Fiction
Summer holidays are the time when you can't procrastinate any longer about reading the stack of novels you've squirreled under your bed since Christmas. If you don't read them now, you might as well put them back under the bed and give them to somebody at Christmas who will read them. Recent highlights? Anil's Ghost, by Michael Ondaatje (Bloomsbury, £16.99) is set in his native Sri Lanka, and is being floated already as a Booker contender. If you're one of those who like to check out the form before the race proper gets started, you should definitely be reading this. Meanwhile Horse Heaven, Jane Smiley's ninth novel, (Faber and Faber, £9.99 in UK), breaks all the rules set out by fiction templates - and succeeds. Jockeys, trainers, owners et al figure in a novel that is essentially about the relationship between people and horses. Ben, In the World, by Doris Lessing (Flamingo, £16.99 in UK), is a sequel to Lessing's fine - and horrific - The Fifth Child, which came out in 1988: the dangerous child of that earlier novel is a young adult when we meet him again in the new one.
A Gesture Life, by Chang-Rae Lee (Granta, £16.99 in UK) is a slow-burning novel, about a Japanese man living in smalltown America, which unexpectedly bursts into flame. Ravelstein, by Saul Bellow (Viking, £16.99 in UK) proves that octagenarians can still come up with provocative books. The Married Man, by Edmund White (Chatto & Windus, £16.99 in UK) is compassionate and honest, documenting a gay relationship in a time of AIDS and dying. White Teeth, by Zadie Smith (Hamish Hamilton, £12.99 in UK) collected a sackful of rave reviews; although hot favourite, it missed the Orange Prize, but is nonetheless a rewarding take on what happens when two cultures collide in today's polyglot London. And Philip Roth fans won't, of course, go anywhere without his latest offering, The Human Stain (Jonathan Cape, £16.99 in UK).
More Bread Or I'll Appear, by an Irish writer who lives in the Big Apple, Emer Martin, (Allison & Busby, £9.99 in UK) is the slightly crazed and moving story of Irish siblings searching the world for their missing sister. No Drinking, No Dancing, No Doctors, by Martina Evans (Bloomsbury, £14.99 in UK) explores the unusual area of religious sects in early 20th-century Ireland, with unexpectedly rewarding results. The Little Hammer, by John Kelly (Cape, £10 in UK) looks at Donegal from the surreal perspective of its narrator. What Are You Like? by Anne Enright (Cape, £10 in UK) is the very unstraightforward story of twins separated at birth. The Keepers of Truth, by Michael Collins (Phoenix House, £9.99 in UK) won this year's Kerry Ingredients Book of the Year at Listowel. Set in America's deep South, it centres around a small town's response to the disappearance of a local farmer whose son is the number one suspect for his murder. Finally, Mary Morrissy's The Pretender (Jonathan Cape, £10 in UK) revolving around the woman who claimed to be the sole survivor of the Romanov massacre - Grand Duchess Anastasia - is a definite must and should also figure strongly as that Booker moment approaches.
On the popular fiction front, the Irish contingent as usual produced many gems this year including The Sky Writer by Terry Prone (Marino Books, £9.99 ). Or, if it's psychological thrills you're after, how about Julie Parson's The Courtship Gift (Townhouse, £6.99) in which a woman discovers that her husband's murder isn't the only shock in store for her...
Non-Fiction
Not everyone wants to escape into fictional worlds on holiday, preferring to explore the one they live in themselves in a bit more detail. Recent titles of note? The Consolations of Philosophy, by Alain de Botton (Hamish Hamilton, £14.99 in UK) will transform your little grey cells into bright exciting rooms. If you liked the TV series this was tied in to, the book is surely a must for you this summer. One Day in September, by Simon Reeve (Faber, £9.99 in UK) is the story behind this year's Oscar-winning documentary about the 1972 Munich Olympics, which began in hope and ended in sorrow after a Palestinian commando squad launched an attack on the Israeli delegation which ended with the deaths of 11 Israelis, five Palestinians and a German policeman. In the Heart of the Sea: the epic true story that inspired Moby Dick, by Nathaniel Philbrick (HarperCollins, £16.99 in UK) is one of those esoteric books that turn out to be as full of unexpected treasure as any shipwreck. If you loved Herman Melville's classic, this is the perfect follow-up.
The Construction of Dublin, by Frank McDonald (Gandon Editions, £25) is essential and timely reading for anyone concerned with the future of the capital . . . and no better man to tell it than McDonald. Also timely is the recent arrival of Refugees and Asylum Seekers in Ireland, by Paul Cullen (Cork University Press, £6.95). The Making of the Celtic Tiger: The inside story of Ireland's boom economy, by Ray MacSharry and Padraic White (Mercier, £20) is the book if you want to understand the anatomy of the boom times.
