listened to every single episode of What Should I Read Next? I feel like that's a claim to fame. Maybe that's less special than I think it is, but I don't know. I feel very proud of that stat.
Anne Bogel [00:03:46] I feel like you should get an enamel gold star in the mail, not just a metaphorical one. Is that something we should do, listeners?
Ginger Horton [00:03:52] I would complete it.
Anne Bogel [00:03:53] I think so. And is that indicative of your reading life? We'll get there. We'll get there. But I'm so glad you're back. Now, I was once again shocked when you reminded me, when we were having one of our regular ongoing conversations yesterday, that our 2021 Summer Reading Guide episode was the first time you'd been on the show. Because we talk about books all the time, and in book club we often talk about books publicly all the time. And my brain just rejects that little factual tidbit that 2021 was the first time.
Ginger Horton [00:04:24] I resisted for a long time. I think some of it was nerves, some of it was like the longer you go on not having been on, then it's like a thing. Some of it is because, despite my, you know, very, very tiny semipublic, I'm a professional book talker. I mean, I guess it's how you put it. I do theoretically get paid to talk about books. I'm rather shy.
So I tell our book lovers a lot of times when they come to a member meet up or something and their face has to be on camera, they're in good company. Like it is intimidating, but as you've reminded us, whenever you're talking about books, it's the most comfortable place in the world because it's something you love, you probably feel passionate about it, and you're probably better at it than you think. So I believe you when you say that, Anne Bogel. I let that live in my head and trust that that is true as well as some good, healthy editing, let's be honest. Those people are-
Anne Bogel [00:05:14] That is the safety net we have firmly in place at What Should I Read Next?. So, listeners, if you're thinking about submitting to be on the show and it makes you so, so nervous, maybe it helps to know that that safety net is firmly in place.
Ginger, you talked about talking about books for a living, and I love listening to you describe books. Do you remember last year when we did our Summer Reading Guide Watch party, I think it was this event and you came with a few books that you wanted to kind of unbox, and I was just like-
Ginger Horton [00:05:43] Yes, yeah.
Anne Bogel [00:05:44] Dang, I'm going to have to up my game here.
Ginger Horton [00:05:46] Pure greed. Pure greed. I mean, honestly, I didn't want to come with just one to share. And if you get to share 42, I think I came with nine or ten. So that was really fun. And maybe I need to resurrect that. We talk a lot about traditions in the book club, they pop up in summer and they stay with us forever. But I might need to resurrect that because it's just a real fun way. But we're going to talk today, I think, a little bit about how fraught summer reading is for me. So I don't want to overcommit.
Anne Bogel [00:06:13] I know a little about your history and I'm excited to unpack it more today. So, Ginger, you've already mentioned Book Club several times. Tell our listeners who don't know you from that community, like what is it you do around here and have been doing around here for going on seven years now.
Ginger Horton [00:06:29] That's right. This is our seventh year in book club, which is just mind-boggling to me. It feels much, much shorter than that. And I think that's because we're having fun. But yes, I am the book club community manager, which really does mean that I get to hang out all day and talk about books. I really do pinch myself. I do not take that for granted. Sometimes I'll get DMs or something from people that get wind of how I fell into this job and they're like, "How does that happen?" And I'm like, "I know. I feel so lucky." It's the best community of readers. So smart, so lovely. We say it's the kindest corner on the internet and I truly mean that.
So I fell into this about seven years ago when Modern Mrs. Darcy really was kind of blown and growing, and I could tell that things were happening. My sister encouraged me to start a blog of my own, and I said, "Oh, I would just be ripping off Anne Bogel, this lady who writes on the internet. Like, she is everything I want to be. She is, you know, bookish and a little bit nerdy and southern and sweet and, you know, all these things that I would just be ripping her off." And she said, "Well, you should apply to work for her." And I was like, "Well, maybe I will."
So I wrote this email to you and didn't send it. That was the problem. But a few weeks later, you mentioned that you were looking for a podcast producer, and so I wrote and said, "Hey, I'm also all wrong for that job but now I'm sending an email that I never sent," saying I just love what you're doing over there. It's my favorite place on the internet.
That same summer you were starting the Modern Mrs. Darcy Book Club, and I was already a part of that and loved it. They are very involved. Couldn't wait to get on the what was then the Facebook thread, which is much less desirable than our forums today. But I was very involved over there and you said, "Mm, well, you're right, no, you are a disaster for podcast producer-
Anne Bogel [00:08:10] Wait, wait. Let's make sure everyone knows I didn't say that.
Ginger Horton [00:08:15] She did not use the word disaster. But I think, you know, clearly my resume was not aligned with that. And you said, "We're starting this book club permanently. Would you want to come on?" So the job has really grown. I mean, I think at the time I just popped in like once a day and the job has really grown. We have so many more events than we even used to have.
