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The Summer Collection includes stories spanning the genres—a light comedy, a mystery, a ghost story, a gothic tale, and some realistic fiction. Each one helps us think in a fresh way about the things, people, and places that form our identity and make life worth living. The five Readings listed below are some of our favorites—none too heavy, all thoroughly discussible, and as delightful as summer itself.
- Revelation by Flannery O’Connor, Foreword by Louise Cowan. We just had a great conversation with younger leaders in Orlando on this darkly comedic and provocative story set in the deep South (see the report below). What will it take to get Mrs. Turpin to see herself as she really is?
- Joy Cometh in the Morning by P. G. Wodehouse, Foreword by Joseph Bottum. Can a little girl from the London slums help Lord Emsworth escape the plans his tyrannical gardener and sister have for his day at the Blandings Castle fête? This light and sunny story offers the best kind of escapism, and Bottum brilliantly explains why.
- Hannah and Nathan by Wendell Berry, Foreword by Gregory Wolfe. What does it take to make a marriage, and a life? Hannah looks back on her marriage, opening a window into her life and her place—Berry’s fictional Port William, Kentucky.
- Ex Tenebris by Russell Kirk, Foreword by Vigen Guroian. Can anything keep the city planner from evicting Mrs. Oliver from her lonely retirement cottage in Low Wentworth? This ghostly tale is timely in considering the role of government in our lives.
- The Oracle of the Dog by G. K. Chesterton, Foreword by Senior Fellow Doug Wilson. Who killed Colonel Druce in his seaside garden in Cranston, Yorkshire? Father Brown solves the mystery from his study a hundred miles away. What does it take to distinguish the clues from the red herrings? How common is common sense?
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