Summer with the classics
Join us, as we immerse ourselves in classic books throughout the summer of 2026.
Hello all! We are excited to start this Substack and connect with even more curious people out there.
For those of you who don’t know us, we are Jamie and Andy, a married couple who own a small, independent bookstore in Lexington, IL. Andy is a reader, a gamer, a veteran, a guitar player, and also works in hospice care. Jamie is a former corporate executive turned entrepreneur, and also teaches business at the local community college.
We’ve heard of this notion of focusing reading for a particular season around a specific theme, and we decided to try it this summer. We are launching “Summer with the Classics" and we invite you to join us!
How does this work? There really are no rules, it’s meant to be fun. Between Memorial Day and Labor Day, try to read classic literature. This can mean anything you want it to. We encourage all reading, so that means books, e-books, audiobooks, graphic novel adaptations, re-reads of books you’ve read before - it all counts. Of course, you’re allowed to read contemporary books as well, but we’ll be writing about and discussing the classics here.
Here are some of the “classics” we have on our list. There’s no way we’ll read all of this in one summer, this is just to generate ideas.
The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
The Lord of The Rings trilogy by JRR Tolkien - this is where Andy’s lore began
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
East of Eden by John Steinbeck - soon to be a Netflix series featuring Florence Pugh!
A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens - by far Jamie’s favorite classic novel
Chronicles of Narnia by CS Lewis - soon to be movies created by Greta Gerwig (of Little Women and Barbie fame)
Little Women by Louisa May Alcott
Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte
1984 by George Orwell
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Poetry of Margaret Atwood, Audre Lorde, or Sylvia Plath, if 2026 has you feeling a bit…frustrated…with the patriarchy
What did we miss? Let us know if you plan to read along with us! We’ll post reviews and other reflections here throughout the summer.
Happy reading!
Jamie and Andy