Then it really started with author talks. And we are going back to our roots this summer. That is at the core of what we've always done. We still do a lot of author talks and book readings together. But it's grown into, like I said, that new site has given us an opportunity to create forums, robust conversation. We do classes and real explicit education over in the book club space. Sometimes I tease that the book club you can join and not read books and you still get tons out of it. So that's what I do.
Anne Bogel [00:09:03] I'm so glad you applied for the job that didn't yet exist. Well, it did exist, you just didn't know it yet. So I'm glad the universe sent you my way via your sister.
Ginger Horton [00:09:11] That's right. Thanks to Bridget.
Anne Bogel [00:09:13] Thank you, Bridget. Okay, Ginger, in the book club, those who know you there refer to you affectionately as basically bottled human sunshine, which feels accurate. Like, "Oh, Ginger is so sweet. She's so kind, She's so loving. She's so thoughtful. She's so compassionate." And people make some assumptions about your reading taste based on that.
Ginger Horton [00:09:33] I like to read whatever the opposite of what the people's assumption is. Please give me a book with a cast of unlikable characters and I will happily drink that down. I mean, I certainly like to read happy books too. I'm on record as being such a Mitford fan. But the other and sizable half of my reading life is The Secret History has become an accidental reread for me practically every year.
One of my very favorite books from the original Modern Mrs. Darcy Book Club Summer was The Nest. Talk about a snarly nest of unlikable characters, man. There was not a person you wanted to be in that cast. So, yeah, I love reading about unlikable characters on the page. I've become a little bit famous for in my own head, I guess, Bring it on. It's my favorite.
But also I think some of that, you know, the strand come from the same place. So you can probably tell from my accent I'm from the South and we have this real strand of hospitality and sweetness that we're known for, but also some real dark depth. You know, some of the real greats, Faulkner and Flannery O'Connor and, you know, Zora Neale Hurston, like they are writing about some dark things. I think that's also seeped into my subconsciousness.
And I love a story about place. I think that comes from my Southern upbringing. I love a story about just, you know, mess. That's what I love about the page is that it can help me experience things that I've never experienced. And thank goodness that my family is not a snarly nest of unlikable characters, but I can sure love to read about them on the page.
Anne Bogel [00:11:11] You reminded me of something I feel like I'm often saying in real-life conversations with friends. Like you don't actually want your life to be a book because books... like the plot is propelled forward with just so much conflict and horribleness. Like bad things have to happen for the story to advance. Like you want to live a more boring life than that.
Ginger Horton [00:11:31] That's right. I want my life to not make a great story, thank you very much.
Anne Bogel [00:11:36] Or a different kind of story. Maybe not the kind that an agent would snap up and want to make a film out of.
Ginger Horton [00:11:40] That's right.
Anne Bogel [00:11:41] So, Ginger, you have a rocky history with summer reading. As you've said before and as we're going to talk about today, let's start with the bigger picture. What is your reading life really like these days?
Ginger Horton [00:11:53] So, you know, I've tried to diagnose this and I think I have a theory, but it doesn't feel like I've quite figured out what goes on with me in the summer. I do love the warm weather. I love the summer season, the long days and nights. I think there's something to the actual weather contributing to the fact that I'm just out and about more, people are hanging out or barbecuing, maybe I'm traveling.
I think there's something to that. But I don't think that's the only thing that explains why I usually have a real dip from the months of June to August. And I didn't really notice this until I started tracking my reading, and the first few years, I mean, I freaked out. I think there was one year that I read maybe... like finished one book in three months. It was dire. And listen, there's nothing shameful about that. There are all kinds of people that that is fine, but it was not fine for me. That was very unusual for me.
So after tracking it for a few years, I realized, Oh, this is a pattern. It's fine. It will come back. When school starts and fall begins, the leaves start falling off the trees, it'll come back. So I don't freak out about it, but I mean, I would like that not to be the case. I lose a lot of months or I guess, you know, lose in heavy air quotes, of great reading time in the summer.
So what happened in the last few years is I moved to a little island in the middle of the Pacific called Hawaii and there is no seasonal difference. There is no difference for me between January and August, and that flattened out. So I like to say it cannot be just as simple as the weather but maybe there is something to that. I mean, truly my year in the last few years, which is completely pretty even.
So I'm a little bit nervous because we are moving back to the mainland where there are seasons this fall. And I'm excited about that move but also I keep thinking, "Oh, no, was this my last good summer? Was this the last summer where I'm gonna have a successful reading here again?" So we shall see.
Anne Bogel [00:13:43] I'm so curious to find out what happens when you do come back to the mainland and live through next summer.
Ginger Horton [00:13:48] Maybe I got good skills. Maybe what happened in the last few years just got better skills. We're going to cross our fingers.
