Beach Reads and Not-So-Beachy Reads

Jeff and I recently returned from a wonderfully relaxing trip to Hilton Head Island.  There was lots of great reading with a cocktail by the pool time, so I got quite a bit of reading done.  I'm happy to share some recommendations with you and as always, would love to hear what you've been reading!

​Maybe in Another Life by Taylor Jenkins Reid
I’m a sucker for novels and movies that present various outcomes for people if they had made different choices at various points in their life.  Sliding Doors with Gwenyth Paltrow comes to mind, and I hear that this is the concept behind Jodi Picoult’s new books as well.  For some reason Maybe in Another Life languished on my TBR list for years but I finally put it on my phone and flew through it.  My expectations were low, but it blew me away AND the author made a thought-provoking point with how she wrapped the stories up.  I recommend this if you’re looking for something on the lighter side but well-written and romantic but not cheesy.

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​The Forgotten Foundations of Fundraising:  Practical Advice and Contrarian Wisdom for Nonprofit Leaders by Jeremy Beer
I love contrarian wisdom!  This was actually my favorite fundraising book that I’ve read so far in my career, because it is hilarious and smart and feeds my ego (hey, I’m doing a few things right!), plus it tends to shoot down highly educated and experienced fundraisers and their best practices (hey wait!).  I take issue with a couple of their suggestions (a SIX PAGE fundraising letter!?!?) but they’ve got this book full of tons of solid examples that really illustrate their points as opposed to just filling space.  If you ever have to raise money for anything, read it.

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​The Swans of Fifth Avenue by Melanie Benjamin
This was one of my two main books that I read while vacationing in Hilton Head last week and it was *perfect* as a beach read for me – meaningful but not too heavy and so much fun with all of the glamour and gossip.  It read like a novel with a crazy cast of characters, but guess what?  Those characters were real and had me googling almost as much as I was reading!  Lately I’ve had the pleasure of reading a few books that have really reminded me why I love reading so much in the first place and this was definitely one of them.  I will definitely be reading more by this author.

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​Hamnet by Maggie O’Farrell
This was our book club book and we were overall a little divided on how we felt about it.  I’m even pretty conflicted.  This was my other book that I finished up on vacation and it was definitely NOT a beach read.  It was a heavy and sad character novel but yet still a page-turner for some reason, which I believe has everything to do with O’Farrell’s amazing storytelling.  

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Shine Shine Shine by Lydia Netzer
This novel about a bald woman and her husband and son who are on the autism spectrum certainly had a lot of potential, but it just didn’t hit me.  The woman’s life is a hot mess and she’s trying to keep it all together, which – that’s all of us, to some extent.  And yet, I found it really hard to relate to her or even care about what happened next.  I could see how others might consider this a thought-provoking read, but it was just out of reach for me.

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Next up:  I'm working my way through a 1200 pager that covers the whole world AND I just started our October book club book - a Stephen King!