A couple of years ago, I did a simply marvellous post (says I to myself) on summer holiday reading lists, and why the recommended beach reads in newspapers – usually detailed in breathless column inches by authors currently on the promotional circuit – are a load of tosh.
The thing about holiday reading lists is that they are lists of books people haven’t read yet, and therefore are full of the sort of books which people won’t actually read. Books to make you look cool; to make you look clever, or deep – you can put anything you want on your holiday reading list, safe in the knowledge nobody will catch you out. Because who’s going to follow up, right?
It’s the insecure author’s holy grail in the print media, where they can promote their own books, by lying about reading books written by other people. But I reckon the rest of us mortal folk are missing out on a trick. Not being quoted in newspapers doesn’t mean we can’t also go around lying about what we’re reading this summer. Why should authors have all the fun?
*************
Picture the scene. You are at the sort of party (let’s say it’s a book launch in a fancy shop) that Tark and Mara would actually turn up to. In fact, there they are in the corner, sneering at the umbrella plants. You try not to stare. You are thrilled to see another well-known author standing by the Mind Body & Spirit section, talking animatedly. You sidle up to eavesdrop.
Well-Known Author: …for a writer’s residence in Stockholm, and then I’m off to Antibes.
Big Fan of Well-Known Author: Oh, how lovely! And what will you be reading on the beach this year?
Well-Known Author: Well, don’t you know, I’ve already packed my books, and I’m not off for another month! Ha, ha! I’m hilarious, I know. My non-fiction pick will be Thomas Piketty’s latest economic treatise. Can’t get enough of that man’s brain.
Big Fan: Oh, yes, I keep meaning to read him, he’s on my list too.
Well-Known Author: Then I’ll be re-reading the bible, for some poolside reflection. Even though I’m not religious. Obviously.
Big Fan: Marvellous.
Well-Known Author: If I feel I need a bit of light relief, I’ll read some Sam Beckett. He’s so funny.
Big Fan: Hysterical.
Well-Known Author: And I’ll finish with some Henry James, because you do need a bit of froth on holidays, don’t you?
Big Fan: I always thought so.
Well-Known Author: And what will you be reading on holidays yourself?
Big Fan: Well, I always bring the complete shortlist for the Booker prize each year.
Well-Known Author: [irritated] Do you, now?
Big Fan: I like to know what’s going on in contemporary arts.
Well-Known Author: [gritting teeth] You’re so brave. I’m terribly clingy with the classics. I’m just so afraid I’ll end up with a dud, otherwise.
Big Fan: [sighing] I know. But it’s worth the risk sometimes. I always pack Middlemarch as a backup, just in case.
At this point, the Well-Known Author narrows his eyes and rummages in his pocket for a concealed weapon. You move away quickly and make for the Crime section.
***************
In case this doesn’t give you enough ideas, I’ve helpfully compiled a list of some of the top books people are claiming they’re going to read this year, along with reasons to lie about reading them. You can thank me by lying to me about how much you love this blog, if you like.
- Middlemarch (George Eliot) – Fiction
No kidding. This comes up year, after year, after year: this is the novel which liars always say they’re going to read during summer. A novel from 1871, famed for its length. FFS.
- The Girls (Emma Cline) – Fiction
This has been described as “shockingly assured for a first novel”, a quote which itself deserves an award for Arsery. It also seems like a popular pick, yet acceptable in literary circles, so go forth and lie.
- At The Existentialist Café (Sarah Bakewell) – Non-Fiction
Several authors tried to make a joke about the fact that there is apparent levity in this study of famous philosophers. This made me very sad. You can cheer me up by telling people you’re going to read it, and then not reading it.
- Zero K (Don DeLillo) – Fiction
Someone said they were going to a Greek island with this book. This is a ridiculous statement. Nobody goes to Greece with Don DeLillo, so it’s a lie. However, it’s not a lie I sanction, so please lie about reading it somewhere else.
- Anything by Donald Trump: Fiction – no – Non-Fiction – no – Fiction – ah, who cares
This will show you have a finely honed sense of irony, and you are also a talented liar who could be triple-blinding me right now and I wouldn’t even know where to start unravelling your deep-seated delusions. It’s going to be huuuuuuuuge.
