But now that school’s out and I’ve been somewhere warm and sunny all week, it finally feels like summer. So I’m devoting this week’s recommended reading to my summer reading list.

Most of these books have been piled up on my nightstand for months waiting for me to crack them open – I can’t wait.

Dreams from My Father: A Story of Race and Inheritance – This one I already finished. Publishers Weekly calls Barack Obama’s autobiography, written after he gained some acclaim as the first black editor of the Harvard Law Review, “a poignant, probing memoir of an unusual life.” If during the 2008 presidential election you ever wondered what exactly Obama’s job as a Chicago community organizer was, or why he didn’t have more to say about race in America, or what really happened to his absent African father, all the answers are here.

The Death and Life of American Journalism: The Media Revolution that will Begin the World Again – Robert McChesney and John Nichols’ discussion of what went wrong with Old Media and what it will take to rebuild the journalism industry. A tip of the hat to my sister-in-law Kendall who lives in Urbana, Illinois, and got me a signed copy  from McChesney, who’s a professor at the University of Illinois there.

Devil in the White City – You can see by now I like non-fiction. This example of long-form narrative nonfiction written by former Wall Street Journal features writer Erik Larson won a 2004 Edgar Award in the Best Fact Crime category. The story tells the twin tales of the architect responsible for building the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair and the serial killer who haunted it.

Eating Animals – I stole novelist Jonathan Safran Foer’s take on the omnivore’s dilemma from my vegetarian daughter’s nightstand – hopefully she won’t notice until I’ve finished it.

Water for Elephants – Sara Gruen’s novel of circus life during the Great Depression.

60 Hikes Within 60 Miles: Portland – Because summer’s not just for reading.

What great books are you reading this summer?

I grabbed it off my bookshelf to share at a writing class I taught at the recent Digital Journalism Camp in Portland – then took it with me on vacation.

I own the book’s fifth edition, which came out in 1994. The only things about it that’s dated is a discussion of the advantage of writing on a computer v. in longhand and a few references to long-dead writers you may or may not have ever read (E.B. White yes, S.J. Perelman, no). The latest 30th anniversary edition, the seventh overall, came out in 2006.

Despite its age, On Writing Well is still relevant as a reference for what to do and what to avoid in many forms of nonfiction: newspaper and magazine articles, travel, sports and humor writing, criticism, memoir – even memos, newsletters and emails you may need to produce for work.

Zinsser’s advice to write tight and bright is especially relevant in a world of shrinking word counts and Internet readers who can’t be bothered to scroll past a story’s opening screen.

If you don’t already have this on your bookshelf, get a copy. Until then, here’s some of my favorite Zinsser advice:

On words – Read your articles out loud to see how they flow. Don’t use words you wouldn’t use in the course of normal conversation. Avoid jargon and cliches. Less is more. Active v. passive.

On the writing process. Writing is hard, even for the pros, the more you do it, the (slightly) easier it gets. Writing is rewriting. Being a writer isn’t about being a certain type of person, it’s about doing the work.

On style – Style is sounding like you on the page, not like anyone else. Zinsser writes:

Sell yourself, and your subject will exert its own appeal. Believe in your own identity and your own opinions. Proceed with confidence, generating it by willpower. Writing is an act of ego, and you might as well admit it. Use its energy to keep yourself going.

On interviews – Write questions out beforehand. Use some form of shorthand to take notes even if you’re recording. Get more material than you think you’ll need. Pay attention to detail. I didn’t realize how much of this I’d absorbed until I read his chapter on interviews then looked at the notes I’d made for that Digital Journalism Camp class on conducting interviews – his influence is obvious.

On leads and endings – If the first line of your story doesn’t grab readers, they’ll never read the second. Hook them with the lead and keep the good stuff coming. Even when you’re writing nonfiction, writing has to be entertaining for people to stick around. Pay attention to how you finish things. Don’t just re-state the lead – circle back to an opening anecdote, close with a bang-up quote, or simply finish telling the story.

On tackling science, technology and other complex subjects – Make sure you understand how what you’re writing about works or you’ll never be able to explain it to readers. Avoid jargon. Include people to keep things real.

On editors – Good ones can make decent stories better, and decent writers better too. Bad ones drive writers crazy, by changing style, voice, content, organization, and generally treating them “like hired help.”

Some of his closing words are a freelance writer’s anthem:

…The purposes that writers serve must be their own. What you write is yours and nobody else’s. Take your talent as far as you can and guard it with your life. Only you know how far that is: no editor knows. Writing well means believing in your writing and believing in yourself, taking risks, daring to be different, pushing yourself to excel. You will write only as well as you make yourself write.