What I'm Reading This Month

As summer breathes its last gasp and the calendar turns to September, a new month of reading begins. When I read, I typically do two books a month that have some sort of shared theme or topic. For example, I focused on my birth state of Arizona last month by reading Kevin Fedarko's The Emerald Mile and Jeff Guinn's The Last Gunfight. Mile tells the story of a Grand Canyon river guide who uses a torrential runoff to slingshot his boat into the record books. Gunfight tries to discern myth from fact in a retelling of what really happened at the Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, most recently popularized in the 1993 film Tombstone. Because I finished a bit early, I managed to slip Robin Sloan's Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore under the wire as a free choice before the month's end.

This month, the theme is, more or less, bestseller fiction, starting with Gillian Flynn's mega bestseller Gone Girl from Crown. A wife goes missing and all signs point to the husband as the prime suspect. As he is scrutinized from nearly every angle, investigators realize this marriage was less than happy. I normally don't read books as dark as Gone Girl, but I'm anticipating the upcoming film version, set for release on October 3. I loved director David Fincher's work in "The Social Network" and "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button" and the cast for Gone Girl is stellar. The film, as with most fall releases, has Oscar buzz around it.

Later this month, I'll be delving into the world of Ready Player One by Ernest Cline, also from Crown. Set in a dystopian future, the book follows a man desperate to flee the real world for a virtual one, the OASIS. When inside, he stumbles upon a series of puzzles from the founder, who apparently has a penchant for 1980's references. The real and virtual worlds eventually collide. The book has been said to have elements of the Harry Potter series and The Matrix, so it's right up my alley. Most people I've talked to about the book rave about it and it has a 4.3 rating right now on Goodreads, so it's been well-received from a variety of readers.


What are you looking forward to reading this month?