Anne Bogel [00:13:53] And you just happened to move to Hawaii?
Ginger Horton [00:13:55] Exactly.
Anne Bogel [00:13:57] Well, I love how you've been able to test out your theories. Not everybody needs to do something as drastic as, you know, moving 5,000 miles away to test out their reading life theory. But since you are moving anyway, I'm glad you got to do that. I'm so curious. Okay, stay tuned, friends and we'll find out what happens with Ginger Horton's reading life when she actually gets to experience the seasons again.
So it's the beginning of summer and you're feeling cautiously optimistic about the season ahead. How would you put it?
Ginger Horton [00:14:27] Yeah, I think I had my rocky start to the beginning of the year here. So I tried another experiment. I'm really big on tracking your reading. I think this has so many benefits to the reading life, but mostly I'm just like a firstborn daughter who likes a gold star.
So I've been counting my books for over a decade now. Wish I had started earlier. But I started in earnest in 2012. I have the records of everything I've read from 2012 on. So I thought, "Okay, I've been doing this for a decade. I'm going to not count my books this year. I wonder if that's doing something bad to my soul. I wonder if I'm only reading to get the golden stars. I wonder..." I had all these wonderings. "Do I read shorter books because I'm trying to get a certain number?"
I had all these wondering. So I thought, Okay, I'm not going to track this year. I'm going to journal my books. I'm going to write what I read down, but I'm not going to put a number beside it. And that was a disaster. About two months in I was not finishing books. I mean, I think I read one book in all of January, finished one book shall we say, because I firmly believe in quitting books that you're not enjoying. So that doesn't mean I wasn't reading, but that means I wasn't finishing books, even books I was enjoying.
And so I quickly abandoned that. It didn't take a whole year to learn that experiment was a disaster for me. I need that gold star and that is fine. And what it does for me is it really makes me finish books I'm enjoying. I'm not talking about abandoning a book that is not right for you. But if I'm enjoying something, I need that little push, to be honest. I find that I will leave like a bookmark... I'll find bookmarks in books, 40, 50, 70 pages to the end. And I think in my head, Oh, I read that" but I never finished it. That's just not great for a sense of accomplishment.
And also the ending so often change books. You know, I think of several Ann Patchett books that I've read and loved, and good golly, do I adore Ann Patchett. Please do not hear me say anything. I am an Ann Patchett completist, but that woman does something with the ends of her books that is unlike anything else I've read. I tell people flat out "don't read the last five pages of State of Wonder" because it changes the book.
Now, that's what the fun of discussion is, is that sometimes the change of a book can really make for such rich thought life and discussion. But it's not great for being a reader to finish books. A writer finished a book. I can finish 40 pages.
Anne Bogel [00:16:41] I feel like we need to take a time out and ring up Bailey on our team and have her join this conversation because she and I were talking about the exact same thing like a week ago when she finished the new Ann Patchett novel.
Ginger Horton [00:16:52] Oh, see, I haven't read the new one, yes. I can tell Bailey is itching to talk about this because she actually texted me or DM'd or something a few weeks ago and said, "Have you read this?" And I said, "No, I'm not. No, I haven't read this yet." I'm trying to not read this yet until it actually comes out. But mainly just because I knew everybody else is contemplating it and I want to read it when everybody's reading it.
Anne Bogel [00:17:12] I think we need team book club because there's some trends I see in books that are publishing the summer, like coming out into this current literary landscape that I'm so interested in and I really want to talk about with fellow readers. But the thing is, Ginger, is I can't even say what the themes are in relation to the books without introducing major, major spoilers. So basically I need everybody to read everything so we can all talk about it as soon as possible.
Ginger Horton [00:17:38] We're going to. And Bailey has been a big influence on my reading life actually this year alone. I'm so glad she's on the team because she has excellent taste in books. Or should I say our taste intersects a lot? Did I just complete excellent taste and my taste? No, no, I did not. But accidentally.
Anne Bogel [00:17:54] You are the hero of your own reading life.
Ginger Horton [00:17:57] That's right.
Anne Bogel [00:17:57] And also it's always worth saying that when somebody says a book is great, well, is it going to be great for you? That depends. And that's what we're talking about today.
Ginger Horton [00:18:06] I'm going to talk about a book today that I did not like that a lot of people liked, so...
Anne Bogel [00:18:11] Well, they want to hear what you have to say about it. I have a question, though, Ginger. What made you realize, "This is a disaster, I have to stop not counting. Like I need to do something different or this whole year is going to go badly." Not to put words in your mouth, but you take over the story from here.
Ginger Horton [00:18:29] Yes, that's true. I did not want a reading life where I read one book a month. And that is again, hear me say, that is fine. I have wonderful people in my life that that is absolutely fine and robust, but that is not robust for me.
