What Melissa Chadburn is reading this summer:

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An oldie but goodie that I can’t wait to return to this summer:

THEM by Joyce Carol Oates

Because it’s sprawling and epic and takes it’s time and the tone of it all feels like the hottest day I ever had in Shreveport Louisiana, where the bugs gave me blisters and time passed like molasses and sometimes you want books in summer to never end like that –it’s an infinity book

One that’s been out for awhile that I look forward to cracking open for the first time:

A HUNDRED DEMONS by Lynda Barry (Sasquatch Books, 2005)

Because I can’t believe I haven’t done it yet and because Lynda Barry makes me feel safe to be me and reminds me the why of it all—that it’s fun and life affirming and an act of love.

One I’ve read recently that is perfect perfect for the beach:

THE BEAUTIFUL RUINS by Jess Walter (Harper Perennial, 2013)

Because half the time you’ll marvel at the thing, how the hell is he doing this you’ll say with it’s mind bending structure with it’s POV twists and turns, it’s trans genreness. Then other times an honest passage like,

“This is a love story, Michael Deane says.  But, really, what isn’t? Doesn’t the detective love the mystery, or the chase, or the nosy female reporter, who is even now being held against her wishes at an empty warehouse on the waterfront? Surely the serial murderer loves his victims, and the spy loves his gadgets or his country or the exotic counterspy. The ice trucker is torn between his love for ice and truck, and the competing chefs go crazy for scallops, and the pawnshop guys adore their junk, just as the Housewives live for catching glimpses of their own Botoxed brows in gilded hall mirrors, and the rocked-out dude on ‘roids totally wants to shred the ass of the tramp-tatted girl on Hookbook, and because this is reality, they are all in love—madly, truly—with the body mic clipped to their back buckle, and the producer casually suggesting just one more angle, one more Jell-O shot. And the robot loves his master, alien loves his saucer, Superman loves Lois, Lex, and Lana, Luke loves Leia (till he finds out she’s his sister), and the exorcist loves the demon even as he leaps out the window with it, in full sorrowful embrace, as Leo loves Kate and they both love the sinking ship, and the shark—God, the shark loves to eat, which is what the mafioso loves, too—eating and money and Paulie and omertia—the way the cowboy loves his horse, loves the corseted girl behind the piano bar, and sometimes loves the other cowboy, as the vampire loves night and neck, and the zombie—don’t even start with the zombie, sentimental fool; has anyone ever been more lovesick than a zombie, that pale, dull metaphor for love, all animal craving and lurching, outstretched arms, his very existence a sonnet about how much he wants those brains? This too is a love story. “

— these passages get you to throw down the microscope and pick up the mirror. Oh it’s me he’s talking to. Me. Me. Me. READ MORE >