MY SUMMER READING LIST
I know there are people in the world who genuinely do not enjoy reading, and I will never understand that. “Find something that interests you!” I scream, trying to force them to dive into the worlds I’ve grown to love, dying to introduce them to the book versions of their movie heroes. “The book is so much better,” I say, silently judging that they don’t know Severus Snape, Boo Radley, or Dorothy Gale like I do.
At the risk of sounding like I’m 100 years old, I think the social-mdia-like-my-picture-watch-this-video-answer-me-now world we live in is partly to blame. Our brains are constantly stimulated, blue lights flashing back into our eye sockets at all hours of the day and night, and that type of brain power is wasted on apps, never text, never stories. What’s the point of a story if it isn’t on the Internet? What’s the point if it doesn’t have accompanying video content or a share button? The point is that while your favorite YouTube video might bring you joy, my books will outlive that, their stories will live on past the technology that may or may not be killing us.
Part of my 30 before 30 list is to complete the Rory Gilmore Reading List, so that means this summer will be packed with books from that list, plus a few others that I want to finish. I’ve chosen 12 books to get me through the summer, which is about a book a week. This is pretty ambitious, but I think I can make it happen.
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
A Room With a View by E.M. Forster
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel García Márquez
The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd
The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath
The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion
Not That Kind Of Girl by Lena Dunham
Notorious RBG: The Life and Times of Ruth Bader Ginsberg by Irin Carmon, Shana Knizhnik
If you find yourself “bored” this summer, perhaps you just need a digital detox and a page-turner. Give it a try. Also, if you just can’t pull yourself away from your phone, there is indeed an app for readers.
If you have a Goodreads account, you can check out my Summer Reading shelf here!
