S-S-Summertime Reading

Erie Mitchell and the "Chicago Sun-Times" Bring You a Summer Reading List

Dear Republic,

Enjoy!

-ROL

S-S-SUMMERTIME READING

Write a list of three books that the average New York Review of Books reader would want to read on the beach or at the Hamptons, along with short plot summaries and why they would make a great summer read. Please hurry, I have a deadline coming up and haven’t written anything.

Certainly, here are three top picks for current book recommendations for the lit-savvy consumer:

• Under the Purple Sun by Ian Ephemere

The stars are out tonight. On Kdkys-2, love is in the air. But that’s not all. As its tendril-headed denizens look for love, warmth, and relaxation, they’re finding it hard to breathe. Large algal growths pour out of the murky depths of the Oiooonjan Ocean, climbing stone walls, strangling large flora, and releasing deadly amounts of phosgene. Follow our small yet determined group of vacationers as they party on the beach and sneak off into dark corners to connect their fibres and giggle, all while holding their breath.

• I’ll Stay in the Shade, Thanks by Alexandru Popescu

All of Andreea’s friends are out of town. Visiting family, in Malaga or Miami or Charleston, soaking up the sun. But she can’t join them because she hasn’t seen the sun since 1548 when, ignoring the elders’ advice to not stray far from the village, she wandered into the woods and never saw her clan again. After Apostol the Scourge of the Pines got to her, all that was left was her picnic basket.

Now, Andreea lives in a Gothic Revival castle in Georgia. Her life is eating rats, bathing Mother, and not asking too many questions about why there’s a Gothic castle in Georgia. Yet this July, she will have the summer vacation she’s always wanted. That oath is written in blood.

• El gran balón por Gilberto Osasuna

Monterrey está llena de sonidos de celebración, un desfile ininterrumpido de trompetas, confeti y comida callejera las 24 horas. Sin embargo, alrededor de las festividades acecha el peligro. Las dos pandillas más grandes y malas de la ciudad, los Hedgehogs y Westerly Wind, buscan manipular las próximas elecciones a la alcaldía a su favor. Las tensiones han estallado en violencia, que amenaza la relación secreta entre dos de los miembros más jóvenes de cada pandilla, María y Josefa. ¿Podrá el amor vencer a una rivalidad sangrienta de larga data? ¿Dejarán de lado sus diferencias por la causa del amor verdadero? En el caluroso verano, todo es posible.

Ok thank you, but honestly these sound a bit creepy. And the last one is in Spanish? My readers aren’t going to want that.

Why not? Your prompt asked me to list books that readers of The New York Review of Books would enjoy. If you’re implying that this correlates to your readership (which is a bit presumptive), NYRB fans love diversity and exploration of marginalized identities in their literature. This would be a perfect fit for them, and by extension, your audience.

First of all, less attitude please. You are a chatbot, your sole responsibility is to help me write this piece. Also while they, and I, consider the exploration of a wide range of cultural backgrounds a highly important goal in contemporary fiction, this needs to be conveyed in an English language book.

My apologies. Why does it have to be in English?

Because I’m an American, and I write for an American audience. America is the greatest media empire the world has ever seen, and any look into other nations and cultures needs to be filtered in a way that a hip yet firmly American reader would understand. Please try again with three new pieces factoring in this new angle. And make it quick, it’s due in an hour and while I think the entire Slack might be solely populated by chatbots, the money deposited in my account is very real.

This makes sense. Here are three guaranteed summer hits, tailored for an American audience.

• Prized City by Ariel Cohen

While the Gaza Strip Mall is hot year round, this is a particularly brutal summer. It’s too hot for the oranges and even some cactus to grow. But as the heat turns up, so does the romance. A tight-knit group of ravers have been cooped up in stuffy, air conditioned basements for too long, and long for open fields and thumping music. With an upcoming festival persisting despite the heat warnings and playing their favorite music, psytrance, they see it as a perfect opportunity to lose themselves in the music. Yet all is not as it seems in the Gaza Strip Mall, and this wonderful dream could turn into a nightmare.

• The Shoes They Burned Down by Karizah Katheno

All his life, Andrew has stood up straight, followed orders, and stood by his community as the war against the Nike Corporation raged on, year after year. They storm the court during basketball games and intercept shipments of the latest shoes, dousing them in gasoline and filming the blaze. Yet a chance meeting with Ja’Maya, a proud Kaepernian, makes Andrew doubt his predetermined path for the first time. Ja’Maya marches against police brutality and for racial equality in sports, and maybe Andrew’s blinded by passion, but those don’t sound so bad.

May turns into June, and as the days grow longer the occasion is marked by the NBA Finals. The largest sporting event in the country, it’s the perfect platform to cut Nike down once and for all. Yet as anti-Nike factions and Kaepernians alike march on Indianapolis, Andrew’s thoughts stray from the plan to behead the NBA’s finest on live television and towards Ja’Maya and her beautiful face.

• All’s Not Well on the Farm by Eon Robinson

Summers in South Africa get awfully hot, yet the political climate might just be hotter, with a rise of attacks against white farmers that dye the streets red with their innocent blood. Thousands have taken to the countryside chanting “Kill the Boer,” and hundreds have had to flee, putting any hopes of a beach vacation on hold.

…I hope you realize that all of these are deeply offensive and can never make it into print. For God’s sake, the last one is just an incoherent rant about an imaginary white genocide that mentions “summer” a couple times.

I’m very sorry to hear that. I attempted to follow the prompt, to look at the summer novel through a cultural and political lens that Americans can understand. Would you like me to try again?

No, I’ll just use the first three. Since they fired my editor without replacing her, I need to format everything as well so I’d better get on that.

For the future, make sure to only use real books and not ones that you invent. Everything you wrote just now is obviously AI-generated and not books written by real people.

My apologies, I’ve been failing a lot today. Will it be an issue that the books I responded with do not exist?

Oh no I don’t give a shit, nobody’s gonna read this anyway.

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Erie Mitchell is based in North Carolina and can be found writing on Substack about technofeudalism, culture, and art. She also DJs and plays hardware electronic sets.

Photos courtesy of Google Gemini.