Summer reading, for indoors or out

Whether you're adding a second coat of sunblock while sitting poolside or stuck indoors due to unseasonably high rainfall in the Northeast, a good page turner is an indispensable ingredient for the long days and nights of summer. The Monitor parsed thousands of pages of high-profile new releases so that you'll know exactly which shelf to head for when you next visit a bookstore.

Claudia thought she had found the perfect husband: an intelligent, caring man who regarded babies as home-wrecking scream machines. Then their best friends have a son, and Ben starts campaigning for a child. Feeling betrayed, Claudia dumps him faster than Tammy Wynette can sing "D-I-V-O-R-C-E," and embarks on an affair with a publishing VP. Despite this distraction, she feels like the world is judging her for not wanting a baby. (Nor does it help that she's surrounded by mothers, pregnant friends, and a sister who's grappling with infertility.) Giffin ("Something Borrowed") is clearly trying to change up the chick-lit formula by bringing in a topic that can be profoundly difficult for couples. Sadly, the shopping, fancy restaurants, and chic locales that are apparently required elements of the genre crowd out the emotional resonance. Grade: C+

As fans know, Furst ("Dark Voyage") can wield a cloak and dagger with aplomb. Reuters correspondent Carlo Weisz moonlights as a writer for the Italian resistance paper "Liberazione" in 1938 Paris. When the editor is assassinated, Weisz gets an unwanted promotion – and a vastly more complicated life. The British and French want him to spy for them, the Fascists are hunting him, and he can't even visit an old girlfriend without someone stuffing a list of German agents into his hands. Not Furst's best, but still a fine addition to his growing canon of World War II thrillers. Grade: B

If you've ever dreamed of swimming with dolphins, dancing with wolves, or walking a cheetah on a leash, then this is the book for you. Or maybe not – unless there's a strong aroma of squid accompanying your daydreams and you're prepared to have the big cat take a swipe at you. Sutherland spent a year at the "Harvard for exotic animal trainers" at Moorpark College in California, following the students (almost all young, almost all female) as they learn everything from how to shovel elephant dung for eight hours without complaining to how to evacuate frightened animals when a forest fire sweeps near the zoo. Training is a controversial subject for animal-rights activists, but Sutherland covers the debate while allowing readers to draw their own conclusions. The descriptions of the animals are vivid, but her portraits of the students are less distinct, and she has a frustrating tendency to drop plot threads without letting readers know the outcome. Grade: B

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