Hot Fun In the Summertime

It's nearly time for Nemoralia, the ancient Roman festival celebrated during the ides of August to honor the goddess Diana. We salute the height of summer with this month's Upper Mezzanine book display, covering everything from trip destinations and our changing climate to local seashores, sun worship, and travel writing. Check out the best selections from our collection to pass those long dog days of summer with a cool beverage and a hot read:

Assassination Vacation by Sarah Vowell

Pacific: Silicon chips and surfboards, coral reefs and atom bombs, brutal dictators, fading empires, and the coming collision of the world's superpowers by Simon Winchester

Blue Highways: A Journey Into America by William Least Heat Moon

Under the Sea-wind: A Naturalist's Picture of Ocean Life by Rachel Carson

The High Desert by James Spooner

Sandwich: A Novel by Catherine Newman

The Cult of Ra: Sun-Worship in Ancient Egypt by Stephen Quirke

The Desert Music, and Other Poems by William Carlos Williams 

The Natural History of Eastern Massachusetts by Stan Freeman

The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway

The Heat of the Sun: Stories and Tales by Seán O'Faoláin

Sun Come Up (DVD)

Wildlife of the Deserts by Frederic H. Wagner

A Scientist at the Seashore by James Trefil

In A Sunburned Country by Bill Bryson

Roman Stories by Jhumpa Lahiri

Fierce Invalids Home from Hot Climates by Tom Robbins

Discoveries of the Census of Marine Life: Making Ocean Life Count by Paul V. R. Snelgrove

Sundials: Their Theory and Construction by Albert Edmund Waugh

Here Not There: 100 Unexpected Travel Destinations by Andrew Nelson

The Rough Guide: Southwest USA 

The Martha's Vineyard Beach and Book Club by Martha Hall Kelly 

The Hot Topic: What We Can Do About Global Warming by Gabrielle Walker 

The Naturalist's Guide to the Atlantic Seashore: Beach Ecology from the Gulf of Maine to Cape Hatteras by Scott W. Shumway

Sun Dials and Roses of Yesterday: Garden Delights Which Are Here Displayed in Very Truth and Are Moreover Regarded as Emblems by Alice Morse Earle 

Beach Reads and Deadly Deeds by Allison Brennan

Neither Here Nor There: Travels in Europe by Bill Bryson

Discover Nature at the Seashore: Things to Know and Things to Do by Elizabeth P. Lawlor

The Telling Distance: Conversations With the American Desert by Bruce Berger

At Every Depth: Our Growing Knowledge of the Changing Oceans by Tessa Hill

Under the Tuscan Sun: At Home in Italy by Frances Mayes

Hot Equations: Science, Fantasy, and the Radical Imagination On A Troubled Planet by Jesse S. Cohn

The Block Party: A Novel by Jamie Day 

Utomlennye solnt︠`sem (Burnt by the Sun) (DVD)

Out in the World: an LGBTQIA+ (and Friends!) Travel Guide to More Than 120 Destinations Around the World by Amy B. Scher

A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson

Gift From the Sea by Anne Morrow Lindbergh

Hothouse Earth: the Greenhouse Effect and Gaia by John Gribbin