So they say you should never judge a book by it’s cover, but should you judge a person by the book they read? No, because it’s reductive and slightly mean, but yes, because it’s completely juicy. So here’s my comprehensive list of summer books and what each one says about their reader.
Grey - EL James
It’s a truth universally acknowledged that a woman who is reading the latest Fifty Shades book has read the 3 entire Fifty Shades books preluding this one. And I just don’t think that’s OK. Sure I read the first one in an ironic, tongue-in-cheek way. Sure I was turned on, in an ironic, tongue-in-cheek way. Sure I went to the film with my friends and pretended to masturbate, in an ironic, tongue-in-cheek way, but I know where to draw a line (I now realise that was before pretending to cum loudly in the cinema). But anyone whose ‘Inner Goddess’ is still caught up in Christian Grey’s grey eyes or reads passages like 'Why don't you like to be touched?' ‘Because I'm 50 shades of fucked up, Anastasia.' with a straight face, is no friend of mine. immediately loses half her close friends.
How To Be a Woman - Caitlin Moran
Funny, inspiring and empowering. It’s also a reminder to the reader that having a ‘perfect beach bod’ is actually very un-PC so pass the calamari please.
The Secret - Rhonda Byrne
This self-help book reckons that positive thinking can create life changing results. Whoever is reading this is probably the type of person you knew at school who clogs up your Facebook feed with their (and I use the term loosely) 'inspirational' memes, written in Comic Sans. They might claim they’ve magically turned their life around, but in fact they’ve just retrained as driving instructor.
A Colouring Book
Speaking of doodles, and we are, last month five of Amazon’s top 10 best sellers were adult colouring books. This phenomenon has been attributed it being both nostalgic, as well as being a creative outlet to destress from modern life. A relaxing task like colouring means that (and here comes the science) the brain shifts down a gear from using beta brain waves that take a lot of energy to alpha brainwaves (and that’s where the science stops from me). So although on first glance it might seem odd to see a thirty something in with a pina colada in one hand and a felt tip in the other, she just finds colouring much nicer than bikram yoga, and she’s not wrong. Namaste.
The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
If you managed to swerve studying this novel at school then chances are you’ve still got to tick it off your bucket-reading list. And It’s a good one because it’s short but still holds a lot of clout. But be warned, often people take these classics as a kind of prop for the beach, something to go with their vintage-look one-piece or to place subtly in the right hand corner of their filtered-to-fuck instagram pic with the title ‘Today’s office’. To weed out the real Gatsby readers from the fakes, just check the spine of the book. You’ll probably find it’s not creased and there is a preferable magazine sitting just out of shot.
Deliciously Ella - Ella Woodward
I think there’s a time and a place for the healthy food movement and it's super-duper pretty representatives. And it’s definitely not whilst sitting on a plastic lounger by the sea, during your 45 minute window between brunch and pre-lunch snack at the all inclusive resort in Majorca. Anyone who’s reading this on their holiday is already planning their post holiday health kick and that's far too organised for our liking. Do them a favour and kick it into the sea.
How to Be Both- Ali Smith
Winner of the Bailey's Women's Prize For Fiction a few weeks ago, this book is the epitome of literary cool. Depending on which version of the book you pick up at random you will get a different one of the two stories first, which is always fun. It’s clever, complex and dazzling, any girl that’s reading this was probably on the Austerity march the other day rather than in Costa drooling over Kendall Jenner's Instagram.
Kindle
I mean, yes, it’s hard to judge a Kindle by it’s cover but lets just assume they’re reading the free erotic books you can download. It’s better that way.
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Picture: Ada Hamza
This article originally appeared on The Debrief.