NPR Audience Picks 100 Best Beach Books Ever

Looking for a good book to read on the beach this summer, a friend came across this NPR article: Audience Picks: 100 Best Beach Books Ever

Almost 16,000 NPR listeners cast some 136,000 votes in the Best Beach Books Ever poll. Said NPR, "Whether such a vote can determine literary quality, who can say? But there's one thing a multitude of book-loving NPR types can most definitely do, and that's pick a list of books that will appeal to... book-loving NPR types."

The poll produced a list of audience favorites, dubbed, "The 100 Best Beach Books Ever." Here are the top 10 from the list:
1. The Harry Potter series, by J.K. Rowling
2. To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee
3. The Kite Runner, by Khaled Hosseini
4. Bridget Jones's Diary, by Helen Fielding
5. Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen
6. Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood, by Rebecca Wells
7. The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald
8. The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, by Douglas Adams
9. Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe, by Fannie Flagg
10. The Poisonwood Bible, by Barbara Kingsolver
Click here for the rest of the list.

Good Morning America and Parade Magazine's Summer Picks

On June 29th, Good Morning America and Parade Magazine announced their summer picks. Read more about GMA's Hot Summer Reads...

Here is the list (click on titles to follow links to our catalog)
Thrillers:
Gone Tomorrow by Lee Child
The Scarecrow by Michael Connelly
The Neighbor by Lisa Gardner
Killer Summer by Ridley Pearson
Guardian of Lies by Steve Martini
The Defector by Daniel Silva
Relentless by Dean Koontz (earlier working title: The Other Side of the Woods)
Above the Law by Tim Green
Fiction:
In the Kitchen by Monica Ali
The White Queen by Philippa Gregory
South of Broad by Pat Conroy
Shanghai Girls by Lisa See
The Story Sisters by Alice Hoffman
The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane by Katherine Howe
Non-Fiction:
Losing Mum & Pup by Christopher Buckley
Not Becoming My Mother by Ruth Reichl
Paul Newman: A Life by Shawn Levy
Rocket Men by Craig Nelson
Light Fiction:
Black Hills by Nora Roberts
Best Friends Forever by Jennifer Weiner
The Castaways by Elin Hilderbrand
Mercury in Retrograde by Paula Froehlich
Queen Takes King by Gigi Levanger Grazer

Summer Reading Websites offer book suggestions

I have been seeing lots of recommendations for summer reading in my e-mail newsletters, professional journals, pop culture magazines, on TV and radio, etc.

Here is a selection of sites you can go to to find something good to read on the beach, or curled up in the air-conditioning on some non-sticky-making couch!

On Morning Edition on June 11, 3 booksellers explained their summer reading choices to Susan Stamberg.
On Morning Edition on NPR this morning (June 19), librarian Nancy Pearl picked her Summer's Best Books and told us why.
The New York Times Book Review for June 19 has The Girls of Summer, a survey of the season's women's fiction.
The Wall Street Journal for May 23 published its The Summer Booklist by Cynthia Crossen.
EW.com has a list 92 In the Shade: books for summer reading.

For summer reading suggestions from your own HCPL librarians, see Readers Place.