Are there assigned books you have to read this summer? Other books you’ve been saving for the beach or the hammock? Tell us what books you plan to read during vacation, whether fiction or nonfiction, and note if you’re reading them by choice or for a school assignment. We hope to compile a list when we get enough responses!
In “Books to Bury Yourself In,” Janet Maslin describes some “beach books” that might fit on your Summer 2011 list:
The beach book has undergone a makeover for 2011. As the season’s traditional big names and story lines run out of gas, new variations on old formulas have emerged. Want a story of power, greed and conspicuous consumption? Forget Hollywood; think hedge fund. Want a killer mystery? Forget that corpse in the opening chapter; think about the heroine who wakes up with amnesia and can’t trust anyone around her. Want a topical family drama about teenage lovers? Think “Romeo and Juliet” with sexting thrown in.
Even if you wanted retreads of the same old stories, they would be hard to find. Chick lit? SO over. Police procedurals? Done to death. Sweet little cottages on Nantucket? They need renovating. Keith Richards? Steven Tyler. Smash-hit Scandinavians? Henning Mankell has kissed off Kurt Wallander. And Stieg Larsson remains dead.
Students: Tell us what you’ll be reading this summer, whether by choice or because of a school assignment. Don’t be afraid to define “reading” broadly to include everything from great literature to “beach books,” newspapers, blogs, magazines or graphic novels. (And remember that in July we’ll run another New York Times as Your Summer Reading Challenge like last year’s, so write in that month to tell us what you’re reading in the paper and why.)
Teachers: What’s on your reading list this summer? Consider answering this question along with your students by commenting here. We hope to publish a list of student and teacher picks later in the month.
Students 13 and older are invited to comment below. Please use only your first name. For privacy policy reasons, we will not publish student comments that include a last name.
We'll begin publishing our favorites on May 31, and will publish a new favorite every day through June 13. 
What's on your summer reading list? Teachers and students, weigh in and we'll compile and publish both lists!
6 Comments
I think that reading on my swing in the backyard is one of the simple joys of summer. I have been reading a series called “The Secret Series” by Pseudonymous Bosch, and I plan to finish the series by reading the last book this summer. The first book is about two kids named Cass and Max-Ernest who go on a daring adventure to find out the cause of a magician who mysteriously disappeared. On their adventure, they uncover an evil group of alchemists called the Midnight Sun, and become members of a secret society called The Terces society, who will help stop the Midnight Sun at all costs. Throughout the series, follow Cass and Max-Ernest on many dangerous daring adventures including an evil Pharaoh, A magical sound prism, a top secret chocolate plantation, and time travel! The Secret Series is perfect for anyone who loves adventure with some mystery and comedy. I am really excited to finish this series over the summer.
— CaitlinFor a school assignment I’ll be reading Frankenstein and Oryx and Crake, and for my own reading I’ll be reading anything by Sir Walter Scott because I LOVE HIM like the Bride of Lammermoor and Rob Roy. Also planning on reading the Sagas of Icelanders.
— KristaThe Book of Negroes by Lawrence Hill
— SpencerThe Innocent Traveller by Ethel Wilson
Monkey Beach by Eden Robinson
Salt Fish Girl by Larissa Lai
1984 – George Orwell
Animal Farm – George Orwell
Discipline and Punish – Michel Foucault
Fahrenheit 451 – Ray Bradbury
One Day – David Nicholls
Civil Desobedience – H. D. Thoreau
And maybe:
— JuliaThe Pickwick Papers – Charles Dickens
Ah-hah~ I love booklist and I’m just worked out my summer booklist last week, thank you for the suggested book ,editor of NYTIMES,~
Here is mine:
1.Freakonomics
2.public enemies
3.winner take all society
4.why read the classics
5.superfreakonomics
6.the best american magazine writing 2010
7.the snowball
8.The stock for the long run
9. Future of Investors
10.Oliver Twist
11.Great expectations
12.Great Gatsby
13.Ann Frank’s diary
14.How to writing well
15.How they got into Harvard
16.Winning
17.Wikinomics
18.AP Chemistry Barron’s
19.AP Chemistry exam princeton review
20.AP US HISTORY Princeton Review
21.Cliffs AP bilogy
22.AP government&Politics Barron’s
23.AP Calculus Barron’s
24.AP Micro&Macro Economics Barron’s
25.AP Statistics Barron’s
26 To kill a mocking bird
27.The scarlet letter
28.The color purple
29.The social animal
30.Heritage of freedom
31.Fiske Guide to college 2010&2011
32.My next steps by collegeboard
33.International student Handbook
34.College Handbook by collegeboard
35.1984
36.The world is flat
37. The Grand History of China(Shiji）
38.Aemrica, past and present
39.Government by the people
40.Lowi&Ginsberg American Government
Those are the first-priority readings. And I plan to first finish reading them by July 10th. Maybe Shiji (the grand history of China) has a little problem, because my ancient Chinese isn’t very well and the language is obscure and abstruse.