***
I’m also interested in knowing your mind on this issue. Which book(s) will you be lying about reading this summer?
Tara Sparling writes 
I will be reading the collected works of Charles Dickens, then I thought I’d also bring the Brothers Karamzov, by Dostoevsky. You know, just for something light. And something by Jilly Cooper, for the shagging. Good thing I have a Kindle, for my case would be heavy otherwise 😀😉
LikeLiked by 4 people
Oh, this is most excellent, Helen. I forgot about Dostoevsky, but I sometimes think that’s because he’s just like, so 2013, you know? It was all the talk of the Russian Greats on reality TV that summer which did for me. But kudos on Jilly Cooper. Massive ironic cachet. Full marks.
LikeLiked by 3 people
Yes, I suppose Big D is a bit passe, but it just feels a bit like a Russian summer this year, what with my writing residency at the Hermitage and all the pesky revolution talk going around. ;-D Still, it’s just for the plane, really…
LikeLiked by 2 people
Oh, tell me about it. You do need something for the plane which doesn’t require any thought. I tried reading Anglo-Saxon poetry on a long-haul flight once (in the original vernacular, obvs) and it gave me terrible wind.
LikeLiked by 2 people
That and the airline food will do it every time.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Wait! You got airline food? What club do you belong to?
LikeLiked by 2 people
Oh, it’s a European thing. I think it all changes after Brexit, sadly.
LikeLiked by 2 people
May I have the audacity to add a handy tip? This is one to do while you’re idling away those last hours at the office before you’re demobbed. Make your own dust jacket of whatever book you’re supposed to be reading to put over the book you actually want to read b:-)) I always take a couple of Moomins books as back up too in case my Proper Book turns out to be rubbish.
LikeLiked by 3 people
This is great advice when dealing with religious relatives as well. Make sure to wrap your bodice ripper or mystery in a Bible or devotional dust jacket before you leave for your trip.
LikeLiked by 3 people
Excellent advice from both of you. I am mocking up The God Delusion and Barney The Dinosaur’s Guide To Authentic Living as we speak.
LikeLiked by 1 person
’80s supermodel Elle Macpherson said, ‘I’d never read anything I haven’t written myself’. That’s good enough for me so this summer I’ll be reading The Complete Works of Elle Macpherson. When she said it, in the actual ’80s, she hadn’t actually written anything. But she must have by now.
LikeLiked by 3 people
This is the best reason I have ever heard to read a book, written or unwritten, Kathy. You need to get this into the newspapers stat.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Will do, it’s not actually summer for sometime… not in Tasmania anyway
LikeLiked by 2 people
Well, it’s never too early to lie. That’s what I always say.
LikeLiked by 1 person
No summer reading list would be complete without the complete works of Thomas Pynchon. If that raises a skeptical eyebrow, then you should say, “at least I’ll run through V and Gravity’s Rainbow again when I’m rained in. They’re such a lark. As Pynchon himself says, ‘why tackle Beethoven when you can settle for Bizet?'” And then, just to show you’re not driven by those sexists in charge of university curricula who pick reading lists, don’t forget The Golden Notebooks by Doris Lessing.
(BTW, that’s not exactly what he said, one of his characters was comparing the musical tastes of the Germans and the French and the consequences for Poland, but you’ll have to actually read him to find the quote. And now you can be even more pretentious when the time arises.
How much do I miss the posturing of grad school? Not at all.)
Happily retired from college teaching.
LikeLiked by 2 people
I’m too impressed by your list to even speak, Phillip. Fortunately, this doesn’t keep me from typing, so I can tell you how impressed I am. You had me at Bizet, but then you went on to mention posturing. You could make a fortune on Etsy selling personalised false reading lists based on keywords supplied by the customer. Just so you know, mine would be ‘toast’ and ‘nihilism’.
LikeLiked by 1 person
You have inspired me to a new career. But anyone who goodles toast and nihilism just needs a healthy dose of Kliban cats you while nibbling on scones with café au lait or tea (or le chocolat chaud) at your local coffee house to restore your blood sugar levels. (“Love to eat them mousies. Mousies what I love to eat. Bite they little heads off. Nibble on they tiny feet.”) Joie de vivre restored.
