If You Read Only 10 Trashy Novels This Summer
By Lev Grossman
Relax. It's summer. At the beach or pool, nobody judges you for reading a book with Fabio on the cover. Probably nobody even noticed that unread copy of The Corrections that's holding down a corner of your towel. If anything, you're being judged for that poochy little tummy you picked up last winter. Kidding.
Summer has a strange effect on the reading mind. Gone is any concern with literary respectability. Shed, any inhibitions about raw escapism. You get back in touch with the tiny Philistine who lives in your lazy, pleasure-loving little heart. Why fight it? We took a look at this summer's guilty pleasures and picked out the most delicious we could find. Go ahead. You've been good. Have a summer fling with an unsuitable book.
OLD BOYS By Charles McCarry
GENRE Stone-cold spy thriller
THE SETUP Paul Christopher, oldest of the old-school Beltway spooks, is missing. The Chinese claim he's dead; they've even returned his ashes in a ceremonial vase. But his buddies, a supergroup of six retired cold war intelligence agents, aren't buying it, and they form an unofficial task force to find out what really happened. In play are an Arab terrorist--also possibly deceased--Christopher's long-lost mother--ditto--and the Amphora Scroll, an ancient document that could prove that Jesus was a tool of a Roman intelligence agency. Cool. At 74, McCarry is an old boy himself, but his hands are still as steady as a safecracker's. There is no better American spy novelist.
FREE SAMPLE "With trembling hand, I took a large mouthful of cognac, leaned forward, and spat it in Hawk's eyes."
IT'S LIKE The best parts of 10 John le Carre novels all put together.
SKINNY DIP By Carl Hiaasen
GENRE Comic suspense? Suspense comedy? Let's just say it's a Carl Hiaasen novel.
THE SETUP Joey Perrone married a jerk. Said jerk, a corrupt wetlands biologist by the name of Chaz, takes her on a luxury cruise that was supposed to bring the sparkle back to their marriage. Instead, he pushes her overboard two miles off the coast of Florida. But unbeknown to Chaz, Joey survives, deeply annoyed yet otherwise unscathed, and she dedicates her life to messing with Chaz's head from beyond the grave.
FREE SAMPLE "I had a feeling he didn't love me anymore, she thought, but this is ridiculous."
IT'S LIKE As we said, it's Hiaasen. That is, not really like anything else out there.
R IS FOR RICOCHET By Sue Grafton
GENRE Mystery
THE SETUP Grafton started this series with A Is for Alibi, and she's working her way through the alphabet, but you should feel free to jump in anytime. Our hero is Kinsey Millhone, a lonely, smart-mouthed thirtysomething who's also a private detective in Santa Teresa, Calif. One day she gets a call from Nord Lafferty, a local zillionaire with daughter trouble: spoiled, sexy Reba Lafferty is fresh out of the pokey (embezzling) and falling back into some of her old habits. (The setup is nicely reminiscent of Raymond Chandler's The Big Sleep.) Guess who gets to baby-sit Reba?
FREE SAMPLE "I should have gone in to work. The Universe keeps track of our sins and exacts devious and repugnant punishments, like dates with unknown men. I went up the spiral staircase and opened my closet so I could stare at my clothes."
IT'S LIKE Chandler in drag.
THE BIG LOVE By Sarah Dunn
GENRE Unapologetic chick lit
THE SETUP Alison is ruthlessly smart, terribly funny and totally neurotic. And the fact that her boyfriend Tom went out to buy mustard, then called to say he wasn't coming back, isn't making her any more stable. At 32 Alison has only ever slept with two people in her life, in part because she was raised an evangelical Christian, which has given her a kind of spiritual-sexual hangover she's still trying to get over. She has a lot of catching up to do. Oh, and she's a newspaper columnist--not the most original plot device, but, hey, sometimes the formula works. The Big Love is a perfect sugary confection, with a surprising center of wistful wisdom.
FREE SAMPLE "I've always thought that dating a really good-looking guy would be like buying a white couch: it might be nice to have, but you'd waste all that time worrying about it."
IT'S LIKE A highlights reel from Sex and the City. It's that funny.
BLING By Erica Kennedy
GENRE Romance--the hip-hop remix
THE SETUP Pretty songbird Mimi is plucked from an Ohio-based go-nowhere girl group by Lamont Jackson, music impresario extraordinaire. Lamont, who's filthy rich and something of a control freak, grooms Mimi for pop stardom--this book is makeover heaven--and introduces her to life in the cutthroat, Cristal-quaffing world of Manhattan's high-rolling hip-hoperati. Mimi starts out a hick but learns fast. Kennedy knows whereof she writes: she used to roll with Russell Simmons' posse, so she's been in all those clubs that would never let you in.
