We hope you're reading along with the Cityline Book Club and enjoying Born Weird by Andrew Kaufman! Our Cityline team is really enjoying this quirky novel and have totally fallen in love with the Weird family. To help our book club get some additional insight into Kaufman as a writer, we asked him 10 questions about his writing habits and favourite books. 1. What was your favourite book as a child? I wish I could say something noble and brilliant like Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, but the truth is I was obsessed with an American writer named Daniel Pinkwater. I loved all his books but my favourites were Lizard Music and Alan Mendelsohn: The Boy From Mars. 2. What’s your current favourite book? Once again I wish I could say Gravity’s Rainbow or Infinite Jest, but my favourite book remains Cat's Cradle by Kurt Vonnegut. 3. Was there a moment when you first knew you wanted to be a writer? I can’t remember wanting to be anything else. I know that sounds pretentious and fake, but it’s honestly true. 4. What is your favourite music to write to? I almost always have music playing while I write, but what that music is changes all the time. It’s usually whatever will help me generate the mood that I’m trying to get on the page. So I have a lot of records, from a lot of genres: pop, classical, dub, indie rock, whatever fits. Although, I have to admit that a disproportionately high number of '80s new wave records get played… 5. What author do you wish you could write like? Easy: J.D. Salinger. 6. Where is your favourite place to write? I keep an office. It’s important for me to have a door to close, a room to leave. Otherwise the line between writing and real life gets blurry. 7. What time of day do you do your best writing? I can get more done between 9 and 11 than I can between 11 and 6. 8. What was your last great read? I’m in the middle of a major detective fiction kick. So I’ve just finished The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler and The Killer Inside Me by Jim Thompson and loved them both. 9. What is the last book you gave as a gift? Concrete Toronto by Michael McClelland and Graeme Stewart. Read it and I promise that you will never drive down Bloor Street the same way again. 10. What do you do when you’re not writing? I have two kids, seven and five. They’re amazing, but as anyone who has young kids knows, there isn’t much of my day or energy left by the time they get to bed. Honestly, the vast majority of my evenings are spent reading or watching TV. And my weekends are filled with soccer games and gymnastic classes. Are you enjoying Born Weird so far? Share your thoughts in the comments - we can’t wait to discuss it with you. Stay tuned for a video interview with Kaufman about the novel, coming up right here in the Cityline Book Club next week!

Are you reading along with the Cityline Book Club? Our latest pick is Born Weird by Andrew Kaufman, and our Cityline staffers are loving this offbeat, quirky read. Kaufman definitely knows how to craft a great story, and we love how quickly we were drawn into the lives of his characters. Want to hear an excerpt? We recorded Kaufman reading the first chapter of Born Weird – watch the video below! [embed]bcid:2553429273001[/embed] Are you enjoying Born Weird so far? Share your thoughts in the comments! We can’t wait to discuss it with you! Stay tuned next week for our Q&A with Kaufman about his reading and writing habits!