LikeLiked by 1 person
That is the most beautiful poem I have ever seen, Phillip. I can’t believe so much emotion can be packed into so few lines. And what a damning indictment of modern society too. I am quite affected by it I must say.
LikeLike
It’s not mine, it’s B. Kliban from Cat, his most famous https://www.amazon.com/Cat-B-Kliban/dp/0911104542/
LikeLiked by 1 person
I don’t mind who wrote it. It’s still powerful.
LikeLike
The mousies thought so too. That poem and one by Yeats are the only two I still carry with me from my days chasing existential dread in grad school.
LikeLiked by 1 person
And who says a liberal arts education doesn’t set you up for life? Philistines.
LikeLike
What does it say about me that I had to Google most of the names of authors and novels mentioned here?
That I am Punk AF.
Up yours Tolstoy, this is my reading list for this summer:
https://www.goodreads.com/shelf/show/bizarro-fiction
LikeLiked by 1 person
Oh, good show, Pyscho (you don’t mind if I call you Psycho?) Those titles alone make for great reading. Do they come in hardback?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Bone or cuticle?
And this seems like something that deserves a Listopia entry on Goodreads.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Well if there isn’t already, there should be, immediately.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Did actually read The Luminaries (enormous but on Kindle) sitting under an olive tree on utterly relaxed holiday. Great stuff on gold mining, enough barminess and a few good characters to keep me going. Too much arse-about-face storytelling to prevent me skipping. Astrologically principled structure made it very top-heavy. Fortunately the wine was excellent and my reading mood benevolent which got me through the vastly overweight 1st chapter. Wouldn’t have finished it in any other circs.
Then it won the Booker.
Now I never have to lie again. Result!
LikeLiked by 2 people
That’s very impressive, Jenny, but I’m afraid you may now have to lie the other way. If people suspect that you spend your holidays actually improving your mind and predicting literary grandees, you’ll have to lie about reading pulp fiction in order to fit in at Bikini Karaoke and Water Bingo, no?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Bugger prediction, I thought it was an interesting oddity that needed a good editor. I bought it on the blurb.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Won’t be the first edited book which needed an editor, Jenny, is my guess. I’m still impressed by you, though.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Morning Tara, I wasn’t a bit surprised that Same Train, Different Track didn’t feature in any of your lists possibly because it hasn’t yet been published but it will be come September – it’s my book of poetry and short stories, not a heavy dome, autumnal reading for a three day away break, another to add to the famous list!!! I know I’m not a bit backwards about coming forward.
LikeLiked by 1 person
You are not, in fact, C.J.! I’m only letting you away with this because you’re such a long time patron of this parish. Still, you might be shooting yourself in the foot, here… isn’t this a list of stuff people are never going to read?!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thanks Tara, sure if they make a purchase does any author mind if they use the book for propping up a wonky coffee table?
LikeLiked by 1 person
Ah, but you’re assuming people actually buy the books they say are on their holiday reading lists. I’m afraid that’s not the case!
LikeLiked by 1 person
I bow to your expert knowledge in all things writerly.
LikeLike
Well, if not writerly, then marketingly. (As my linguistic skills will attest.) 😀
LikeLiked by 1 person
Touche: Back now to the scribbling board.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I keep meaning to read Love in Time of Gonnorhea. I think I read it last summer, too.
LikeLiked by 3 people
Don’t they have a cream for that now, Tenderlation? You might think about reading The Satanic Virus this year. Harder to shake off, but more zeitgeisty.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Oh, thanks for recommendation, Tara. I LOVED Midnight’s Chilblains.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I really hope you’re not waiting for me to make a Salmanella joke, because I’m not going to.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Shame.
Those lists are hilarious. They always remind me of the music certain certain claim to have listened to during their formative ears. “Yeah, man, Cohen, he got me through the nursery years”. No he didn’t. That was the theme tune to The Magic Roundabout.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Which was underrated in itself. Anyone who’s ever had a mind-altering substance can tell you that.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Middlemarch? Seriously?! Who claims to enjoy this? Having suffered Eliot’s Silas Marner for LC English (I’m showing my age now) I can’t imagine how anyone reads her for fun.
