Trust & Obey

It may already be the end of June, but I have created a summer reading list and I am going to attempt to knock out as many books as possible before school starts! I am leaving August 19th, so I have to try to cram all of these books in.

I call this a Smart Girl Summer reading list because, many girls will talk about a “hot girls summer” and I’m not about that life! I like chilling in my house hunched over my computer reading articles or hunched in a chair in the living room reading books. I actually don’t really like the beach or the pool! So reading books is a good summer for me. Okay, now that I have introduced you to my Smart Girl Summer reading list, here are five books that I am really excited to read from the list:

In Order to Live by Yeonmi Park

I usually am disinterested by autobiographies but this one got my attention after hearing Park’s interview on Fox News recently. Park escaped North Korea with her mother and they trekked through the Gobi Dessert and were even sold into sex slavery before making it to the United States. This young woman is truly inspirational! She was so intelligent and well spoken in the interview that I wanted to hear more about her story in detail. So, I now have her book coming in the mail!

Outdated by Jonathan “JP” Pokluda

I really haven’t read a dating book in years ever since I read I Kissed Dating Goodbye by Joshua Harris. That book somewhat burned me out on self-help Christian dating books because they just feel so unrealistic to me. The idea that you just “don’t date” is possible in some arenas like high school relationships where you can have the significant other be with you and your family. This would be done instead of the classic dating relationship. However, what happens when you head out to college? Things get trickier. With all of this in mind, my hope with this book is it will bring good insights to dating and create stronger standards.

1984 by George Orwell

It’s a classic that’s been discussed a lot lately in politics. Some say that we’re in a 1984 kind of world, others vehemently disagree. Well, this summer I would like to find out for myself and draw my own conclusions regarding this statements.

Brave New World by Aldous Huxley

According to Rod Dreher, the author of Live Not By Lies, we are living even more so in a Brave New World and I thought that was a very interesting idea. I really new very little about Aldous Huxley’s work because no one really talks about it. To give a brief idea of what this book is, Brave New World is set in a dystopian future where people are birthed in artificial wombs and are programmed to obey the government without hesitation. One person of this society decided to shake things up a bit which causes chaos for him.

The Cellar by Natasha Preston

I really disliked The Lost by Preston. Nevertheless, I am wanting to try one more book by her because even if one book was rough, doesn’t mean that all of her books won’t be my cup of tea. My hope is that this one will be good! This book definitely falls under the horror/thriller genre and I though it would be a good one to through into the mix. The Cellar tells the story of a girl who gets kidnapped by a man who renames her Lily and his other prisoners flower names. These girls become the abuctor’s flowers but they don’t want to be. So, they plot their escape.

Besides these five books, I have five more on the list that I didn’t have enough time to go into but you should absolutely check them out!

Not all of these books may be your cup of tea. I really tried to branch out this summer with a few biographical-type books. We’ll see how it goes! A lot of these are non-fiction and typically I prefer fiction over the former because I enjoy taking a break from the craziness of my life. This summer, though, I would really like to learn and grow hence why I call it the “smart” girl summer reading list and not just a summer reading list!

Do any of these books interest you? What books are you reading this summer? Tell me all about it in the comments!