So this really changed when you gave us the opportunity as team members to select one book for the Summer Reading Guide. That is something we've done before in the past, but not quite in the same way where we were reading books that were arcs. I don't read a lot of Advance Reader Copies. I don't pay attention to what's coming out. I have the privilege of being on this team where a lot of other people do that as their own hobby. So I just get to wait and let people like Bailey and others tell me what to read. And that's been my happy reality for a while.
But it was really fun this year, in January to April or so, to pay attention to what's coming out in the summer and select a book to include in the Summer Reading Guide. So as I was deliberately not finishing books that weren't quite right for the Summer Reading Guide, I wasn't enjoying, I really realized, Oh, there's a difference between, no, this isn't right, this isn't right for me, this isn't right for me right now, and I wandered off. And good golly, I was enjoying that book. It's on my coffee table. Why didn't I finish that? There's a massive chasm.
So that's really what made me realize that. Because I read a story of books by really big-name authors, and I suspect at least a couple of those were just not right for me right then. But I read several three-star books that were, ah, they were fine, I was happy to read them, but I don't want to talk about these all summer long. I don't want my name put up beside them in the Summer Reading Guide. I don't want that to be like my one pick. And so putting those aside showed me the stark difference.
And then I found one that I did not feel mad about. In fact, I think as the story goes, you and I were on Zoom and I was telling you, "I just can't find anything. Everything is kind of dark and depressing this year. I don't know, maybe it's me." And then I clutched my hand to my chest about one and I was like, "Except for..." And you said, "Oh, Ginger, that's the book. You just clutched your hand to your chest." Which I hadn't realized, but yeah.
Anne Bogel [00:20:28] I remember this conversation. You were like, "Should I just put my name beside a three star pick?" And I don't remember exactly what I said except, "No. No, I don't think you want to do that." But tell everybody what the book was that you really loved.
Ginger Horton [00:20:43] I loved The Postcard by Anne Berest. This is about 500 pages and I took this down within a week. And that is the one that I was talking about that I read in January. That was the only book I finished in the month of January. Now it's rather long and I'm a slow reader, but I read that in a week. Could not put it down. 500 pages. It's a quick 500 pages, but it's still not short.
So you see a real stark difference when you can't seem to finish something and then when you can't seem to not stop reading something. That is a massive difference. And when you see that in your reading life in such a short period of time, it becomes clear, Oh yeah, I should be reading more of these that I cannot put down, my hand clutches to my chest, I'm telling friends about them, friends that are sitting on my real life couch, I'm like, "Here, take this home. This is my beat up, ugly art that I wrote in. But yes, you must, you must. Please read this."
Anne Bogel [00:21:32] So you realize the difference between the, like, "Oh, that book experience" and "Hey, yeah, I liked it. I liked it. It was fine."
Ginger Horton [00:21:42] Okay.
Anne Bogel [00:21:43] Well, I'm glad you did. So, how have things been since that realization?
Ginger Horton [00:21:48] Much better. I do not feel like I'm back to like ‘20, ‘21 kind of everybody staying at home that year, all we're doing is reading numbers but I'm definitely back to myself. And again, I know about how many books I should be reading at a time. I know about how many books I finish in a week or a month just for my own health. Like I know when I'm dipping below a number. What's going on? Let me just examine something in my life. Maybe it's just a matter of being too busy, but also maybe it's that I'm flipping on that baseball game that I do not really care about. I don't know why I picked baseball. I don't really watch baseball.
Anne Bogel [00:22:25] So that is definitely a warning sign in your reading life?
Ginger Horton [00:22:28] That is a warning sign. We do have some friends that do that that we've been watching a couple of games with lately. So that's a weird example. But yeah, if I'm not interested in doing something else, I should be picking up a book.
Or I've heard the other thing from readers is that, you know, some people are voracious and they know if they are reading a book a day that is maybe not a place that they want to be because it can be some healthier, unhealthy denial or that can be an escape place. Nothing wrong with that. But again, it's just worth examining, like, is this normal for me?
So I would say I'm about at normal levels now. And also just really reading things I'm enjoying, which is the most important thing, and giving myself some real healthy permission in a way that I haven't, in recent years, to reread. This is something new that has come into my own life from book club, the joys and the real benefits and merits of rereading. So I've been letting myself reread some older things. After a string of brand new books that I wasn't sure if they were right for me, it's been real refreshing to revisit some things that I know that I've loved, and on a second or even third pass, you see things you hadn't seen before.
Both of these books that I've reread recently are for the Modern Mrs. Darcy Book Club, one in April and one in May. And I love to reread a book you're going to discuss because you see extra things and highlight something where you're not just reading it for the enjoyment of it, you're like, "Oh, I can't wait to talk to so-and-so about that," or "Oh, I know the book club is going to respond well to this."
