Dear Reader,

My late husband was a historical biographer with four published books; three of them were written during our marriage. It was an eye-opener to live with someone who writes for a living. For one thing, it seemed like he did a lot of nothing. He would
oftentimes just sit on our deck and read all day, and he spent hours on end in libraries. While I toiled away, chained to my computer, chasing writers, responding to endless emails, there was my husband, just sitting in our black leather chair—reading! “What are you doing today?” I would ask, and he would always remind me: “I’m working, honey….”

Taking time out of one’s day to read does feel like a luxury. Our Protestant work ethic frowns on such an activity. But what about someone like LA artist Tim Youd? He reads books, then rereads them while retyping them for his art? I think I’d have a fit if I was his wife!

One of Youd’s “finished novels” appears on the cover of our Summer Reading issue. In April, I flew out to Nebraska to visit Tim and watch him perform in Red Cloud, retyping The Song of the Lark, by Willa Cather. Having close contact with him, the Willa Cather Center staff—and most of all, The Prairie—made the experience of reading Cather incomparable. If I had access to the location and surroundings of every novel I read, my reading pleasure would be that much more meaningful. Tim’s performances, which took me to the various spots of Cather’s upbringing, elicited a deeper comprehension of the author and her story. Youd impresses upon his audience what it might feel like to spend one’s entire day with a book. He starts every morning fresh for a new day of reading. The only time I feel like I can do that is when I’m on vacation.

I invite you to read (when you have the time) about Youd’s 100 pilgrimages to authors’ haunts as he retypes their novels and how he came to start this unique and formidable project. Please take a gander at other worthy items in this issue. Writer/artist John Tottenham treats us to his tribulations in the publishing industry. There are some big laughs to be had in his essay, which will continue as a featured online series, keeping us abreast of his efforts to get his novel into print. The books we are reviewing also make for richly rewarding summer reading: Brave New World: The Graphic Novel, reviewed by Glenn Harcourt, reminds us how prescient Aldous Huxley was and demands a must-re-read (with pictures this time around). Another good read about the late great LA guru conceptual artist Chris Burden is out now: Poetic Practical. All of Burden’s unrealized projects are in this book, attesting to how he was always ahead of his time.

So, this summer, take a book on your plane flight; bring along a copy for your camping trip; lug a novel to lounge by the pool. Whatever it takes, read a book. No matter what time of day.