I have noted all the titles now and I’m off to buy the CliffsNotes. Not sure I’ll actually read them though.
LikeLiked by 2 people
There were 4 references to Middlemarch in one article alone, Donna. Hilarious. Don’t bother with the CliffsNotes, though. The beauty of this is that you never have to know a damn thing about the books on your list. Because you were just too busy to get around to them. Natch.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Oh obviously. I have far too much going on in my hectic life!
LikeLiked by 1 person
I’m actually reading The Girls right now ahahah! It’s Ok…
LikeLiked by 1 person
No, no, you’re too far ahead Amanda! Say it’s just amaaaaazing, essential reading, and then when everyone else jumps on the bandwagon, say it didn’t do much for you 😉
LikeLiked by 2 people
I’ve already read my summer reading list as I try to put off working on WIP no. 13 (no significance to the number there – oh wait…) I’m working on Christmas Holiday reading list, and soon I will be delving into Summer 2017 reading list and reading BOOKS THAT HAVEN’T EVEN BEEN PUBLISHED YET! HA!
LikeLiked by 2 people
Hahaha!! Congratulations Melodie, you have won the internet for today. Only books which haven’t been written yet could beat that. You should be feeling very smug about now.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I received this Oprah’s book club 2.0 summer reading list on July 12. The newsletter includes:10 Beach Reads You Won’t Be Able to Put Down, 6 new books with incredibly beautiful settings, 11 authors tell us their favorite books, what’s on Hilary Clinton’s bookshelf? must-read books of the summer, and my personal favorite … 40 books to read before turning 40.
This is what the queen of reading decreed. [ Beach reads that sizzle: We all love a juicy, compelling book—that’s also written with smarts and heart. Here are our favorites for 2016. Bring them on your next getaway or to your front porch for a literary adventure. ]
All this plus a survey to determine your emotional age. The headline invites us to “try this insightful quiz that will help you discover the advantages of inner youth and how to use them to get the life you want by the author of ‘The Emotional Edge’.
Now I’m in a tizzy. I’m way older than 40, so there is no list for me, although who doesn’t love an incredibly beautiful setting, and I don’t dare take the survey. My inner youth is now a cranky cynic. And the beaches where I live (on Vancouver Island, Canada) are in bear territory.
LikeLiked by 2 people
It’s all gone a bit…….. um……. commercial, isn’t it, Veronica? We’ve come a long way from Oprah’s first book club, haven’t we. Back in the days when a recommendation from the big O didn’t have the weight of a large planet entering a black hole, but seemed rather an innocent plug of sorts for a book she’d read and liked. Oh, well. I remember a time long ago when people made money from blogging too.
In the meantime, please don’t worry. I just started a list for the 100 books to read before you’re 100. It’s going to bother the bejeebus out of 99-year-olds, but I’m sure you’ll be fine. As long as you don’t feed the bears, eh?
LikeLiked by 2 people
Ulysses, obviously. I’m Greek, after all🇬🇷
LikeLiked by 2 people
As long as you don’t mean any Ulysses by Don DeLillo, M.L., I’ll allow it.
LikeLiked by 1 person
James Joyce, my dear…
LikeLiked by 1 person
I was trying to make a bad joke about the DeLillo. I think I succeeded 😉
LikeLike
😂😂😂he he
LikeLiked by 1 person
Hey. I like Eliot! (Not Middlemarch, though – I think I had to read it at some point in my life and suppressed the memory). I have a stack of indie books from bloggers-extraordinaire that I’ll be reading this summer (if summer would make a point to stopping by). A warm day at the beach sounds blissful – no lie!
