In this post, the Liv Avenida Blog has five books for you to check out the next time you’re at the library. Summer is the perfect time for reading, especially in Arizona. You have more free time, it’s sweltering outside, and your apartment at the Liv Avenida is cool and air-conditioned. Might as well stay inside and read! Here are five classics we recommend picking up this summer.
The vibrant residents of Middlemarch muddle through life, love, money, inheritance, and loss in George Eliot’s classic. Fred Vincy must come up with the money to marry his childhood sweetheart; Dorothea Brooke must find a way to escape her dead husband’s restrictive will. Tertius Lydgate is all too willing to lose everything for love, and Nicholas Bulstrode has a dark past he’s desperately trying to hide. The lives of these characters intertwine and diverge in Middlemarch.
Pygmalion by George Bernard Shaw
Eliza Doolittle wants to become a girl in a flower shop; she’s tired of selling flowers on the street. Henry Higgins believes that he can turn an ordinary flower girl into a duchess. He takes on the task of turning Eliza into a true lady. Henry and Eliza clash over phonetics, class, and credit.
Peter and Wendy by J.M. Barrie
Peter Pan refuses to grow up. He offers to take Wendy and her brothers to Neverland. In Neverland, Wendy and her brothers meet Tinker Bell, Captain Hook, Tiger Lily, and Peter Pan’s crew of Lost Boys. Wendy acts as mother to the Lost Boys, and they all go on harrowing adventures together.
Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare
After finding herself shipwrecked in Illyria, Viola is employed by Duke Orsino to woo his sweetheart, Olivia. Viola is disguised as ‘Cesario’—unfortunately for the Duke, Olivia ends up falling for ‘Cesario.’ Meanwhile, Viola has fallen for Duke Orsino, and Olivia’s household has begun torturing her steward, Malvolio. This comedy will have you laughing all day long.
Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen
Catherine Morland is a voracious reader. Her favorite books are Gothic novels, but they tend to fuel her overly romantic, unrealistic notions. This complicates her relationship with love interest Henry Tilney, his sister Eleanor, and their father, General Tilney. She lets her romantic imagination run wild while visiting the Tilney’s home, Northanger Abbey.
What books are you planning to read this summer? Let us know in the comments!