When a college professor is recommending these books for summer reading, you know you’ve got a problem (for the record, I’d be saying the same thing if he was recommending Stupid White Men and the DaVinci Code). For those attending the University of North Carolina at Wilmington, I’d recommend avoing Adams’ class, unless you’d rather read second-rate right-wing conspiracy-lit than anything worthwhile.
For what it’s worth, if I were a college professor suggesting some good summer reading, my list would go something like this:
Midnight’s Children and/or The Satanic Verses by Salman Rushdie
Skinny Legs and All by Tom Robbins
The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath
Zami: A New Spelling of My Name by Audre Lorde
White Noise by Don Delillo
The New York Trilogy by Paul Auster
Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami
Women, Race and Class by Angela Y. Davis
Against Love: A Polemic by Laura Kipnis
Interpretor of the Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri
Ragtime by E.L. Doctorow
Old School by Tobias Wolff
Backlash by Susan Faludi
American Pastoral and/or Portnoy’s Complaint by Philip Roth
Beloved by Toni Morrison
The Color Purple by Alice Walker
There are a million others, but I’ll stop while I’m ahead.
Add your suggestions in the comments.