LikeLiked by 2 people
Ah, but what books will you be lying about reading, Diana?! The ones you’re actually going to read don’t count in this instance…
LikeLiked by 2 people
Lying requires too much effort, Tara. It makes me tired and I have to take a nap. Oh…I’ll be reading Murakami, of course. 🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
Niiiice. I am actually a Murakami fan, but only in winter.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I actually do want to read Murakami, just won’t get to him this summer – so it’s sort of a lie. I’ve heard his style of writing is wonderful. I’ll save it for winter 🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
I got you to lie! I’m delighted 😁😁
LikeLiked by 1 person
😀
LikeLiked by 1 person
We obviously holiday in different countries, or different parts of countries. In the Greek island where I recently holidayed people didn’t read book by the pool or on the beach. Instead they toasted in the sun, eyes firmly closed (possibly like their minds?). A few had earbuds pumping music into their lugs, a few sat upright and flicked through a magazine while downing an extra large local beer, A few, while sitting to get their backs tanned, stared vacantly at the pool. On the plane Kindles or tablets were the order of the day, not for books but for games. I slid my paperback (one of a number taking my case perilously close to the 15kg limit) from bag and delved in. A paperback incidentally bought, as our nearest bookshop closed several years ago and I never know what to order from the big A, from a charity shop. Amazing what wonderful reads have been sourced there.
Books for the beach – so passé, don’t ya know! So no need for lies. Sorted.
LikeLiked by 1 person
But lying is such fun! And so arty. Are you sure you don’t want to lie about one teeny tiny tome?
LikeLike
I might try James Joyce’s Ulysses again and see if I can get to the end this time (or at least beyond page 9, my previous record). If I actually succeed, I won’t be able to lie about reading it, so I’ll just lie about understanding it instead.
LikeLiked by 2 people
I think what you’re supposed to do, Bun, is superimpose your own understanding based on only one paragraph of it, thus subverting all previous readings and setting Joycean scholars on a journey of paralysing self-doubt which will in turn spawn sixty new readings of his work. At least that’s what happened last time.
LikeLiked by 1 person
It was clearly about Brexit. The heavy foreshadowing was quite unmistakable.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I think you’re right. I hadn’t seen it before, but I was distracted by the sausages. It’s an old trick I know.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Much as I like sausages, I’d never be distracted by them (unless they were chocolate-coated, of course).
LikeLiked by 1 person
I read that in so many different ways. Tee-hee.
LikeLike
Oh, you…! 🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
I’m impressed you got to page 9. What’s your secret?
LikeLiked by 2 people
I read it with my eyes shut while listening to music. It went far better than I expected.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Did George Washington ever write anything – because I too cannot tell a lie, so he’d be worth a look. Except that I’ll probably be way too busy for reading this summer, because I really should be writing… ><
LikeLiked by 1 person
Well then, this whole exercise is perfect for you, Jan! Write away, and lie about all the other stuff. You’re welcome. 😉
LikeLike
Haha! Picketty? Come on… 🙂 I will read none of the above. I bought Houellebecque’s Submission in Paris last year. In original Frog. No subtitles. I haven’t been able to pick the courage to read it. To close to home. I might bring it along next month as I go to Paris for the summer. I have Vol de nuit by Saint-Exupéry which I will probably finish before I leave. I just bought Mr. Fox in San Francisco. That is probably the only other book I will bring along. my (almost) daily routine is to walk along the Seine and buy old books in the boxes for 2 euros. The mystery of the book-hunt. You never know what you might find. And since Godot is generally almost always played in Paris, I might buy myself a ticket. Cheers Tara. (And thank you for your remarkable sense of humour…) 🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
No, thank you Equinoxio… your summer sounds like a cultural dream. I might admire it more if you were lying about it, but alas, I suspect you are telling the absolute truth. My warmest regards to Paris and all of France, especially in light of such woeful events last night – no art can make sense of that.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thank you Tara for those thoughts. Madness has no sense. And yet it is growing like a disease. I sometimes wonder whether humanity’s fate is just War. Regardless, I will fly to Paris Sunday a week from now, and will transmit your regards. 🙂 Take care.
Brian
PS. “Admire it more if it were a lie?” 🙂 Interesting thought. That is where I would agree that Fiction is grander than Reality. But in this case, it is Fiction come true. Hemingway and Fitzgerald in Paris does sound like fiction. But the book boxes along the Seine are real, and though they are, they contain the greatest treasure… Treasures soon to be forgotten, but still whispering: B.O.O.K.S.S.S.S.S.SS
LikeLiked by 1 person
I hope you go where the whisper takes you, Brian, and find a book to transport you somewhere else fantastic!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thank you Tara. Taking Mr Fox with me for the flight. Then we’ll see what magical whispers come out of the book-boxes. Take care. Have a nice week-end. B.