And when I finish the above list, I woulf continue with the following:
1. different seasons
2.On writing well
3.Dreams from my father
4.Pride&Prejudice
5.The five people you meet in heaven
6. The starbucks experience:5 principle
7.Coco Chanel: a biography
8.He’s just not that into you
9.A brief history of time
10.The tipping point
11.Harry Potter (1-7) (can you believe I never read this, LOL)
12.The kite runner
13.The catcher in the rye
14.Tuesdays with Morrie
15.The lord of the rings(1-3)
16.Lolita
17.The power of now
18.The godfather
19.Alice in Wonderland
20.Dewey:the small town cat who touched the world
21.How to make anyone like you
22.Have a little faith
23.Breakfast at Tiffany’s
24.Why men marry bitches(…….don’t laught at me….)
25.Harvard business review on developing high potential leaders
26.A thousand splendid suns
27.The unbreable lightness of being
28.Mrs Dalloway
29.The magic of thinking big
30 Gone with the wind
31.Our knowledge of the external world
32.For whom the bell rings
33.The intelliegent investor
34.Beloved
35.Globality
36.Emotional Intelligence
37.Competitive strattegy
38.Five minds for the future
39.What I talk about when I talk about running
40.A short history of modern philosophy
41.The last song
42.One hundred years of solitude
43.The other side of me
44.Present like a pro
45.Water for elephants
46.In praise of idleness
47.Predictably irrational
48.Security analysis
49.Death on the nile
50.The love dare
51.Paddy Clarke hahaha
52.What made Jack Welch into jack Welch
53.A sense of urgency
54.Everything I know about business in Mcdonald
55.Her waythe hopes and ambitions of Hilary Rodham Clinton
56.Finding the next Starbucks:how to identify and invest the hot stock tomorrow
57.Chicken soup for college soul
58.The help
59.Stones into schools
60.The practice of management
61.Jane Eyre
62.Life of Pi
63.Blink
64.Hatchet
65.The american gods
66.Out of Africa
67.Eistein: his life and universe
68.Norwegian wood
69.One up on the Wall Street
70.The age of turbulence
71.The ascent of money
72.Sisterhood of traveling pants
73.The sea, the sea
74.The prince of darkness
75. Influencer
76.The book thief
And hope I could finish them before the Oct. SAT TEST. And god bless me have a 2300+ and a 750+ on reading, if not my chance to an IVY LEAGUE would be infinitely small.
— YingAs a matter of fact, I actually enjoy reading. So I already planned a lot for this summer)) I do hope I have enough time) So, here is the top-list:
1. W.S. Maugham “Theater” (currently reading)
2. James Hadley Chase’s novels
3. Isaac Asimov “I, Robot ”
4. Theodore Dreiser “An American Tragedy”
5. Harper Lee “To Kill a Mockingbird”
6. Arthur Hailey “Airport”
7. Washington Irving “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow”
8. Gabriel García Márquez “One Hundred Years of Solitude”
9. J. D. Salinger “The Catcher in the Rye”
10. William Golding “Lord of the Flies”
And it’s just a little half! OMG!
— Anna