This afternoon I finished reading Father's Day by Philip Galanes. This is his first novel. Very well done for his first. The book was about a guy who goes through a year in his life after his father committed suicide. Throughout the story he goes back in time and tells stories of his childhood and young adulthood. These stories are told in the middle of current day stories about his mother, his dealing with his father's death, his dating experiences, and his addiction to sex chat phone lines. The anecdotes of the sex chat line are scary at times and remind me of when I was a slut and used to hook up a lot. However, the sex club experiences he talks about are alarming. It was a good book and it held my interest from beginning to end. I look forward to his next novel should there be one.

Next up is The Salt Point by Paul Russell. Earlier this year I read War Against The Animals by the same author and enjoyed it. The Barnes and Noble book review has this to say about The Salt Point:

“From the award-winning author of The Coming Storm comes the brilliantly conceived and precisely rendered novel The Salt Point, which explores the lives of four people-Anatole, Leigh, Chris, and Lydia-and their intermingled and unwinding desires. Set in a Poughkeepsie mall, the Main Street to a new generation, the novel follows these characters as they achieve their oddly triumphant lives redolent with loss and hope, humor and sadness, union and alienation. As promises are diminished and futures are abandoned, all four are hurtled toward that place in which everything is transmuted-the salt point.”

Not much to go on with that review. I'll read it anyway and of course give my opinion when I'm finished. I love being off in the summer. It allows me more time to read, which I love doing. Especially when I find books interesting enough to read. I've still got quite a stack on my night stand shelf to read. I'm sure by the end of the summer I will have read another 3 or 4 books. Reading takes you away from the world around you. I find myself living vicariously through these stories. If you aren't a reader, pick up a book and become one.