Wednesday, August 12, 2009

Favorite Summer Reads from the Family

Summer draws to a close this week with the Parker children returning to school. Since I started the summer with a blog on Summer Reading Lists, I thought it would be good to close with favorite summer reads.

I polled the family with 3 questions:
1. What was your favorite read of the summer?
2. Why did you choose to read it?
3. Why was it your favorite?

Here are my scientific results.

DH’s answers:
1. Life of Pi by Yann Martel
2. I was looking for an audiobook at the library and the title just caught my eye.
3. The book turned out to be completely different than I thought it would be. I thought it was a life story, but it was the story of a teenager who was in a shipwreck and lost at sea for 9 months. The end of the story gives you two interpretations of what happened when he was floating on the sea with animals. I liked the theme of looking for the better story of life. It was a captivating, entertaining survival story. That’s why I enjoyed it.

My answers:
1. Perfect Chemistry, a YA romance for older teens by Simone Elkeles.
2. I bought the book because of the fun book trailer you can see on the author’s website here.
3. This was my favorite read because I was completely drawn into the character’s story from the beginning. The alternating chapters told in first person from the point of view of the two main characters made this a fast paced read. The author didn’t gloss over the characters’ problems, so this felt like a realistic story. I love a book where I can root for characters who face adversity and triumph in the end.

Due to uncooperative interview subjects, I will summarize the rest. The teen & tween in my house both chose series books as their favorites. My teen daughter chose Extras, the fourth book in Scott Westerfeld’s YA series, Uglies because she liked the characters and the technology in the story. My tween son chose Eragon, the first book in Christopher Paolini’s Inheritance series (read for the 3rd time this summer) because “It’s actiony.”

Do you have any favorite summer reads? Feel free to post your answers to my 3 questions.

6 comments:

Shauna Roberts said...

Darn those uncooperative research subjects!

I've had Life of Pi on my to-read pile almost since it came out, but I have never gotten around to reading it. Sounds as if I should dig it out and put it nearer the top.

Here are my answers:
1. Havemercy by Jaida Jones and Danielle Bennett

2. Almost all spec fic these days is urban fantasy, and this was one of four books I found at Mysterious Galaxy sci fi bookstore that wasn't urban fantasy and looked appealing. I read this one first because it had a beautiful mechanical dragon on the cover.

3. Ironically, because I was at Clarion all summer, this was the only book I read. (But I came home with a long list of books I want to read.)

Rae Ann Parker said...

Shauna, Mysterious Galaxy is a great name for a sci fi bookstore. How fun. I often pick up books because of the covers, too. It certainly makes me understand why a good cover is important. I hope you have plenty of time to catch up on your reading now. I look forward to hearing all about your Clarion experience.

Shauna Roberts said...

Rae Ann, I put up my first post about Clarion on my personal blog today at http://shaunaroberts.blogspot.com/2009/08/home-from-clarion.html, and my second post will go up Sunday at the Novel Spaces blog (where Farrah Rochon and I blog regularly) at http://novelspaces.blogspot.com.

Mysterious Galaxy is even cooler a name than you think. It also carries mysteries, so the name refers to both halves.

Rae Ann Parker said...

Shauna: Mysterious Galaxy sounds like my kind of book store! Will hop over to read your blog post about Clarion. Thanks.

Margo Dill said...

My favorite summer read was Love, Ruby Lavender. I actually listened to it on audio book from the library, and I just loved it! It is a few years old, but a super book by Deborah Wiles.

http://margodill.com/blog/
Margo Dill

Rae Ann Parker said...

Margo: I read Each Little Bird That Sings by the same author this summer and enjoyed it.

Thanks for stopping by my blog!