July 2022 Reading

I still don’t know why I read less during the summer than any other time of year, but it’s true.  This month, I read six books, all fiction.  Four are in the picture because two were audio books.

 

The audio books were The Two Towers and The Return of the King by J.R.R. Tolkien (read by Rob Ingliss).  As I said last month, it had been a long time since I read through the books.  I still like them a lot, but I found the sexism and racism irritating.

 

Circe by Madeline Miller tackles issues of power and humanity and sex via an imaginative retelling of the mythic material from Circe’s perspective.  The writing is lovely and the story is engrossing, if occasionally brutal.  I highly recommend it.

 

It’s always a treat to find out that a writer I like has another series I haven’t read yet.  A Bird in the Hand is the first of Ann Cleeves’s books about George and Molly Palmer-Jones.  It lacks some of the depth of her later work, but she is always a pleasure to read.

 

I continued to read along in the Veronica Speedwell mysteries by Deanna Raybourn, enjoying A Treacherous Curse.  Who doesn’t like a story about dastardly Egyptologists?  Veronica is tough and funny and sexy and wonderful.

 

Richard Powers won a Pulitzer for The Overstory and I understand why.  What a great book!  He weaves together multiple storylines into a deep and thought-provoking book about what it means to be alive, about the importance of the environment, and about the connections we make and break.

 

Month total: 6

Summer total to date:  10

Year to date:  61