Anne Bogel [00:23:53] Ginger, I imagine that Take My Hand by Dolen Perkins-Valdez is top of mind because that is what we're reading in Modern Mrs. Darcy Book Club in May. But would you tell our listeners about the amazing experience you had rereading our April selection? Because that was really unique and special and basically I want to hear you talk about it again.
Ginger Horton [00:24:13] Absolutely. Yes. So both of these books actually, Take My Hand and Fault Lines by Emily Itami, which is our April selection, I read first on audio. And I just kind of took them in in a casual way. Listening to a book is a different experience for me. I'm a big note-taker, writer, margin writer in my books. So it's a bit more of a passive experience. But I loved both of these.
So I read Fault Lines back... I guess maybe last spring. Whenever it came out. Read that, enjoyed it, told everybody about it. I think it might have even been my best book of the summer last year. So I loved that. And then I got the opportunity to go to Tokyo in the spring this year and could not resist reading that again before I went.
So I read it quickly within like three days on paper, some of it on the airplane like to Tokyo. It was so magical to be reading it, going into that place, picking up on things after researching the place that we were visiting. And then I got to the city and I spent a couple of weeks there and I came back home and reread it. Because now I didn't want to read it in preparation for going. I wanted to read it after having seen Roppongi Hills and that spider statue that she talks about on page 214. I had to experience it afterward.
So luckily this is a rather slim book. As I mentioned, I'm a slow reader. I think it's like 214 pages or something. So it's a short book and I downed that three times within a calendar year. That is super unusual for me.
Anne Bogel [00:25:40] And then you got to talk to Emily Itami.
Ginger Horton [00:25:44] Yes, yes.
Anne Bogel [00:25:45] I love it. Thank you for sharing that with us. I could ask you questions all day because really, I want to get a picture of your reading life. And for me, I want to get a picture of your reading life right now. I always love to find out what you are reading. And you find books that I don't like. You've put books on my radar. I've really enjoyed Salty by Alissa Wilkinson was our November Modern Mrs. Darcy Book Club selection. I didn't know about that book. I hadn't seen that book anywhere. But we're going to get into your reading life. And I think we want to get into your books and do that now. Are you ready?
Ginger Horton [00:26:14] I'm ready. I picked these in a real specific way. You just got finished saying, Hey, sometimes you put books that are not on my radar. None of these are going to not be on your radar because all of these have come from past Summer Reading Guides. So I did get to talk on What Should I Read Next? a couple of years ago and I picked maybe not like all-time favorite, but that was the pressure. That was like, "These have to be representative of my reading life."
And so this time I thought, "What am I going to do? What am I going to do?" So I went back through all the previous Summer Reading Guides. A major shout out to our friend Janine who actually compiled a few years ago all the Summer Reading Guides and one big list, just like a friendly list. This is not like famously exists somewhere. But thanks to my friend Janine because she put those in a book for me and I was able to quickly flip through that and pick out three books that are representative of my reading life that I loved, that I think about all the time. But they all originated from an SRG past.
So that's where these come from. But at least one of these I actually had forgotten was on the SRG. So when I was going through these lists, I thought, "Oh, I forgot that's how I heard about it. I loved this book. I might want to pick this one anyway."
Anne Bogel [00:27:23] Y'all can go back and listen to that episode. It aired on May 18th, 2021. It's called Don't Save the Good Stuff. And Ginger, do you remember what you chose for that episode?
Ginger Horton [00:27:33] Mm, such a good question. I think I remember what I hated. Let's see if I'm right here.
Anne Bogel [00:27:43] I'm going to give you a clue. Backlist book club.
Ginger Horton [00:27:46] Oh, I wonder if I must have talked about Homebuyers.
Anne Bogel [00:27:50] Uh-uh.
Ginger Horton [00:27:52] No? Oh, golly. Everyone Brave is Forgiven, probably.
Anne Bogel [00:27:58] Yes.
Ginger Horton [00:27:59] Okay. I figured I had to have included that one. And that was one of our very first summers in the Modern Mrs. Darcy Book Club, and also, we did that for one of our backlist book clubs, because mainly I just want people to go back and watch Chris Cleave all day long. Let's see here. Gosh, I cannot remember.
Anne Bogel [00:28:17] Okay, I'll tell you. So it was Young Jane Young.
Ginger Horton [00:28:20] Oh, yes. Oh, my gosh.
Anne Bogel [00:28:22] And Stay With Me.
Ginger Horton [00:28:24] Oh, of course, Stay With Me. The famous two jaw-drop book. How had I forgotten? I do still love all of those titles. You know why I think it surprises me is I had in my head that what I had picked were very representative of my reading life. And certainly I love all of those. But I feel like all those books are so similar.
