Brightest Young Things

The heat is on and it is HIGH TIME to buy/borrow/steal some summer reading. And as every young (at heart) person with intellectual aspirations (see me avoiding labels here?) worth their salt
(Eggers (and this involves all Beleiver and McSweeny action too)-check, Foster-Wallace-check, Pynchon-check, some Didion as of last year-check....you know what I'm talking about here)
you need to keep abreast of the books that not only you can READ, but you can then TALK about (ad nauseum) on people's roofs and by pools and even over really, really, really loud speakers.

Well, this is why we are here, to guide you through the "must buy/must peruse/must drop like its hot" list.

On the cutting block: Miss July, Mr. Murakami, Sir Moody and...a Bush?
(disclaimer: all books were actually released in the last 2 weeks or so, naturally, it is unnatural to expect from us to have read them ALL, but we DID read about them all)

off we go:

Miranda July's "No One Belongs Here More Than You"
First off all, we don't even care about the book, we could read the website dedicated to it FOREVER AND EVER. (this already sounds bad, we know, but we double dare you to go to http://noonebelongsheremorethanyou.com/ and not become obsessed with it).
Loving Miranda July is like loving a poem: you either do or you don't. I have (even before the movie) long thought her a genius: performance art (plus: Learning to Love you More project), that movie, those Autumn DeWilde photos, the New Yorker essays, the Wholpin collaboration ("Are YOU the favorite person of anybody?") and now a (according to reviews: seemingly slight, but very, very charming, a gem of unconventional storytelling (etc.etc...) book of short stories. In pink and yellow, to be color coordinated with your summer shoes accordingly.

buy and read more about it here (if you can tear aware yourself from that book dedicated website to begin with)

Haruki Murakami's "After Dark"
If there is one thing we learned while researching this article it is that: EVERYONE HAS A WEBSITE. And writers have the coolest ones (check out Haruki's here). The Man that brought you (and your pensive boyfriend) "Norwegian Wood", "Wind Up Bird Chronicles" and most recently "Kafka on the Shore" returns with a "A short, sleek novel of encounters set in the witching hours of Tokyo between midnight and dawn.
Brief synopsis (tho you know that it will all turn into a metaphysical excercise now, don't you?) is: At its center are two sisters: Yuri, a fashion model sleeping her way into oblivion; and Mari, a young student soon led from solitary reading at an anonymous Denny's into lives radically alien to her own: those of a jazz trombonist who claims they've met before; a burly female “love hotel” manager and her maidstaff; and a Chinese prostitute savagely brutalized by a businessman. These “night people” are haunted by secrets and needs that draw them together more powerfully than the differing circumstances that might keep them apart, and it soon becomes clear that Yuri's slumber - mysteriously tied to the businessman plagued by the mark of his crime - will either restore or annihilate her..
I mean, we already bought it (estimated time of arrival reading time: optimistically: August)

buy and read more about it here

Rick Moody's "Right Livelihoods: 3 Novellas"
This book is SO new, it is not even out yet (release date: June 6th) but the man behind "The Ice Storm" (+ a "Beleiver" contributor, natch) and one of the most acute chroniclers of American (lack of) spirit is so high on our list of favorites we HAD to add him in here. The book tackles the post 9/11 paranoia, and features " hard-drinking xenophobe, and a mind-blowing drug that eases survivors in bombed-out Manhattan, plus some nasty office politics" making it officially the "important" (fiction)book to read this summer.

buy and read more about it here

Jenna Bush's "Ana's Story: A Journey of Hope"
Wait, whaaaaaaaaa? Ok, this, granted, is totally a gratuituous entry, but come on, come on... we LIVE in DC and Jenna is (sort of) a DC girl and Jenna (really) drinks, and Jenna even braved St-EX on one occasion (remember the "non-popped collar" request they had up last summer?) so, we HAD TO write about it.
Accordin to W.Post's "Reliable Source "A peek at the 296-page advance manuscript shows a strong narrative as Bush traces the life of a 17-year-old Panamanian girl living with HIV-AIDS(......) the president's daughter spent six months interviewing Ana, her family and others. Her story unfolds like a novel: Ana's parents die after battling AIDS, she is molested by an acquaintance, falls in love with a boy also infected with HIV, and gives birth to a daughter at age 16".
Which sort of makes it as heavy handed as some of the books listed above (but with a seriously inferior graphic designer working the cover) and MORE IMPORTANTLY, sends her on the Book campaign trail, allowing for all sorts of "fun Jenna spottings" along the East Coast (NYC Book Fair, Broadway shows, Hanging out with Elmos?... check out the fun Wonkette has with it, since we probably could not do it better ourselves).

So there, if you want to buy or read more about this book, just google it, we are sure its all over the interwebs.

EN.TO.THE.JOY.
and don't forget the sunscreen.