Summer reading: I'm a sucker for frilly frocks

Jane Austen: The Back Catalogue. I've always loved Jane Austen; I've read everything she wrote at least 10 times. This is because she practically invented the smart chick lit genre. And because she's sarcastic, with a penchant for picking the scab off Victorian moral hypocrisy. And because I'm a sucker for frilly frocks and grand balls (the social occasion type, you understand).

I can't think of many things I'd rather do than curl up under a shady tree with Pride and Prejudice on a hot summer's day: pure bliss.

I'm also looking forward to reading Christopher Kremmer's The Carpet Wars. My bloke's just finished this one, and it comes to my side of the bed highly recommended.

Billed as "a writer's true-life odyssey through a crescent of Islamic nations and regions", The Carpet Wars is — according to the bloke, anyway — a fascinating blend of travelogue, history and anthropology. Most of all, it gave him an authentic insight into life in those bits of the Middle East that are frequently in the news for all the wrong reasons. I'm looking forward to it.

Bill Clinton's My Life. I've always had a bit of a crush on Bill, so when mum presented me with this weighty tome for my birthday I was well chuffed. Sadly, Bill's charisma doesn't translate to the written page. He comes across like a relationship counsellor on Valium.

Oddly, I feel compelled to plough on through his endless lists of political contacts and campaign accounts. It's the Bush effect — I'll take anything left-leaning I can get. With any luck I'll be done by Christmas 2005.

And because I love a bit of celebrity gossip and red carpet-couture on my days off: piles of dog-eared women's mags . Of course, I'm too much of a hypocrite to actually buy my own at the dairy — instead, my ever-thoughtful mother-in-law saves piles of scandalous back issues for me. Bless her.

* Daya Willis is a canvas columnist