I was more strategic this time. I'll go ahead and admit I was more strategic about picking something that represented this facet of my reading life in this facet. But maybe that just really goes to show that I've grown as a reader and I know how to think about my own reading life and what to look for a little bit better than I did two years ago.
Anne Bogel [00:29:01] Well, I love that. I'm really excited to hear what each of your selections represents in your reading life. Okay, Ginger, tell me about the first book you love.
Ginger Horton [00:29:10] Okay, the first book I loved is Who is Maud Dixon? by Alexandra Andrews. You put this into my hands a few years ago. But even considered reading this for the Modern Mrs. Darcy Book Club, I had to go back and look and make sure we did not. But we did not. And this one was everywhere. So this is probably not the title on my list here that flew under the radar. But this is just everything I want in a summer novel.
We did talk about this in Don't Save the Good Stuff Episode 283 that you just mentioned. But what I ended up loving about this book is that it is just thick with atmospheric details. There is atmosphere at the start. There is atmosphere at the end.
They kind of have this big catalyst where the two main characters go on this trip together and there's just all of this real esthetic, kind of you could feel the coolness of the house, and then you can feel the hotness of where they travel to. And I'm trying to avoid spoilers. If you can't tell, I'm like dancing around where they would go to and why because I don't want to tell the plot of the story is just so compelling, so page-turning.
But there's this one sentence in the book that I think about all the time, probably because we do have China Cups and Clementines at our house very frequently. But there's this line that the main character's mother, she has dreams for her daughter that are just very different than what her daughter would want to go on to do. And so she says, "Florence's mother like to imagine a life of diamonds and gilt, and that's G-I-L-T but also probably G-U-I-L-T."
Anne Bogel [00:30:38] You know, that's a necessary clarification for this story.
Ginger Horton [00:30:42] Mm-hmm, it really is. So diamonds and gilt for her daughter. That's one kind of mother. But this was the life Florence wanted. A blue and white teacup stuffed with clementine peels, a tangle of white binoculars, and a ceramic pitcher on the windowsill. So I don't know about you, but I can just feel the coolness of that house, the sophistication of that house versus kind of a house that would be full of diamonds and gilt. Those are two different lives in Florence's mind and in mine.
So to really read about some of the concrete details on the page, a blue and white teacup stuffed with Clementine deals, that is so evocative for me, and that is what I want to be reading in the summer. I want to sink into an atmosphere for sure. Number one requirement wish, dream for my summer reading life, books with atmosphere.
Anne Bogel [00:31:28] Okay, there's so much I want to talk about here, starting with the characters in this book are not likable, Ginger.
Ginger Horton [00:31:37] They are not.
Anne Bogel [00:31:39] Which is your jam?
Ginger Horton [00:31:40] It is my jam, yes.
Anne Bogel [00:31:42] Okay, tell us more about that.
Ginger Horton [00:31:43] It definitely adds to the story for me. So I didn't pick this up. Nobody is going to say in a blurb probably ever, Book with unlikable characters. Like that's not going to sell books. That is not marketing copy. But when I find that that becomes apparent, it draws me even more into the story.
So the story might hook me for a travel aspect for this book is set in the publishing world that's often going to drag me in. You instantly know that one of the characters is unlikable based on just the premise. You know, she is a reclusive author, but you slightly distrust all the other characters. You're not quite sure the entire time it's unmooring, is this an unreliable character, is this an unreliable narrator? You're sort of viewing it through the eyes of this [00:32:29] intern, and you're just not quite sure about any of them, to be honest. And I loved that. Then, of course, once you get to the end, you really find out firmly who is likable and unlikable.
One of the things that I love about reading is not just the reading experience, but how you can continue to think about it years afterwards and how you see publishing interns and reclusive authors through that lens forever and ever. Amen.
Anne Bogel [00:32:56] I'm actually realizing something as you're talking about Maud Dixon and unlikable characters. Or maybe what I'm doing is formulating a theory. I'm not sure if it's a real realization. But I've heard readers, like readers is really A-reader, very recently was saying, "Oh yeah, I thought that book was overrated. I guess how it was going to end, and I can never guess how it's going to end. She should have plotted a better mystery."
But I'm just realizing that often when that critique is leveled at a book, and I don't think that's what the writer was going for, it's because the characters are unlikable and you're not reading to like be shocked at the twist. What you're reading for is to watch terrible people get what's coming to them. How's that? Like, the suspense isn't like, "Oh, like who done it?" but "how is it going to go down? And what is that going to look like?" What do you think? Talk that out with me.
Ginger Horton [00:33:52] First of all, I'm impressed that anybody saw what was coming. I am a trusting reader and a story-trusting reader, and I did not see that. So that is not a universal experience. I like that about my reading life because I'm often able to be surprised. But I also really enjoy a book when I am able to guess. I think, first of all, that's fun. Like, don't you feel superior when you're able to guess? I do. I think, how clever am I. But exactly that.