FREE SAMPLE "When EnVee fell to the floor an inch away from the steel spike of Vanessa's Choo, it was an opportunity Vanessa couldn't resist."
IT'S LIKE A novelization of Beyonce: Behind the Music, written by Jacqueline Susann.
THE GHOST WRITER By John Harwood
GENRE Ghost story
THE SETUP Gerard is a timid librarian whose only real friend is his pen pal, a beautiful Englishwoman named Alice, who is, sadly, confined to a wheelchair after a horrific car accident. They've been sending passionate (and frankly kind of sexy) letters to each other since they were 13, but they've never actually met. In fact, Alice refuses to let Gerard come to visit her. Does she have some connection to Gerard's creepy, semi-insane mom, who's also English? And to those Victorian horror tales that Gerard keeps stumbling across? What's she hiding, anyway? The answers are yes, yes, and wait and see.
FREE SAMPLE "At the inquest, a cabman told the coroner that he had seen a gentleman racing, hatless, across Battersea Bridge, from which, about half-way over, he had vaulted into the river. The tide was running strongly, and by the time the witness had reached the edge of the embankment, there was nothing to be seen."
IT'S LIKE A.S. Byatt's Possession. But without all that distracting poetry.
EIGHTBALL #23 By Daniel Clowes
GENRE Graphic novel
THE SETUP If you think Peter Parker is alienated and nerdy, check out Andy, a feckless, aimless orphan whose father left him an unusual legacy: superstrength and a ray gun that instantly annihilates its victims. Eightball positively crackles with self-loathing and pop-culture smarts and crawls with the kind of weirdo loners Clowes portrayed so well in Ghost World. Every frame is like a melancholy miniature Daumier, rendered in pulpy primary colors. If you're wondering what all the fuss is about comic books--sorry, graphic novels--check out Clowes. Nobody does them better.
FREE SAMPLE "Sure, you've got some powers, but that's nothing without motivation. Look at the Hulk--his wife died, or something."
IT'S LIKE Holden Caulfield with his phaser set on kill. Phonies beware.
WEAPONS OF CHOICE By John Birmingham
GENRE Weapons-grade military techno-thriller
THE SETUP The year is 2021. An ultra-high-tech multinational battle fleet (led by the U.S.S. Hillary Clinton, a George Bush--class supercarrier) is cruising off the coast of Indonesia, when suddenly a nearby high-energy physics experiment has a whoopsie, and the year isn't 2021 anymore. It's 1942, shortly before the Battle of Midway. So much for history as we know it. Birmingham could have just left this story as one big battle scene--he describes military hardware with an exuberance and virtuosity that's positively Clancyesque--but he also shows a surprisingly tender touch with his characters, who react to their unexpected time trip with authentic, believable anguish.
FREE SAMPLE "Charlie Company doubled as Colonel Jones's cliff assault and small boat raiding squadron, and the SEALs had come to acquaint them with a new toy: the G4, a lightweight assault rifle that fired strips of caseless ceramic ammunition and programmable 30-mm grenades."
IT'S LIKE A Clive Cussler novel fell into a transporter beam with a Stephen Ambrose history, and they came out all fused together.
TEN BIG ONES By Janet Evanovich
GENRE Mystery
THE SETUP In case you haven't met before--this is the 10th book in the series--Stephanie Plum, based in Trenton, N.J., is a bounty hunter with a great sense of humor that balances out her bad attitude and worse luck. This time around, Stephanie--through no fault of her own--is the sole witness to a robbery, which makes her a target for the gang of bad guys who perpetrated it. At least it gives her an excuse to turn to her ridiculously good-looking fellow bounty hunter Ranger for help.
FREE SAMPLE "'I vote we get him tonight at the multiplex,' Lula said. 'There's a movie I want to see. It's that one where the world gets blown up and there's only mutants left. I saw the ad on television, and one of those mutants is really fine.'"
IT'S LIKE Dorothy Parker with a lousy job and a Jersey accent.
DARKLY DREAMING DEXTER By Jeff Lindsay
GENRE Serial-killer thriller
THE SETUP Dexter is a forensic analyst with the Miami police department, specializing in the study of blood-spatter patterns. Dexter is also an emotionless serial murderer, driven by a remorseless alter ego he calls the Dark Passenger. He only kills people who deserve it--isn't that nice?--but when another serial killer starts preying on the citizens of Miami, Dexter hears the call of a kindred spirit. Or possibly some very unfriendly competition.
FREE SAMPLE "Whatever made me the way I am left me hollow, empty inside, unable to feel. It doesn't seem like a big deal. I'm quite sure most people fake an awful lot of every day human contact. I just fake all of it."
IT'S LIKE Very little else you've read. Imagine if Hannibal Lecter starred in CSI: Miami instead of David Caruso, and you're halfway there. With chills like this, you can skip the air conditioning this summer.