The Dark Valley: A Panorama of the 1930s, by Piers Brendon (Cape, £25 in UK) has been hailed as the best study yet of that complex decade, while colleague Lara Marlowe thought so highly of Kosovo: War and Revenge, by Tim Judah (Yale University Press, £25 in UK), that she'll be taking it with her if she covers another Balkan war. Deliver Us from Evil by William Shawcross, described as the foremost journalist of his generation by reviewer Kevin Myers, is another highly recommended title in the growing genre of books on modern wars and political strife - and what can be done about them . If the so-called "Break-up of Britain" debate is a particular interest, the best book of a number this year may possibly be Tom Nairn's After Britain (Granta Books, £15.99 in UK).
We're always most suspicious of books about ourselves, but Conor O'Clery of this paper thought Silver Linings: Travels Around Northern Ireland, by Martin Fletcher (Little, Brown, £14.99 in UK) was "charming"; and being both a Northerner himself and a former Belfast Editor of The Irish Times, he's eminently qualified to make such a pronouncement. It was when covering the North as a journalist that Fletcher discovered, as O'Clery put it, that there was more to the North than "its bloody awful side". Leaving The Blaskets: A Journey From The Edge Of Ireland, by Cole Moreton (Viking, £14.99 in UK) is a significant and original addition to the Blasket canon: it would be particularly good to bring if you're heading for Dingle or Kerry generally, not to mention if you're lucky enough to be actually making a trip out to the Great Blasket. The Politics of Irish Drama, by Nicholas Grene (Cambridge University Press, £14.95 in UK) has been described as the best survey of 20th-century Irish drama around, and could be a good book to bring if attending any of the myriad summer schools which will no doubt be dissecting many of the playwrights discussed between its covers.
Joyceans will be among those who will have John McCourt's book The Years of Bloom - James Joyce in Trieste 1904-1920 (Lilliput Press.£25) on their list. Ideally why not add Trieste to the itinerary over the coming months and read it in situ!
Biography And Memoir
We Irish have always been big buyers of biographies: perhaps it has something to do with our unofficial tradition of telling and valuing stories that illustrate our own lives, no matter how modest those lives may be. Here are some of the best titles out recently, which you can stick in the bag in case you don't find anyone to swap stories with at the bar. Experience, by Martin Amis (Cape, £18 in UK) is Amis's much-hyped memoir about his dad Kingsley, his marriages, his life as a writer, and yes, his teeth. George Moore, 1852-1933, by Adrian Frazier (Yale University Press, £29.95 in UK), is a major new biography on a long-neglected subject. Already the book has been put in the Richard Ellmann class: can there be a higher accolade? Fool of the Family: A Life of J. M. Synge, by W.J. McCormack (Weidenfeld and Nicholson, £25 in UK) illuminates Synge's connections with Wicklow, among other things.
With the marching season approaching Susan McKay's Northern Protestants; An Unsettled People (Blackstaff Press, £12.99 in UK) might help you get to grips with the psyche of some of those involved, while Trimble, by Henry McDonald (Bloomsbury, £16.99 in UK) provides background on the man we see nightly on our screens but about whose background and personal life we know little. In the same political vein, if the Thatcher days still have a lingering appeal for you, John Campbell's Margaret Thatcher: A Biography - Volume One (1925-1979): The Grocer's Daughter (Cape, £25 in UK) gives revealing insights into her early career. Another giantess of an Englishwoman - albeit in a wildly different mould - gets her story told in Mary Wollstonecraft: A Revolutionary Life, by Janet Todd (Weidenfeld and Nicholson, £25 in UK).
Hemingway versus Fitzgerald: The rise and fall of a literary friendship, by Scott Donaldson (John Murray, £25 in UK) provoked a correspondence on the letters page of this paper about the dumbing-down of bookshops when readers couldn't find it quickly enough in the shops. A good sign. Get it, quick - if, that is, you can find a copy.
Crime And Thrillers
Let's face it, the moment when you start a crime novel on holiday is not the time to start worrying whether you have locked the doors of the house you left behind: just enter the underworld as effortlessly as the fictional knives that slide through these fictional bodies. Monster, by Jonathan Kellerman (Little, Brown, £10.99 in UK) is his new Alex Delaware novel. Day of Reckoning, by Jack Higgins (HarperCollins, £16.99 in UK) sees Sean Dillon's helterskelter eighth outing. Set in Darkness, by Ian Rankin (Orion, £16.99 in UK) is Inspector John Rebus at his best, and backdrop Edinburgh at its darkling worst. The Dealer, by Paul Kilduff (Hodder and Stoughton, £10 in UK) is set in the world of high-risk finance. The Brethren, by John Grisham (Century, £16.99 in UK) is another bestseller from one of the biggest names around, while Void Moon, by Michael Connelly (Orion, £16.99 in UK) has a plot that writhes as sinuously as a snake. And finally there's the late Mario Puzo's last novel, Omerta: you can't miss it, way up there as it already is, riding high in the bestsellers.