Yes, I think there is really something to be said about not just reading for what's going to happen, but how it's going to happen. And if that's well done on the page, it can still be an interesting reading experience, even if you are one of those really clever people that guesses super often.
Anne Bogel [00:34:32] Okay. I'm going to keep thinking about this as well as that tangle of white ranunculus because that is my favorite.
Ginger Horton [00:34:38] Oh, so good.
Anne Bogel [00:34:39] Ginger, tell me about another summer book you love.
Ginger Horton [00:34:42] Okay, So I wanted to throw a nonfiction read in this list because I love nonfiction. I always want to read more of it, and I find myself frequently reaching for novels, whether that's because that's what I'm encountering on Bookstagram or maybe some of that is, you know, an outcome of the job is that we often read novels together in the Modern Mrs. Darcy Book Club. And rightfully so those make for such great discussion.
But I want to read more nonfiction in general in my life. And last summer, actually, found that I was kind of losing that hour between 7 and 8 p.m. like, dinner's over, maybe the kitchen's cleaned up, maybe aspirationally, and I'm kind of just scrolling. Like, it's not time to go to bed yet. I don't really want to turn on that baseball game that apparently I don't watch. I don't want to turn on TV. What am I going to do?
So I set this goal for myself that only during that hour I would read nonfiction. For some reason, it's a lot easier for me to come to than fiction in that time when my brain's a little tired. And I ended up working my way through 12 books, 12 full nonfiction books within a couple of months. So that felt like that really, really worked for me in that deliberate way.
So surprisingly, or maybe not surprisingly, for those of you that pay a lot of attention around here, a lot of my nonfiction life is actually influenced by Will Bogel. I think some of that is indirect-
Anne Bogel [00:35:57] He'll be honored.
Ginger Horton [00:35:57] ...coming through Anne's reading recommendations. But he has kind of famously introduced us all to Outside Magazine, I'm not sure if this was his influence, but back in the day Into Thin Air was actually on the Summer Reading Guide. Years and years and years ago I took that down in one sitting in one hotel room. This is probably a giant waste of Northern California, but I sat in my hotel room and do not regret spending an entire day with Into Thin Air in beautiful redwoods in California. I don't regret that a bit.
But Will has kind of a... if he mentions a nonfiction book like my ears perk up. I'm sort of embracing my inner like dad book fan and please hear the heavy air quotes there as well. And by that, we generally just mean that narrative nonfiction. I'm not sure why dads have sort of a reputation for reading those books, but I think what people should.
I heard about this book.. That was such a long lead-up to say I heard about this book from Will in our joint episode, our team Episode 291. Brenna paired each of us up with a sort of an unconventional team member, and I got paired with Will and he mentioned Chasing the Thrill and it moved it right on up my to-be-read list. So I read this nonfiction tale of a treasure hunt. So absorbing.
[00:37:08] Again, there's a lot of atmosphere here because there's actual people looking for treasure. There's mountains and, you know, crevices where they have to like kind of tangle through the brush a little bit to get to a certain spot that might potentially have this treasure. There is a literal treasure room in this guy's house, kind of an eccentric millionaire character.
So you're really on this journey... and you also don't know how this is going to end. This is nonfiction but I resisted every urge to Google whether the treasure had been found, what ended up with the story, you know, who came out of this looking like a good guy and a bad guy. Some of the characters are a little shady in this story as well, even though it's nonfiction and real people are much more complicated than people on a page. But there's not a clear right and wrong who's the good guy, who's the bad guy even in this story. But I really enjoyed the read.
It doesn't tidy up with a neat, little bow either. For narrative nonfiction, reader beware. I do love a good story that does tie up in a neat way. Sometimes you can look back in history and find out what happened. This one is a little murkier than that.
Anne Bogel [00:38:15] This one is in the Summer Reading Guide because of Will and because I live here and we talk about what interests us. I knew that he was following the Forrest Fenn treasure hunt online and in Outside Magazine. So when I found out there was a book on the way, I said, "Hey, are you interested in this?" Not at all thinking about the Summer Reading Guide. Because why would there be a book about the treasure hunt in the Summer Reading Guide? No. I'm not interested in that. The end.
But he read it and said, I really think you're going to like this. And I really did. And I love that it appealed to you, too. And now we're talking about it today as one of your favorites.
Ginger Horton [00:38:51] I think about this one a lot. That is Chasing the Thrill by Daniel Barbarisi.
Anne Bogel [00:38:58] Love it. Okay. And we're going back to fiction, I think, for your final favorite. What did you choose?
Ginger Horton [00:39:03] You sure are. This one is the one that goes way back. I had not remembered that this was on a Summer Reading Guide, but this is The Female Persuasion by Meg Wolitzer.