One of our favourite things about summer is getting to curl up with a good book, either on the beach, dockside, or even just underneath a big tree in the park! While fluffy chick lit stories and pulpy thrillers are popular go-to picks in the summer, we wanted to give you some different options this year, so we've rounded up some of our favourite novels that are set in the summertime! Read on for our picks, and happy summer reading! F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Great Gatsby: "I love New York on summer afternoons when everyone's away. There's something very sensuous about it - overripe, as if all sorts of funny fruits were going to fall into your hands." Fitzgerald's classic novel captures 1920s New York City in the summer like none other. We wish we could spend the season at Gatsby's big summer bashes, too! Ann Brashares, The Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants: Four best friends + their first summer apart + a magical pair of jeans = a fun young adult novel that's a perfect summer read for anyone who's young at heart. If you really get sucked into the sisterhood, there are four sequels you can dig into, as well. William Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night's Dream: Shakespeare's classic tale of love, mistaken identities, and fairies channels the beautiful mysticism of summer. A Midsummer Night's Dream is also one of our favourite plays to see live outdoors - try to find a Shakespeare in the Park performance of it near you! Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird: This classic coming-of-age novel set in the 1930s in the Deep South opens on a seemingly innocent summer. But when young Scout and her brother Jem first learn about their shadowy neighbour Boo Radley, the children have to reassess their own beliefs of right and wrong. If you haven't read this novel since high school, you're definitely due for a re-read. Judy Blume, Summer Sisters: Judy Blume may have gained her popularity through her young adult fare like Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret., but this novel is strongly aimed at an adult audience, due to its heavier sexual content. This coming-of-age story about two teenaged girls who spend every summer together chronicles their complicated friendship. Ian McEwan, Atonement: This British family saga spans more than 60 years, but the crux of the drama begins in the blistering hot summer of 1935 in the English countryside, when young Briony's innocent mistake ends up ruining the lives of her sister and her sister's lover. If you like to dig your teeth into a meaty novel in the summertime, try this epic read. Nicholas Sparks, The Notebook: Arguably Nicholas Sparks' most famous novel (mostly due to the Ryan Gosling/Rachel McAdams film adapation), this romance tells the story of Noah and Allie and their young summer romance that was cut short because of their class differences. Even non-romance readers will likely find themselves caught up in this touching love story of long-lost summer flings. Peter Benchley, Jaws: You've probably seen the movie, but have you read the book? The 1974 novel tells the story of a great white shark that preys upon a small resort town, and was inspired by several real-life shark attacks along the Jersey Shore in 1916. If you're the squeamish type, you might not want to read this book while you're visiting the ocean though! Patricia Highsmith, The Talented Mr. Ripley: The gorgeous Italian coast provides the summer setting for this twisted psychological thriller, that later became a hit movie starring Matt Damon, Jude Law, and Gwyneth Paltrow. Although the film stands alone, the 1955 novel has four sequels, so you can dive even deeper into Tom Ripley's creepy mind. Jeanne Birdsall, The Penderwicks: A Summer Tale of Four Sisters, Two Rabbits, and a Very Interesting Boy: Channel your inner child with this 2005 children's novel that has drawn comparisons to Louisa May Alcott's Little Women. This National Book Award-winning book will instantly transport you to the sisters' cottage in the idyllic Berkshire Mountains of Massachusetts. Do you have a favourite book (or movie!) that's set in the summer? Share your fave summertime picks in the comments below!

Since we're a big group of book lovers here at Cityline, we're inviting our viewers to read along with us! For our last book club pick, we read Saleema Nawaz's Bone and Bread (House of Anansi) - did you read it, too? Be sure to watch the video of our book club meeting to see what we thought of the book, and to enter for your chance to win a book prize pack courtesy of House of Anansi! For our latest book pick, we're switching from the dramatic to the comedic (it is summertime, after all!) and we'll be reading Born Weird by Andrew Kaufman (Random House of Canada). Once again, we hope you'll read along with us! Here's the book's synopsis:

The Weirds have always been a little off, but not one of them ever suspected that they'd been cursed by their grandmother. At the moment of the births of her five grandchildren Annie Weird gave each one a special power. Richard, the oldest, always keeps safe; Abba always has hope; Lucy is never lost and Kent can beat anyone in a fight. As for Angie, she always forgives, instantly. But over the years these so-called blessings ended up ruining their lives. Now Annie is dying and she has one last task for Angie: gather her far-flung brothers and sisters and assemble them in her grandmother's hospital room so that at the moment of her death, she can lift these blessings-turned-curses. And Angie has just two weeks to do it. What follows is a quest like no other, tearing up highways and racing through airports, from a sketchy Winnipeg nursing home to the small island kingdom of Upliffta, from the family's crumbling ancestral Toronto mansion to a motel called Love. And there is also the search for the answer to the greatest family mystery of all: what really happened to their father, whose maroon Maserati was fished out of a lake so many years ago?

We're so excited to start reading this fun and quirky novel, and we hope you'll read along with us! Want a copy? We have 5 copies to give away to some lucky readers, courtesy of Random House of Canada! To enter for your chance to win, tell us about your last great read in the comments below! Over the next six weeks, we'll be sharing tons of great features about the novel and the author, as well as a behind-the-scenes look at our office discussion of the book! So go out and grab your copy, and get reading! We can't wait to discuss with you!

Have you been reading along with the Cityline Book Club? Our latest book pick, Bone and Bread by Saleema Nawaz, was a huge hit amongst our Cityline staffers. From the novel's ever-engaging plot to Nawaz's beautiful prose, we had so much to say about this debut novel...and we want to share our discussion with you! Watch our book club meeting below: [embed]bcid:2525378380001[/embed] If you read Bone and Bread along with us, we want to know what you thought of the novel! Post a comment below with your thoughts on the book, and you’ll be entered to win a book prize pack courtesy of House of Anansi! For our next book club pick, we'll be reading Born Weird by Andrew Kaufman (Random House of Canada), and once again, we want you to read along with us! For more information on our latest pick, and for your chance to win a copy, click here.