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Summertime means schedules often get tossed up in the air as people head on vacation, work different hours, and in many parts of the country spend time at leisure activities not available at other times during the year. We also layered in an office move --- our first in 21(!) years, which brought with it a ton of details (phones, copier, mail) that required my attention. Whew! So glad that is behind us.

Though the days were long, I still read each morning and evening, but not as much as I would have liked. Remember when you were a child, they would say, “As part of your homework, read for pleasure for 30 minutes.” I felt like I was on that schedule, but was always bargaining with myself for “five more minutes.” I was wishing that DEAR (“Drop Everything and Read”) was part of the adult lexicon.

While it used to be a fact that book groups did not meet during the summer, we are hearing from more and more readers that summer does not affect their meeting plans. We also hear from others who, like my mom, join a book group where they vacation over the summer. Many resort communities schedule author events to bring readers together, knowing that they have a captive audience on vacation. When I was at the Avalon Free Public Library two weeks ago, I kicked off their Summer Reading Series where they will be bringing in authors on Wednesday evenings, including Daniel Silva and Meg Donohue. Above is a photo of me at that event, with Erin Brown from their staff (on the left) and some local avid readers, who are all Bookreporter.com and ReadingGroupGuides.com readers.