Best Summer Books

10 must-read summer books include dark fantasy, quirky history and a grouchy cat

When people described Book Expo America to me in the past, I imagined a cross between fashion week, an industry trade show and ComicCon. Experiencing the event in New York City earlier this month made me realize a more apt analogy would be book Mardi Gras.

The annual early-summer trade fair is where publishing houses, authors, booksellers and educators come together to harvest and sell the year’s book crop, but that doesn’t accurately describe the sometime figurative, sometimes literal drunken free-for-all that occurs when the book industry throws mounds of books and authors at each other.

After sorting through my Book Gras loot, I’ve put together a summer-read list of some of the most buzzed about titles. There seems to be a definite trend in dark tales this year, but that might be just the cool treat we need to get through the sizzling Texas days.

Mythical and Supernatural

The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman(out now)

It was standing room only for the novelist, television writer and twitter king at Book Expo. Calling his first adult novel since 2005 a “particular, dark little book,” about magic and memory, Gaiman confessed it’s also an accidental book that started as a short story based on a forgotten piece of childhood history and the tragic suicide of his family’s lodger.

The Returned by Jason Mott (out Aug. 28)

Though The Returned revolves around the fantastic conceit that the dead are being returned to the living exactly as they were before they died, Mott says he tried to treat the subject matter as realistically as possible.

The inspiration came from a haunting dream Mott had of coming home from work one day to find his deceased mother waiting for him at the kitchen table ready to hear about the years of his life she had missed. ABC has already adapted the book for television.

The Bone Season by Samantha Shannon(out Aug. 30)

If you grew up on Harry Potter or A Song of Ice and Fire and think a seven novel series is just the right length, this might be the summer sensation for you. Both fantastic and futuristic, this debut novel is set in an alternate future dystopian Britain, where psychics and clairvoyants are a persecuted minority.

The 21-year-old Shannon created her “voyant” hero Paige Mahoney while working on an English degree at Oxford. She’s managed to stay in school while completing the novel and mapping out the next six. She already signed a movie deal.

Yeah, I kind of hate her too, but this series looks like it could become addictive.

Sometimes the Best Stories Are True

Two nonfiction books titles won me over before I even turned the first page.

The Telling Room: A Tale of Love, Betrayal, Revenge, and the World's Greatest Piece of Cheese by Michael Paterniti (out July 30)

Traveling through Spain the author visits a “telling room” — a room built inside a cave where wine and cheese were counted before being stored for winter. Within this counting room that over centuries also served as a storytelling room, Paterniti meets a cheese maker who recounts a tale of mystery, murder and magical cheese.

He had me at magical cheese.

Topsy: The Startling Story of the Crooked Tailed Elephant, P.T. Barnum, and the American Wizard, Thomas Edison by Michael Daly(out July 2)

I’m always fascinated when disparate historical figures bump into each other in books, and this chronicle of P.T. Barnum, Thomas Edison, George Westinghouse, Nikola Tesla, the War of Currents and an electrocuted elephant seems to be a lost, true story of early 20th century American history we all should know.

Literary and historical

TransAtlantic by Colum McCann (out now)

The National Book Award winner’s new novel spans three countries and many time periods, focusing on U.S. to Ireland and back Atlantic crossings. Read now, then meet the author when Inprint brings McCann to Houston in November as part of their 2013-2014 season.

The Son by Philipp Meyer(out now)

I heard a lot of local buzz for this century-spanning, Texas-set novel, especially from the Brazos Bookstore guys. While regional excitement might be biased because Meyer just completed four Texas stops on his book tour, even The New York Times is saying The Son should be raised to the ranks of the greatest historical novels.

If you missed out on meeting Meyer, check out Kent Wascom’s debut novel The Blood of Heaven. The 26-year-old New Orleans native reads from his dark, violent depiction of early 19th century Gulf Coast settlers and revolutionaries at Brazos on June 28.

A different kind of memoir

Men We Reaped by Jesmyn Ward (out Sept. 1)

I’m playing favorites because I recently interviewed this National Book Award winner. Her passion to tell the true stories of the lives and deaths of five young African-American men from her small Mississippi town sold me on this book before I ever saw it.

