"As a part of the African American Association/Women On A Mission Buddy Reading program, I will be reading You Can Find A Way, by Patrick Mahony. Each member in the program chooses a book, and I buddy up with each one to read it. The book is the second in the program; The Four Agreements, by Don Miquel Ruiz was the first. Outside of a few other books in the program, I will be reading a lot of baby and parenting books as my wife is expecting in November."---Michael Moton, TRIO Programs, Opportunity Scholars Program, Union


"Summer at Tiffany, by Marjorie Hart, is a charming story of two Midwestern college girls making the journey to New York City to find summer jobs in 1945. When they find themselves employed as pages at Tiffany's for the summer, they realize their jobs will have more to offer than just the sparkle of diamonds. They learn life lessons, fall in love, cope with tragedy, have frequent celebrity sightings and experience life in a big city. This summer at Tiffany's will change their lives forever. I recommend Summer at Tiffany because it allows you to escape to a bygone era where elegance and charm were commonplace. It's an endearing story of two young women coming into their own while experiencing one of the greatest cities in the world and one of the greatest stores in the world. It's a fun, easy read that will keep you intrigued until the last page."---Jennifer Gessner, Carolina Alumni Association


"My recommendation is actually three books rather than one, but they are a quick, pleasant, and a rewarding read. They are the books by Ruth Reichl charting her growth from an awkward New York child to food critic of The New York Times. Each is filled with a joy for food and cooking, as well as insights into the process of growing up, discovering your passions, and moving through life. I just finished reading them in backward order and it seemed to make no difference in my enjoyment. The books are: Tender at the Bone: Growing Up at the Table; Comfort Me with Apples: More Adventures at the Table; and Garlic and Sapphires: The Secret Life of a Critic."---Lynn Robertson, McKissick Museum


"Pam Durban, a native of Aiken, is the author of So Far Back, which won the Lillian Smith Book Award in 2001. The novel explores the implications of a modern-day Charleston woman's discovery of an old diary that reveals expected truths about her family's history in the early 19th century. With a love affair, a hurricane, a ghost, and all the sights and flavors of Charleston, this beautifully written novel offers all the human drama, intrigue, and local color that one might want from a beach read. The descriptions of the city and depiction of Louisa's relationship with her aging mother are especially fine. But Durban is also a craftswoman with a feel for all the moral complexities of living in and loving the contemporary South. You'll want to read this finely tuned book again and again. Durban's other books include The Laughing Place and All Set About with Fever Trees. Her short story, "Soon," was selected by John Updike as one of the best American short stories of the 20th century."---Tara Powell, English and Institute for Southern Studies


"Here are my picks for early summer. My Latest Grievance, by Elinor Lipman, is written in first-person from the point of view of the teenage character, a young woman who is the daughter of two liberal professors who teach at a third rate women's college in the Northeast. The professors are house parents who live with their daughter in a dorm on the campus of fictional Dewing College. I am enjoying the perspective of a young person in deconstructing the politics and traditions in a higher education setting. The daughter of this pair of professors is both wise and funny. She thinks out loud in this novel. Then I'm on to Henning Mankell and his Kurt Wallander mystery series. I love this series. Mankell's books are translated from Swedish. They are slow reads, filled with suspense. I love the settings of this series; the landscape is so unlike my own world. I read more than 20 mysteries a year. These I savor. They are slow moving and filled with meticulous detail. If you read one, you will be hooked. I look forward to beginning my newest, One Step Behind."---Cynthia Colbert, art


"I hope to get to the following books this summer: Forever, by Pete Hamill, just a great story, and Somebody's Got to Say It, by Neal Boortz, a man who hammers everybody who has an agenda! And Clive Cussler has a new book out. I can't remember the name, but he is one of my favorite authors."---Charles (Bubba) Dorman, head baseball coach, Salkehatchie


"I'm reading Killing Mister Watson, by Peter Matthiessen. It's part of a three-book series set in the 10,000 Islands area of southern Florida around 1900. The novel is based on a real character who just couldn't shake his somewhat exaggerated reputation as a ruthless killer. I like reading books set in areas that I visit. I am planning to do some sea kayaking in that area in the next year or so, and it's fun to know some of the history, geography, and natural history of the area before I go. Last summer I went kayaking on the Kenai Peninsula in Alaska. I had read Bering, a biography of Vitus Bering, who had explored the Aleutian Islands and the southern coast of Alaska. It helps me make a connection to the area I'm traveling to."---Todd Scarlett, biology, Lancaster


"I'm reading Capitalism and Freedom, by Milton Friedman. I teach economics. What can I say?"---Jeff Wicker, athletic recruiter/fund raiser and adjunct professor, economics, Salkehatchie


