theGrio’s summer 2012 books round-up: Great beach reading on black love, African-American history and more!

theGRIO REPORT - Whether you are looking for words of wisdom from a top chef or a former of secretary of state -- or perhaps a little history or just a great story -- theGrio has your summer 2012 reading list covered...

Luther Vandross was outed as gay after his death.

Ada’s Rules: A Sexy, Skinny Novelby Alice Randall, Bloomsbury, $24.

Everyone loves a plucky heroine, and this book delivers in the plus-sized form of Ada Howard. One hundred pounds and 25 years ago, Ada was a hopeful college student basking in the glow of her first love. Now Ada is the middle-aged wife of a straying pastor, the caretaker of ailing parents, the mother of two grown daughters, a busy day-care worker, and a woman who has lost her sense of self.  When she receives an invitation to her twenty-five-year college reunion with a flirtatious wink from an old beau, she has an epiphany: “She would be fit and fifty. She would not succumb to mammydom, or mommydom, or husband-come-undonedom. She would have change.” So she decides to take charge of her life, and her weight, and makes up a list of 53 diet rules and vows to stick to them. For example, “Rule #1: Don’t Keep Doing What You’ve Always Been Doing.” By the time her reunion comes in 12 months, she hopes to be slimmer, perhaps rekindle her old romance, and find happiness again.

Randall, the author of three other books, including the New York Times bestseller The Wind Done Gone, and someone who has struggled with her weight as well, has created a highly relatable character in Ada — a woman who gives so much to others that by the end of the day, she has little left to give herself.  Sound familiar? Her loving depiction of Ada will inspire other women to find themselves and get healthier, both emotionally and physically.

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