What Our Readers Read

What Our Readers Read

(NOTE FROM THE EDITOR: Earlier, we asked readers to let us know what books captured their interest this summer, and a number sent us their recommendations. No slouches here — our readers take their summer reading seriously. Here's an overview of responses. Thanks to everyone. The pile of books next to my bed continues to get larger!)

Joyce Kinkead, vice provost for Undergraduate Studies and Research at Utah State, discovered Alexander McCall Smith's series that opens withLadies Detective Agency (reviewers call it "Miss Marple in Botswana"). Liking what she read, she continued with Tears of the Giraffe, listened during a cross country trip to Morality for Beautiful Girls and returned to book-in-hand for the fourth in the series, Kalahari Typing School for Men.

"These gentle reads feature Precious, an independent and independent-minded woman whose powers of observations help her solve mysteries and people's problems," Kinkead said. "Each book has been satisfying and takes me into a world I know little about, Africa, but the human problems evident in these novels are universal."

Col. Lawrence Larsen is serving in Operation Iraqi Freedom and proves the point that Utah State Today is read around the world. To gain a better historical perspective of the area, he is reading Ur of the Chaldees: A Revised and Updated Edition of Sir Leonard Woolley’s Excavations at Ur by P.R.S. Moorey (Cornell University Press. 1982.) Thanks to Dr. Larsen for responding, and we wish him well and a safe return.

Back on the Utah State campus, Chris Luecke, department head for Aquatic, Watershed and Earth Resources, sends this: "Richard Russo's novel Straight Manshould be required summer reading for all university administrators. It captures the spirit, nuttiness and creativity necessary in a state-supported institution during lean budget times."

Diane Jessen recommends Mutant Message Down Under. The book is the fictional account of the spiritual odyssey of an American woman in Australia.

As to your editor's summer reading — it covers a little of everything. I opened the summer with Gilded City by M. H. Dunlop. Next was Isaac’s Storm — The Drowning of Galveston by Eric Larson. (Lesson learned from that one: don't live on the Texas coast and the science of storm prediction has come a long way.) Next, in a tip of the hat to my former life in the arts, came Lillian Gish: Her Legend Her Life by Charles Affron. (Apparently age issues in the movie industry were with us from the beginning — in other words, don't ask a lady her age!) Another movie-theme book followed with The Book of Illusions by Paul Auster, and then a no-brainer-beach-read (although I didn't go to the beach) in Tawni O'Dell's Back Roads, a book that could make just about anyone feel good about their family life. After that last one it was on to In Stalin's Secret Service by W. G. Krivitsky. Now I'm just beginning The Three Roosevelts by James MacGregor Burns and Susan Dunn.

And with that, it's time to say summer is over, school's begun and it's time to leave the reading to the students. Hit those textbooks!