It's Monday 8/23! What Are You Reading?

Just returned from a weekend spent camping in the Catskills with my extended family.  It was good to see everyone, and the kids had a blast running around with their cousins all weekend (not much reading this weekend!).  Kind of a rough ending, though - packed up in the pouring rain on Sunday, then spent 9 hours driving home!!!  It should have taken about 5 hours - crazy traffic, road construction, plus the rain slowed things down to a crawl.  So, home now, with piles of sopping wet, muddy laundry and a filthy camper.  The A/C is out for the 6th time this summer - thank goodness it cooled down over the weekend - supposed to be in the 80's this week instead of the 90's.

With Jamie's birthday last week, plus camping preparation, we didn't do a lot of reading but squeezed in a bit:

• I finished Elvis and Olive by Stephanie Watson and posted a review.  I really enjoyed this sweet, funny middle-grade novel about two very different girls who become good friends and spend a summer spying.
• I started a novel my husband gave me for my birthday last month, The Little Book by Selden Edwards.  It's set in 1890's Vienna, with a main character who has somehow been transported there from 1988 San Francisco.  It's good so far with a very intriguing plot - I always enjoy time-travel novels.
• Sixteen-year old Jamie is reading a book we gave him for his birthday last week, Congo by Michael Crichton.  He enjoyed Crichton's Sphere this spring, and Congo is my all-time favorite Crichton book, about an ape who can communicate with sign language.  He's enjoying it very much so far.  It's fun sharing favorites with my kids!
• Twelve-year old Craig - who feels it's a complete waste of time to read during the summer - is still working on The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin for his assigned summer reading.  He does like it and says it's getting better and better - he'd just rather be outside running around!  He needs to finish it this week because school starts next Monday.
• My husband, Ken, finished The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson and started right in on The Girl Who Played with Fire.  He's loving this series!  My mom's husband, who we saw this weekend, is also reading the series on his Kindle, and I gave my sister The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo for her birthday this weekend.  A runaway family hit!
• Our never-ending trip home yesterday was made much more enjoyable by a new audio book, Boom! by Mark Haddon, the first kids' book by the author of the award-winning The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time (which Jamie, Ken, and I have all read).  It's a very funny middle-grade adventure book that kept us all laughing even in the midst of traffic.  We have just a little bit left to finish tonight (after 9 hours in the car, there was no way we were going to sit in the driveway and finish it last night no matter how good it was!)

And, last week, I gratefully accepted the Versatile Blogger Award and passed it along to five deserving bloggers, so please check them out!

What are you and your family reading this week?

(What are you reading Mondays is hosted by Sheila at Book Journey)