Reading in the shade

Just back from a vacation (and a little work) in Europe. Most of the time I was in Italy, most of which is hot and crowded in June, and not conducive to refreshment. My solution was to retire with my books in the heat of the day. As you can see my reading list has grown exponentially today thanks to my afternoons in the shade of a fig tree.
In a village up in the hills from Florence I reread Room with a View, the novel which first whetted my appetite for Italy. I had forgotten how ironic it is and remembered only the section set in Florence. Of course strolling along the banks of the Arno, crossing stoney piazzas and staying in viewing distance of the Duomo brought Miss Lucy's adventures alive, but at the same time the book  enhanced my enjoyment of Florence. This alchemy of pleasure was probably missed by the crowds forging from the Academie to the Duomo with their noses in their guide books, determined to check all the boxes by closing time.
I've resisted reading The Help ever since it appeared on Amazon's bestseller list, probably because I'm just cussed but also because I thought it was yet another American self-flagellation on race relations back a century or so ago. But finally I succumbed and discovered the challenging voices of southern black women in recent history. I know very little about the American south but Kathryn Stockett let those black women speak about their lives in the 1960s from their point of view. They exposed the true relations between black and white women, and told of the irreparable damage done to generations of black families by white women ignorant of or careless with the power they wielded.
Once I got over my irritation with the hyper, whining New York voice of the protagonist, Peter, of By Nightfall I rediscovered my veneration of  Michael Cunningham's prose. He reflects on the things that really matter in life by destabilising the certainties Peter assumes every day just so that he can function in the world. Peter's comfortable marriage, his sexuality and his career come under close scrutiny and lose all of their solidity before the book is over.
In my small hotel room in Vienna after a long day at a conference I downloaded Tea Obreht's The Tiger's Wife and went on a totally different journey. Somehow she welds middle European superstition to modern pragmatism to produce a gem of a story in beautifully crafted prose.
At the suggestion of an English couple sharing our villa in Tuscany I read Salmon fishing in the Yemen on the plane from London to Bangkok. It was the perfect escape from the cramped cabin and plastic food - Yes Minister times a hundred, very, very funny!
Australian Kristen Tranter's The Legacy was a darker read. A young woman setting out on life with lots of potential inherits some money and gradually fades from her friends and family's lives. Her disappearance seemingly straightforward at first eventually raises more questions than answers. It is not a genre mystery but I am still puzzling through the hints the young woman's friend uncovers 2 weeks after finishing the book.