Summer Reads 2018: Book Recommendations for the Season

One of our most popular programs — what to read this summer! Our all-star cast will share the books they’ve read recently and are looking forward to reading. This summer also sees PBS' "Great American Read," an eight-part series that explores and celebrates the power of reading, told through the prism of America’s 100 best-loved novels, as chosen in a national survey.

Richard Russo, author of eight novels, including “Empire Falls,” which was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in 2002. His new book is “The Destiny Thief – Essays on Writing, Writers and Life.”

Josh Bodwell, executive director of the Maine Writers & Publishers Alliance, the series editor of a three-volume relaunch of the collected short stories and novellas of Andre Dubus. The first two volumes will be released on June 20. Richard Russo wrote the introduction to Vol. 2.

Kate Christensen, author of seven novels, including “The Great Man,”” which won the 2008 PEN/Faulkner Award for fiction, and soon-to-be-released “The Last Cruise.”” She’s the author of two food-centric memoirs, “Blue Plate Special” and “How to Cook a Moose,” which won the 2016 Maine Literary Award for Memoir.

Terri-Lynne DeFino (by phone), author of “The Bar Harbor Retirement Home for Famous Writers (And Their Muses).”

Emily Connelly (by phone), editorial assistant with AudioFile Magazine.

• “Natural Causes: An Epidemic of Wellness, the Certainty of Dying, and Killing Ourselves to Live Longer,” by Barbara Ehrenreich
• “House of Broken Angels,” by Luis Alberto Urea
• “The Last Cruise,” by Kate Christensen
• "Sunburn," by Laura Lippman
• "The Devil's Highway," by Luis Alberto Urrea

• "Trajectory," by Richard Russo
• “Moby Dick,” by Herman Melville
• “Kudos,” by Rachel Cusk, the final book in her "Outline" trilogy.
• “Sick,” by Porochista Khakpour
• “My Ex-Life,” by Stephen McCauley

• In Honor Of Father’s Day, June 17: “When I First Held You: 22 Critically Acclaimed Writers Talk About the Triumphs, Challenges, and Transformative Experience of Fatherhood,” edited by Brian Gresko
• The. Best. (So Far In 2018): “Anything Is Possible,” by Elizabeth Strout
• Must-Reads For Writers: “Draft No. 4,” by John McPhee and “The Destiny Thief: Essays on Writing, Writers, and Life,” by Richard Russo
• Must-Read For Readers: “The Book: An Homage,” by Burkhard Spinnen
• Read Before You See The Movie This Summer: “The Bookshop,” by Penelope Fitzgerald, “Wildlife,” by Richard Ford and “Lean on Pete,” by Willy Vlautin
• In Celebration Of National Short Story Month, May: “Varieties of Exile” and “Paris Stories,” both by Mavis Gallant and “So Long: Stories 1987-1992” and “Where I Live Now: Stories 1993-1998,” both by Lucia Berlin
• To-Be-Read This Summer: “The Last Cruise,” by Kate Christensen, “The Fact of a Body,” by Alexandria Marzano-Lesnevich, “The Burning Girl,” by Claire Messud and “Little Fires Everywhere,” by Celeste Ng

• "All the Ever Afters," by Danielle Teller
• "This Dark Road to Mercy" and "The Last Ballad," both by Wiley Cash
   

• AudioFile Sync summer audiobook program
• "Lincoln in the Bardo," by George Saunders
• "Children of Blood and Bone," by Tomi Adeyemi
• "Give Me Some Truth," by Eric Gansworth
• "The Hate You Give," by Angie Thomas
• "Born a Crime," by Trevor Noah
• "The Dublin Murder Squad Mysteries," by Tana French
• "Circe," by Madeline Miller

• Island Readers and Writers lists
• Rockport Public Library book sale
• George Guidall event at the Patten Free Library in Bath
• "Florida," Lauren Groff
• "Turtles All The Way Down," John Green
• "Jabari Jumps," by Gaia Cornwall
• "A Gentleman in Moscow," by Amor Towles
• "Lost Empress," by Sergio De La Pava
• "The Overstory," by Richard Powers
• "The Fun Mover Chronicles," by Tim Fahey
• "The Stand," by Stephen King
• "Vacationland," by John Hodgman
• "Stranded: A Story of Frontier Survival," by Matthew Mayo
• "White Pine: American History and the Tree that Made a Nation," by Andrew Vietze
• "Trap the Devil," by Ben Coes
• "Voting Down the Rose: Florence Brooks Whitehouse and Maine's Fight for Woman Suffrage," by Anne B. Gass
• "Beyond the Road," by Jt Curran
• "The Believing Brain," by Michael Shermer
• "Calypso," by David Sedaris
• "The Swan Thieves," by Elizabeth Kostova
• "Camulod Chronicles Series," by Jack Whyte
• "Call Me American," by Abdi Nor Iftin
• "When We Were the Kennedys," by Monica Wood
• "Into the Raging Sea: Thirty-Three Mariners, One Megastorm, and the Sinking of El Faro," by Rachel Slade
• "Waking Lions," by Ayelet Gundar-Goshen
• Jen Blood's K-9 series

For more recommendations from our listeners, visit the Maine Calling Facebook page.

• Bruce Springsteen - I'm on Fire
• The Replacements - Can't Hardly Wait