Dark Crime

Alex by Pierre Lemaitre (out Sept. 3)

The book, already a best-seller in France, is being compared to Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. After seeing so many editors and publicists in a perpetual state of forced excitement about their books at Book Expo, hearing the Random House rep happily tell a room of librarians that Alex was “very, very sick” was so refreshing and hilarious, I wanted to check out this thriller immediately.

Celebrity Books

Celebrity books are as as prevalent as celebrity fragrances, but the latest trend is the celebrity penned children’s book. Jessica Lange, Julianne Moore and Jim Carrey all made Book Expo appearances. Octavia Spencer's Randi Rhodes, Ninja Detective especially looks like a fun romp for kids. But if the Book Expo signing line length is an indication, the hottest celebrity book this summer will be. . .

Grumpy Cat: A Grumpy Book (out July 23)

Internet domination wasn’t enough, so Grumpy Cat has pawed a photo-heavy book filled with grumpy games and activities.

Sure it’s a crass, cash-in on an Internet meme, but after all that magical, historical and literary darkness, a grouch cat just might bring some sun to your summer.

Grumpy Cat: A Grumpy Book

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Movie Review

Daniel Craig shines in Queer, an unapologetic tale of love and loss

Photo courtesy of A24

Drew Starkey and Daniel Craig in Queer.

As recently as the late 2010s, if a movie was made about an LGBTQ+ character, it was more than likely about their coming out experience. Romance, if it existed, was typically chaste, and actual sex was almost completely out of the question. Things have changed dramatically in the 2020s, to the point that a major movie star has no issue starring in a film called Queer.

Based on the 1985 novella by William S. Burroughs, the film features William Lee (Daniel Craig), whom everyone calls just Lee, a writer living in 1950s-era Mexico City who spends most of his time haunting local bars with friends like fellow writer Joe Guidry (Jason Schwartzman) and hitting on younger men. His early interactions in the film seem to indicate that Lee has a bad reputation within the local gay community, as multiple people avoid him or give him odd looks.

Lee senses an opportunity when he encounters a newcomer, Eugene Allerton (Drew Starkey). Despite some awkward interactions, the two of them start spending time together, although Lee has much more invested in the relationship than Eugene does. Their hit-and-miss bond continues until Lee, who’s starting to get into drugs in addition to the booze, convinces Eugene to accompany him on a trip to South America.

Directed by Luca Guadagnino and written by Justin Kuritzkes (making their second straight film together after Challengers), early on the film seems to be mostly about the divide between an older person who’s grown comfortable in his ways and a younger person who’s living a relatively carefree life. The introduction of drugs into the plot changes things, though, with Lee searching out more ways to open his eyes to what the world has to offer.

Guadagnino and his team use some interesting visual storytelling techniques to introduce ideas that may not be present in the actual script. The most successful, demonstrated in multiple scenes, is the superimposition of movements by Lee over what’s actually taking place in the scene. The subtle overlay gives the audience insight into Lee’s true feelings, showing what he can’t or won’t say out loud.

Music also plays a big part in how the plot is perceived, with the use of anachronistic songs from Nirvana and Prince serving to heighten certain moments. The score by Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross is not as in-your-face as the one they did for Challengers, but it complements the film well, especially when the plot starts to get trippy in its final half hour.

Craig, who appears sweaty and disheveled for much of the film, is about as far from the suaveness of James Bond as you can get in this role. He takes multiple risks with his performance and almost all of them pay off. Starkey’s character is subdued by comparison, but still comes off well. Schwartzman and Lesley Manville are given showy roles, with both using altered appearances that make them nearly unrecognizable to deliver memorable performances.

Queer is not as accessible as Challengers was storytelling-wise, but the fact that it tells a story about gay men living their lives as they see fit with no interference or questions shows how far the film world has come in a short period of time. It also continues Guadagnino’s streak of making audacious films in a way that few other filmmakers are willing or able to approach.

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Queer is now playing in theaters.

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