Ahh summer. Warm days, sun, surf, crystal clear lakes, lazy days on the back porch, and books. Lots and lots of books. You know the ones on the list you’ve been compiling all year. If your list is anything like mine, summer will have to be extended to get them all in.

Let’s see, what will it be this week? A mystery. The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo by Steig Larssen has been very popular at the library. A computer hacker who uses her skill to solve crimes. It’s part of a series. What if I really get hooked? There goes the summer. But I’ve heard it’s a really great read.

Then there’s Heresy by S. J. Parris, a medieval thriller about a monk who actually lived during the sixteenth century. – Caught reading Erasmus in the privy, he barely escaped the monastery in Italy with his life, and eventually found his way to England and became a spy for the court of Elizabeth I. His mission was to root out religious heretics at Oxford. Quite a role reversal. That could keep me up nights.

Maybe I’d like a change of pace. Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand by Helen Simonson has gotten some great press. Let me think, a retired, very proper British Major, a charming Pakistani store keeper, both widowed; a lovely English village. Sounds promising so far. But can Edgecomb St. Mary get its arms around a multicultural romance among the not so young, with intrusive family on all sides? Add a looming developer with plans to reinvent the village, and things are at the boil. I can’t wait to find out how it all turns out.

So many books … you know the rest.

See you in the Fall.

Lilly the Librarian