LikeLiked by 1 person
The best book for reading on the beach is the Minehead Almanac of High and Low Tides. Read that and there’s no risk of being caught on a sandbank and drowning. Another good one, sadly out of print, is Wisden’s Good Beach Guide (How to Avoid Radioactive Contamination). It sold well around Heysham and Sellafield, but nowhere else. They went back to publishing books about cricket.
I was once caught reading How to Get a Life on a car park in the Lake District frequented by rare breeds of chickens. (This is true.) It was a bit embarrassing.
As for the whole ‘what I’ll be reading on my holidays’ thing, all I can say is lucky you for going away on holiday. Where I come from a decent holiday is leaving the wheelie bins five yards farther up the road than normal. (Used to be five metres, but we’re not in the EU any more.)
LikeLiked by 1 person
Your literal take on literature is to be lauded, Chris. Not by me, because I don’t do that sort of thing, but I’m sure several people are reading your comment and silently applauding. I am appalled at your being caught in flagrante delicto in the Lake District. Small wonder you’re not going on holidays any more. Perhaps that career in politics is closer than you think?
LikeLiked by 1 person
If chickens had the right to vote I’d be there. Mind you, I eat a lot of chicken so maybe I wouldn’t get many votes.
And flagrante delicto was a flavour of ice cream sold at the shop close to that car park.
LikeLiked by 1 person
OMG. I’m totes psychic. I knew it.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I will unashamedly reread some of my Ross MacDonald. The best crime noir writer that ever lived. That and some tosh I will download at the last minute. Such is life.
Major p.s.: SPARLING! Get over to my blog and check out the new theme, the new logo, the new self hosting, the new every fecking thing. She’s fab!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Saw it. Loved it. Coveted it. It’s a triumph of good taste in every application of the term, Conor. I want to have a big chat with you about self-hosting. MAJOR chat, even.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Let me get my own head around it first. Still struggling with a lot of it!
LikeLiked by 1 person
I’ll be reading an ARC of Donald Trump’s upcoming blockbuster hit: How I Became President by Drinking Zero K with the Middlemarch Girls at the Existentialist Cafe. It’s bound to be riveting.
LikeLiked by 2 people
Oh my Blog. Someone call the Zeitgeist Police! Carrie’s stolen our literary present. We will forever after remember this as The Summer The Publishers Imploded…
LikeLike
I’m amazed that I have all the books mentioned in comments on my list. I’ll take them in paperback of course because textured reading is the new black. And naturally I will accord with the Obverse School of Reading but starting on the last page and working my way to the start. If I had to chose one book to not read I wouldn’t because I really can’t lie about reading; I have to sit or walk. Boom Moob
LikeLiked by 1 person
I want a T-shirt which says ‘Textured Reading Is The New Black’. I will of course wear it ironically, over a bikini and combat trousers. I also want to go to the Geoff Le Pard school of Online Commentary. Do you take discredit cards?
LikeLiked by 1 person
I recently came out as contactless and have found the freedom that comes from bacteria free spending very liberating
LikeLiked by 1 person
A Ryanair bagful of Mills and Boon. So there!
LikeLiked by 1 person
But is that the truth… or a lie? Is it an untruthful truism?! Because other people definitely will, but I don’t think you would, and then the fox goes into the boat with the chicken and wait… no, that’s not right! My head hurts
LikeLike
The truth, naturally!
I have a secret wish (now unleashed) to be published by M&B. Tried an online comp they ran a few years ago but my chapter was too risque! I wonder about my calling in the world of fiction!
LikeLiked by 1 person
There’s a market for that too Jean, go get ’em!
