6
JUNE 22�29, 2022
FROM THE SHELF
CHECKING OUT THE
WORLD OF BOOKS
Reading list: Must-read books for summer 2022
By Moira Macdonald
The Seattle Times
Sure, you could be spending
these pre-summer days doing
outdoor activities — but wouldn’t
you rather be reading? For those
whose answer to that question
is an enthusiastic “yes,” here are
four new books worth staying
indoors for.
‘LOVE MARRIAGE’
BY MONICA ALI
This is one of those enchanting
books full of people making bad
decisions, but you fi nd yourself
rooting for them regardless. Ali,
previously a Booker Prize fi nalist
for “Brick Lane,” introduces us to
two small families: the Ghoramis,
consisting of India-born parents
Shaokat and Anisah and their
grown children Yasmin and Arif,
and the Sangsters, British national
and single mother Harriet and
her grown son Joe. Yasmin and
Joe are doctors (as is Shaokat),
engaged to be married as the
book begins, but Yasmin worries
about how her traditional parents
will react to Harriet, a well-known
and outspoken feminist writer.
She’s wise to have worried, as the
months before the wedding are
fi lled with pronouncements, misun-
derstandings, sexual missteps and
a gradual examination, by all of the
characters, of love and passion.
‘TRACY FLICK CAN’T WIN’
BY TOM PERROTTA
More than 20 years after the
1998 novel “Election” (made into
a darkly comic fi lm the following
year), Tracy Flick is back, and she’s
still bitter. The girl determined
to win the presidential election
at her high school no matter
what — because she deserved
it — is now a woman in her 40s
who hates vacations, struggles to
connect emotionally with oth-
ers (including her own daughter)
and has convinced herself that a
dark incident in her past means
nothing, because she’s moved on.
Now acting principal at a diff er-
ent high school, she believes that
she deserves the top job, but as in
high school, there are obstacles
in her path: scheming colleagues,
tedious committee assignments, a
parade of people simply unwilling
to recognize Tracy’s obvious worth.
It’s a book populated with middle-
aged people disappointed in what
life has brought — and yet, “Tracy
Flick Can’t Win” is an oddly uplifting
read. Perrotta’s great gift is that
he lets his love for his characters,
fl aws and all, shine through, and
Tracy emerges as a much richer,
more sympathetic character than
in the earlier book; she has grown,
as has her creator. I was rooting
hard for Tracy Flick to, fi nally, win.
‘THE WOMAN IN THE
LIBRARY’ BY SULARI
GENTILL
Of course I needed to include
a mystery in this mini-roundup,
and this one’s deliciously tricky
book-within-a-book-within-a-
book structure won me over
instantly. Australian author Gentill
clearly had some fun with mir-
rors while plotting her book out:
At its center is Freddie, a young
Australian woman in Boston on a
writing fellowship. She’s working
on a novel — and she’s actually
a heroine created by another
Australian writer named Han-
nah, who’s sending her chapters
to an American writer friend for
feedback (he’s named Leo, and
he’s also in Hannah’s book). Got
that? Anyway, Freddie and her
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Simon & Schuster
writer friends think they may have
overheard a murder in the reading
room at the Boston Public Library
— it is, notes Freddie, the oppo-
site of a locked-room mystery. In-
vestigations are launched, fi ngers
are pointed, potentially dangerous
liaisons unfold and I was turning
those pages like there was cake
at the fi nish line. And, hmm, what
exactly is going on with Leo?
‘LESSONS IN CHEMISTRY’
BY BONNIE GARMUS
Interesting that I was reading
Garmus’ delightful debut in the
same time period as watching
“Julia,” the new HBO series about
Julia Child: Both are stories set
in the 1960s, in which a woman
found an unexpectedly wide au-
dience as the star of a television
cooking show. But Elizabeth Zott,
Garmus’ unfl appable heroine, is
no cheerily lilting Child: She’s a
no-nonsense presence, a single
mother and a brilliant chemist
who lost her job in a research lab
because (so they said) she was
pregnant and unwed. Through
an unexpected series of cir-
cumstances, Elizabeth ends up
hosting the local cooking show
“Supper at Six,” where she fo-
cuses on the science of cooking
and on ahead-of-her-time female
empowerment. “She never
smiled. She never made jokes.
And her dishes were as honest
and down-to-earth as she was.”
It’s a novel full of dark moments,
and yet “Lessons in Chemistry”
feels richly funny. Elizabeth Zott
is a unique heroine, and you
fi nd yourself wishing she wasn’t
fi ctional: A lot of us — perhaps
even Julia Child — might have
enjoyed watching “Supper at
Six.”
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