I Love Vacation Reading.............

James Patterson

364 pages

SF PD detective Lindsey Boxer, along with her partner and crime-fighting friends, solve two murder investigations. In one investigation, a homeless man who seemed to be a street hero is found murdered. The other investigation takes Lindsey and her partner into SF society, where long simmering resentment boils over. Predictability and likeable characters, like a favorite television show or movie, a SF setting, and mild crime mysteries all make this a great, non-literary "start of vacation" read for any grown-up.

Allegra Goodman

385 pages

Can a cancer research lab and cancer researching doctors actually add up to a compelling and interesting realistic novel? You betcha! Sandy and Marion, the lab directors, and their post-doctoral lab researchers work on a cure for cancer. When one of the researchers, Cliff, finds some promising results, everyone gets involved in working on the project and getting it publicized. Character relationships, conflicts, and characterizations make this novel a compelling read. The title comes from a hunch one of the researchers; where experiment results "tweaked" to come up with favorable results?
This is "literature."