LikeLiked by 1 person
I mainly read indie books now. No lie. Oh, I’m supposed to lie? Boy, I suck at it in regards to reading. Oh, I know! I am a pig’s eye. There. Lie. Oh wait. Lie about reading! Sigh. Excuse me. I’ll be in the corner, sucking away…
LikeLike
Hmmmm. Either you’re doomed, or you’ve invented a new kind of rhyming lie. Choose carefully, and it might catch on.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Uh, I’m doomed to lie rhyming. Double whammy.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I really enjoyed this post, Tara. It was very entertaining. I usually fall asleep wearing a book on my face at the beach so I suppose I should think about the title and cover (what it says about me, etc.) Hmmm…………. I’m going to order ‘The Dialogues of Plato’ from Easons (I doubt they have it in stock). That should make me look super intelligent as I lie wrapped in my beach towel snoring my head off. 😉
LikeLiked by 1 person
There’s a much easier solution than that, Jean, courtesy of weebluebirdie in the comments above. Just get a dust jacket for Plato and wrap it around whatever the hell you like. Hey presto – literary pretensions instantly realised! They’ll all be doing it next year, you mark my words.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Lol! Knowing my luck, the dust jacket will blow away and I’ll be discovered fast asleep under Nicholas Sparks …………. er…… let me rephrase that. 😮
LikeLiked by 1 person
I’d rather you didn’t. What you said first sounds like so much more fun. 😀
LikeLiked by 1 person
I loved the title of your post so much, I didn’t need to read the rest (but I did). Don’t tell me Donald Trump has written something. Middlemarch done. I persuaded our reading group to do it two years ago (as I had never read it). I could take the Piketty; I gave it to my husband a year (or so) ago, but I don’t think he made much progress. The Luminaries is still sitting (3 Christmases on) unopened by my bedside. Ah! I’ve just remembered, I’m not going to lie on a beach – problem solved.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Trump has written more than one, Hilary, I’m sad to report, all about himself. So you have quite the choice there, I’m afraid. The Luminaries sounds like a great book to talk about bringing on holidays, but not going so far as to pack. I reckon you’re already sorted, no matter where you’re going – no Donalds required.
LikeLike
Well, you’re far too late with this post… I’ve already been on my summer holiday, and come back again. My holiday reading was… unsettling, and unplanned. I cant tell you about them, of course, because it really happened, and I really did read them. But if I was going on another summer holiday, and if I had to lie about what I was planning on reading, I’d say all the Shades of Grey, the daily international newspaper followed, by any self help manual I could get my hands on. That would do the trick. And if returning to Ireland’s alternative greyness wasn’t enough to depress me, the reading matter certainly would. Especially if it was award winning. Or ranked as a best seller. By the author. I look forward to hearing your holiday reading story. Happy Holidays!
LikeLike
Thanks Ali. Seems you have all the bases covered there. Trash, terror, and trickery. I hope you read something better in real life to cope with what you returned to…
LikeLike
Reblogged this on Skorn.
LikeLike
The Iliad and The Odyssey. Obviously. War and Peace. I’ll bring Beowulf along for light, beach reading. For some contemporary reads, All the Light We Cannot See and Station Eleven. Because. Literary.
LikeLike
I don’t know, Sarah. Do you not these titles are a bit… well…. popular? I mean, how embarrassing would it be if you were on the beach beside someone else reading Beowulf? Although, the Instagram pics would probably get good hits. I like your literary picks. I should have had them on the list. Especially All The Light We Cannot See. I kept feeling every few pages like he was shouting THIS IS A DESCRIPTIVE PIECE NOW. SEE HOW I DISPENSE WITH VERBS AND SUBJECTS TO COMMUNICATE DISLOCATION AND LOSS. CHRIST I’M CLEVER.
LikeLike
My family are so sad they are impressed by the mere look of me reading…any book. I was watching child genius tonight and one child, aged 9, claimed she reads 40 books per month. Her favourites are shakespeare. Her record speed is 12 pages per minute. My daughter, aged 18, commented, ‘I think I read the lion the witch and the wardrobe when I was 9. In the whole year, I added, before I reminded her that it was in fact, I, who read it to her.
Sigh. I read once it is the thing most lied about, what we like to read as opposed to what we really read.
The one thing I will definitely take from this post is ‘an award for Arsery.’ It’s like a daily prompt. I so want to use that in a post.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Please feel free to use that, Tric, I wouldn’t dare to keep a lid on Arsery with so much of it surrounding us these days. That poor kid, loving Shakespeare at 9! Shakespeare wouldn’t have loved Shakespeare at the age of 9. I hope she gets to have a childhood before it’s too late. Otherwise university is going to be front page news.
LikeLiked by 1 person