CL Summer Reading List: Top Books Every Classy Co-Ed Needs

What is there to do this summer besides lying out in the sun, working part-time, and sleeping?  That’s simple, picking up a good book and reading.  With all the new releases out there, you might be asking yourself ‘What book(s) should I read?’  Let me help.  If there is one thing I know, it’s how to pick a great book.

Here are a few of my recent favorites that I’m sure any classy co-ed will enjoy:

Everyone Worth Knowing

Summary – When Bette Robinson quits her Manhattan banking job like the impulsive girl she’s never been, she knows she won’t miss the 80-hour workweeks, her claustrophobic cubicle, or her revolting boss. But soon the novelty of walking her four-pound dog around her unglamorous Murray Hill neighborhood wears as thin as the “What Are You Going to Do With Your Life?” phone calls from her parents.

Then Bette meets Kelly, head of Manhattan’s hottest PR firm, and suddenly she has a brand-new job where the primary requirement is to see and be seen inside the VIP rooms of the city’s most exclusive nightclubs. Bette learns not to blink at the famous faces, the black Amex cards, or the ruthless paparazzi. Soon she’s dating an infamous playboy—and scaring off the one decent guy she meets. Still, how can she complain about a job that pays her to party? But when Bette begins appearing in a vicious new gossip column, she realizes that the line between her personal and professional life is. . . invisible.

Everyone Worth Knowing has been one of the best books I’ve ever read, and now one of my favorites.  The book covers every emotion a person feels when going through change, love and friendship. I bought my copy in France while I was studying aboard, and once I finished it, both of my roommates read it – and loved it!  I would recommend this book to anyone!

Lucia, Lucia

Summary - Set in the glittering, vibrant New York City of 1950, Lucia, Lucia is the enthralling story of a passionate, determined young woman whose decision to follow her heart changes her life forever. Lucia Sartori is the beautiful twenty-five-year-old daughter of a prosperous Italian grocer in Greenwich Village.

The postwar boom is ripe with opportunities for talented girls with ambition, and Lucia becomes an apprentice to an up-and-coming designer at chic B. Altman’s department store on Fifth Avenue. Engaged to her childhood sweetheart, the steadfast Dante DeMartino, Lucia is torn when she meets a handsome stranger who promises a life of uptown luxury that career girls like her only read about in the society pages. Forced to choose between duty to her family and her own dreams, Lucia finds herself in the midst of a sizzling scandal in which secrets are revealed, her beloved career is jeopardized, and the Sartoris’ honor is tested.

Lucia, Lucia was another novel that I just could not put down.  It is full of fashion, success, romance, and betrayal.  This is another one that I would recommend to anyone.

One to Pick Up:

I have not yet read The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake, but I have read many great reviews on it.  As soon as I finish my current read I will be picking up a copy for myself.

Here are a few reviews on the novel to help you decide if this is your next summer read:

“Odd and oddly beautiful….moving” (The Washington Post)

“The fairy-tale elements in her writing, far from seeming outlandish, highlight the everyday nature of her characters’ flaws and struggles. In Ms. Bender’s stories and novels, relationships and mundane activities take on mythic qualities.” (Wall Street Journal)

“wacky stew of alienation and contradiction….unraveling family secrets as strangely lucid as they are nightmarish. At its core, Aimee Bender’s novel The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake encourages us all to make the most of our unique gifts while still finding a way to live in the so-called real world” (O, The Oprah Magazine)

The Particular Sadness of Lemon Cake

Summary – On the eve of her ninth birthday, unassuming Rose Edelstein, a girl at the periphery of schoolyard games and her distracted parents’ attention, bites into her mother’s homemade lemon-chocolate cake and discovers she has a magical gift: she can taste her mother’s emotions in the cake. She discovers this gift to her horror, for her mother—her cheerful, good-with-crafts, can-do mother—tastes of despair and desperation.

Suddenly, and for the rest of her life, food becomes a peril and a threat to Rose. The curse her gift has bestowed is the secret knowledge all families keep hidden—her mother’s life outside the home, her father’s detachment, her brother’s clash with the world. Yet as Rose grows up she learns to harness her gift and becomes aware that there are secrets even her taste buds cannot discern.

If you are looking for another book to read, check out Kaitlyn’s post about the upcoming Cassandra Clare novel Clockwork Angel

Samantha Crotty is an intern with College Lifestyles.  She is a Communication/Print Media student at Western Carolina University.  She absolutely loves cuddling up in bed and re-reading all of her favorite books, especially P.S. I Love You.