Anne Bogel [00:39:13] [The ether?]
Ginger Horton [00:39:14] Yeah. I did not remember this was on the guide. I don't know where it came into my reading life, but that's very likely the place I discovered that she had a new title as it often is. The cover is fantastic. I love Meg Wolitzer regardless. I think she's one of the finest writers. She's not exactly not known, but I think she flies under the radar far more than she ought to.
I think about The Interestings. Constantly it's one of my favorite books all the time. That's another great summer read, by the way. It's about summer camp and friendships, and they turn into complicated adult relationships and massive unlikable characters there. But just the experience of reading this book is really what I think about when I think of The Female Persuasion.
I met this group of seven ladies at a very early Modern Mr. Darcy Book Club event. We now call each other the bookish besties, and we've spent years together. We have this epic text thread. We have been on trips together almost every year except for those pesky COVID years. They are actually bound up in my COVID origin story. We canceled a trip together in the very, very early days of that. We've sent Christmas presents across the US. You know, a couple of them have a podcast together. These are my people. I cannot talk about these people enough.
But our very first trip we went to Charleston and we picked a book or two to read in kind of a little tiny miniature book club together on the trip. So we all show up to this trip, we have so much fun, we see the beautiful city of Charleston. But in the evenings we sat in Diane's living room and we had this grappling discussion about this novel really of feminist and feminism and the early days and what that means for more modern feminists.
We, in this little tiny, bookish beasties group, are very different ages, different marital statuses, different political affiliations but there was so much to talk about here. Wolitzer is really thoughtful. She's such a thoughtful writer, but these books go down so easy.
So I think if you're actually a fan of someone like Taylor Jenkins Reid where it feels like a page-turner but there is great conversation and great discussion. Even if that lives in your own mind or in the margins of the page, this is one of those authors you should be putting on your list. Again, with the esthetic details, I think about how she used some symbolism, particularly in the wardrobe of the women. I think about those trademark suede boots all the time. And she uses those to great effect. They are a bit of a symbol of what's going on in the lives of original feminists and modern-day feminists.
Anne Bogel [00:41:38] I love how that book is so deeply tied to important people in your life.
Ginger Horton [00:41:42] Yes. Yes. That is indicative of my life. So certainly a good book is a good book. But if I can talk about a good book, it's no longer a good book, it's a great book or it's a great reading experience. And I value that tremendously to the degree that we had a discussion in Modern Mrs. Darcy Book Club, I did not think this was going to be as controversial as it was. But we have a question of the day most days, and one day I posed the question, "If you could never read another book, you could talk about anything you've ever read before in the past, but you could never read another new book in your life, or you could read all you want, but you can't talk about them anymore.
I thought this was going to be rather contentious or rather debated. There was a clear line of delineation and most people wanted to read even if they couldn't talk about it. And I was baffled because I would probably say, this would be hard for me, but I would want to talk about books even if I could never read another one again. There is something to me that is really, really magical about talking about books. And maybe I just have to depend on the great ones I'd read in my past life and talk about them all day long, which I think is really indicative that I'm in the right place in the book club because that's what we do all day long.
Anne Bogel [00:42:49] Yes, I do think it's indicative, but I'm still kind of hung up on the fact that you asked everybody such a cruel question.
Ginger Horton [00:42:55] I was really cruel.
Anne Bogel [00:42:56] I'm really glad they don't have to pick.
Ginger Horton [00:42:58] They are usually not that controversial. Like yesterday's question was, have you ever written a fan letter to an author? Like, usually they're much lighter. But that surprised me.
Anne Bogel [00:43:08] Now, tell us about a book that wasn't right for you. You've already referenced this obliquely. Let's hear about it.
Ginger Horton [00:43:14] Okay. So this pains me to say, because I know so many of you loved this, but that is The Hazel Wood. I don't feel too bad talking about my experience of not liking this because I know it is firmly loved. And that is right and true. This is a fantastic book, it was just not the right book for me.
I have known in the past that every now and again you take a chance on a book. But I know that too much worldbuilding is just a no-go for me. It can be so intricate and so well done. I love and appreciate a writer like Jemison. I'm trying to think of other books in the past that I've read where there's just... And when I say too much, that is subjective. But there is just too much world. I don't want to spend 60% of the book trying to orient myself. I want to get right to the story and particularly to the characters.
So I don't often finish books that I don't like, which was one of the reasons that this one wound up on my "wasn't right for me" list. Typically, like I said, I don't mind putting a book away, but I could just tell this one was so well done. I could draw you a picture of that world. I could draw you a map. But like, what really happened?
So I know that some readers love that part, and it is fascinating as a reader to watch happen on the page. I mean, that is a skill that a writer has that is very fine, but it's just not for me.
&l