Travel
Having travelled to 27 islands in the Caribbean, Hunter Davies is well placed to describe the 10 he feels are the most interesting in A Walk Around the West Indies (Weidenfeld, £18.99 in UK). Barbados, Antigua and Mustique are among them. This book is really a must if you're going to Cuba, on which Davies is particularly good. Lost White Tribes by Riccardo Orizio (Secker and Warburg, £15.99 in UK) about the mainly poor white descendants of colonists takes in Sri Lanka, Haiti, Jamaica and many other countries and could provide an unusual glimpse of these countries if you happened to be venturing that far this year. And for those who thought Nevada was one of those less exciting states in America, think again - and try David Thompson's In Nevada: The Land, The People, God and Chance (Little Brown, £20 in UK)
Paperbacks
These are the books that get into the holiday bag in greater numbers than any others by dint of being less precious - do you really want to smear Ambre Solaire all over a brand-new hardback that may adorn your library shelves long after the holiday's over? Here are some which are worth firing into your packing this summer.
Much praised by Eileen Battersby on these pages as, among other things, a vivid portrait of a rural world that is disappearing, The Banyan Tree, by the Irish writer Christopher Nolan (Phoenix, £6.99) spans a century, is set in Westmeath and tells the story of one woman's life. Being Dead, by Jim Crace (Penguin, £6.99 in UK) is the tale of a middle-aged couple and the troubled spaces left behind after a murder. For the Relief of Unbearable Urges, by Nathan Englander (Faber, £6.99 in UK), is a thought-provoking debut collection of short stories with Jewishness at its heart. The winning Booker title, Disgrace, by J.M. Coetzee (Vintage, £6.99 in UK) as well as being a wonderful read, may tell you more about the contemporary situation in South Africa than 10 current-affairs titles. Hannibal, by Thomas Harris (Arrow, £6.99 in UK) needs no introduction: just think horror.
My War Gone By, I Miss It So, by war correspondent Anthony Lloyd (Anchor, £6.99 UK) contains dispatches from his time spent covering conflict areas, including Bosnia, Afghanistan, and Chechnya. Interesting reading for the growing numbers of people interested not just in the regions affected, but in war itself and the lure it can have for a journalist. We wish to inform you that tomorrow we will be killed with our families: Stories from Rwanda, by Philip Gourevitch (Picador, £6.99 in UK) is classic reportage and is at last available in paperback, as is Loyalists, by Peter Taylor (Bloomsbury, £7.99 in UK).
Nicholas Shakespeare has written a superb, page-turning life of the chameleon-like travel writer Bruce Chatwin (Vintage, £7.99 UK), while In the Red Corner: A Journey into Cuban Boxing, by John Duncan (Yellow Jersey Press, £12 in UK), looks at the politics behind the sweat of the boxing world.oib in (Picador, £5.99 UK) is the book that can guide you to the best of summer reading all the way back to 195
Anna Pavord's unusual book The Tulip (Bloomsbury, £8.99 in UK), about the history of this flower, was an unexpected bestseller - and is about an awful lot more than just tulips. The Map of Love, by Ahdaf Soueif (Bloomsbury, £6.99 in UK), was described as the "best read" on last year's Booker shortlist - a fine book that commutes across generations and is mainly set in Egypt. Glamorama, by Bret Easton Ellis (Picador, £6.99 in UK) is social satire which bites deep. If you liked the recent film based on his earlier novel American Psycho, you might like to sample more of his work.
If you're heading to Italy, the slim On the Spine of Italy; a year in the Abruzzi (Pan, £6.99) by Harry Clifton would fit in even the tiniest suitcase and help you enjoy central Italy even more; while soccer connoisseurs who can't cope with the idea of a postEuro 2000 summer can take refuge in Jimmy Burns's Barca (Bloomsbury, £7.99 in UK). Sensitive, stylish and very, very thorough - a bit like the Barca teams over the years, in fact - it explores not just the football itself but the club's extraordinary status within the culture of Catalonia. Again ideal if that's where you're heading.
Finally, if you're really having trouble deciding, The Modern Library: The 200 Best Novels in English since 1950, by Carmen Calill and Colm Toibin is now out in paperback (Picador, £5.99 in UK). The perfect book to guide you to the best of summer reading - all the way back to 1950.