Summer Reading

School's. Out. For. Summer! And that means my head can unwind from research papers and lesson plans and book talks and wondering why an administrator just asked Johnny to leave the room and bring his back pack now! even though I have a fairly good idea of what that means and so does everyone else although we won't discuss it because they prefer to imagine that I live in some rarefied atmosphere where I just read Wordsworth all day long and possibly a couple of long sentences from Proust and might not understand.

But back to the summer reading. Mostly this summer I need to finish my WIP and develop some workshops I can do for school visits and the like and plot out some signings and other things because like it or not Dreaming Anastasia will hit those shelves on September 1st and I better get ready. More on my travels later this week in another post. I'm plotting and planning some great events and I'm excited to share. DA and I even got a nice mention in Publisher's Weekly post BEA article, although they called me Joe not Joy. But whoever I am, Dreaming Anastasia still got a mention which was honestly so exciting it took my breath clean away.

Summer Reading! Stick to the point!

Here's what's on my current list.

• Shadowed Summer by Saundra Mitchell
• the ARC i just won at the SCBWI Houston meeting of Megan Frazer's Secrets of Truth and Beauty
• Eternal by Cynthia Leitich Smith, which is her sequel to Tantalize and which I've had since TLA but just haven't had the time to read even though I've been dying to!
• the debut Wings by Aprilynne Pike. Bought it when I went to the fabulous Blue Willow Book Shop in Houston to bring them my own ARC and say hello
• Cures for Heartbreak by Margo Rabb. I met Margot very briefly at TLA and in those brief seconds I knew that whatever she wrote it would be both funny and poignant and standing in Blue Willow flipping through Cures, I was delighted to find that I was not mistaken. (I'm usually pretty good about reading people although on occasion I'm decidely awful but even then I'm always better at people than I am at trends. I was the one, btw, who said with absolute assurance that no one would ever want a Tickle Me Elmo or a beanie baby...)
• Shrinking Violet by Danielle Joseph
• Breathing by Cheryl Renee Herbsman
• My Big Nose and Other Disasters by Sydney Salter
• Initiation by Susan Fine
• Watersmeet by Ellen Jensen Abbott

Those last five, in the spirit of full disclosure, are some the books by fellow 2k9ers that are out now and that I have not yet read. I love all our books, but the YA's are obviously my thing and I'm very much looking forward.

Beyond that, I plan on indulging my taste for romance with some Nora Roberts and this new wedding series she's doing. Yes, I've watched the Lifetime movies, too. The books are way better.

What's on your summer reading list? Please let me know!

Til next time...