Lit Hub Daily: June 21, 2023

• At long last, summer has arrived. Celebrate with 50 of the greatest summery novels of all time (according to us). | Lit Hub Reading Lists

• Richard Delgado, Aja Martinez, and Victor Ray discuss the importance of critical race theory—and the delusional attacks on it. | Lit Hub Roundtable

• “So little had changed in this world he had sacrificed so much to keep safe.” Tamara J. Walker on the experience of Black WWII veterans, including her grandfather. | Lit Hub History

• Sometimes all you need to get writing again is… Taylor Swift. | Lit Hub Music

• Stephen Aiken captures a 1974 (literary) star-studded public debate in the East Village: “This was a conversation about art where the stakes seemed as weighty as life itself.” | Lit Hub Photography

• Authors and students are suing Florida over the state’s “Don’t Say Gay” law. | The New York Times

• “With today’s chatbots, human users are not really speaking; they are prompting.” Anna Wiener on the language of AI. | The New Yorker

• Laura Miller considers Richard North Patterson’s claim that New York publishers rejected his new novel because he’s white. | Slate

• Robin D.G. Kelley on the long war on Black studies. | New York Review of Books

• “Being a Big Brother is hard. I bet it makes you angry when Winston doesn’t submit to your will.” Jessie Gaynor explores gentle parenting in classic literature. | McSweeney’s

• “Being friends with a genius isn’t always easy. Sometimes you are loved, as Norén loved me until that coffee date on August 30, 2015.” Elisabeth Åsbrink on her literary breakup with Swedish playwright Lars Norén. | The Dial

Also on Lit Hub: Stacy Jane Grover recounts the quiet shuffle of a death vigil in Central Appalachia • New poetry from Megan Fernandes • Read from Leila Slimani’s newly translated novel, Watch Us Dance (tr. Sam Taylor)