"Having just finished my thesis, I'm inclined to now only read what can fit on the back of a cereal box. But, inspired by my wife, Lisa, a spirited reader who I'm convinced was born with a bookmark in her hand, I press on. I'm reading Desert Solitaire: A Season in the Wilderness, by Edward Abbey. It's about his time as a seasonal park ranger in Arches National Monument in Utah. Abbey's been called the 'Thoreau of the American West' and his descriptions and opinions on the stark, natural beauty of the environment put the reader right there. Will be reading next The Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck. His vivid story of the voiceless during the Great Depression illustrates timeless issues of equality and social justice. Hope to then get through The Inheritance of Loss, by Kiran Desai, a story about cultures pushed together by a shrinking world. On the lighter side, I can't wait to read J.R.R. Tolkein's new book, The Children of Hurin, which takes place before the Hobbit and the Trilogy series. Professionally, related to advertising, I'm reading What Sticks, by Rex Briggs and Greg Stuart. And I would not be true to my marketing pedigree if I didn't mention one last book coming out this summer, Global Health and Medicine (McGraw-Hill), since I wrote a chapter in it. It may be great beach reading, except for the part about parasites and vector-borne diseases!"---Gary Snyder, marketing and communications


"I plan to read Kidney for Sale by Owner: Human Organs, Transplantation, and the Market, by Mark J. Cherry. He contends that the market is indeed a legitimate--and humane--way to procure and distribute human organs. My list also includes Black Markets: The Supply and Demand of Body Parts, by Michele Goodwin. It's 'an interesting and provocative look at the brave new world of human organ and tissue donation and transplantation.' I also plan to read several novels by Dennis Lehane, the author of Mystic River."---Charles Reback, economics and finance, Upstate


"I am usually reading three or four books and alternate. Or, if I really have time, then I usually read the 'beach fare.' Like last week, when I was on vacation, I read Dorothy Benton Frank's Full of Grace in a day and a half. Otherwise, here's what is on my list for the remainder of the summer: The Yiddish Policeman's Union, by Michael Chabon; Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, by J.K. Rowling; Wicked, by Gregory Maguire; A Whole New Mind, by Daniel Pink; The Assault on Reason, by Al Gore; and Confessions of a Slacker Mom, by Muffy Mead Ferris."---Rachel Barnett, director of marketing and public relations, hospitality, retail, and sport management


"Since I'll be spending the summer with Shakespeare, my summer reading is really research, but I've saved Stephen Greenblatt's Will in the World and Marjorie Garber's Shakespeare After All for fun. Garber will keep me grounded in theme, plot, and character, while Greenblatt's speculation on the life of Shakespeare himself should be either illuminating or completely infuriating."---Mary L. Hjelm, English, Salkehatchie


"In one afternoon, I read I Love You, Beth Cooper (2007), by Larry Doyle, and I laughed out loud the entire time. Doyle is a former writer for The Simpsons, and he's written a hilarious novel that takes every teen comedy from Gidget through Sixteen Candles to the present and blends them together into a story that will appeal to anyone who felt any kind of anxiety in high school. On a more serious note, I am halfway through Don DeLillo's Falling Man (2007), a novel about a man who survives the 9/11/2001 World Trade Center attacks. DeLillo's descriptions of that day are amazingly vivid and effective, and the novel accurately captures the various moods, emotions, and opinions from the days and weeks that followed. Later in the summer, I plan to read Michael Chabon's new novel, The Yiddish Policemen's Union (2007), which combines speculative history and mystery in a story about a murder investigation in a fictional Jewish homeland located in Alaska."---Andrew Kunka, English, Sumter


"One book that should be on everyone's list for at least a skim through is Mountains Beyond Mountains, by Tracy Kidder. Dr. Paul Farmer is a fascinating physician and anthropologist who applies his skills to solving, and I mean solving, the health problems of the Haitians. Haiti's people are among the poorest and sickest on earth. The book does not dwell on their suffering but on the life of this remarkable man who has been greatly aided by benefactors from South Carolina."---Susan U. Holland, Carolina Piedmont Foundation, Upstate


"I read a lot of books, but here are some that I have enjoyed recently. My Life in France, by Julia Child with Alex Prud'homme, is Julia's autobiography and is filled with a rich texture of history and people who changed the world of food. Life with Picasso, by Francoise Gilot and Carlton Lake, offers fascinating insights into the most influential painter of the 20th century. The Judgment of Paris, by Ross King, is the newest in a series of historical nonfiction dealing with the advent of the impressionists and the politics of art. Others of interest in this group are Brunelleschi's Dome and Michelangelo and the Pope's Ceiling. For fun and fantasy, a must read is the Dresden Files, by Jim Butcher. The first of a multipart series is Storm Front, and the most recent is the ninth book, White Knight."---Loren Knapp, biological sciences

6/07