Two giant shadows loom over the summer's unusually good selection of new novels -- the constant buzz about Amazon's Kindle e-book readers and the Sept. 15 rollout of Dan Brown's sequel to "The Da Vinci Code," called "The Lost Symbol."

It seems, in fact, that summer reading has seldom been as promising, defying the conventional wisdom that it's nothing but "beach reads" suitable only for soaking up spilled gin and tonics.

When authors such as Thomas Pynchon, Alice Hoffman, Kate Christensen and Stephen L. Carter are delivering new books in the good old summertime, it's time to revise the formula.

Here is the Post-Gazette summer roundup, including a few books that certainly are "beach reading."

"The Angel's Game" by Carlos Ruiz Zafon (Doubleday, $26.95). A best-seller in Europe, it's an exotic thriller set in 1920s Barcelona. Zafon's previous novel, "The Shadow of the Wind," was a U.S. hit.

"The Story Sisters" by Alice Hoffman (Shaye Arehart Books, $25). The talented Hoffman ("Practical Magic") follows three sisters as they seek their fate.

"Trouble" by Kate Christensen (Doubleday, $26). PEN/Faulkner winner returns with another New York novel with lots of sordid sex.

"Gone Tomorrow" by Lee Child (Delacorte Press, $27). Sadists rejoice. Jack Reacher returns to kill people.

"Dune Road" by Jane Green (Viking, $25.95). A beach book set -- where else? -- on the beach, a chi-chi place in coastal Connecticut. She's also author of "The Beach House," in paper from Plume ($15).

"Home Safe" by Elizabeth Berg (Random House, $25). Widow and daughter cope with exposed secret.

"Fall" by Colin McAdam (Riverhead Books, $25.95). Canadian craftsman delivers a romantic suspense novel.

"Fragment" by Warren Fahy (Delacorte Press, $25). Manuscript was auctioned for big bucks at the London Book Fair last year, due in part to movie potential. When a TV reality-show crew finds exotic creatures on isolated island, H-bombs are called in until ... .

"The Signal" by Ron Carlson (Viking, $25.95). A beacon falls from the sky into a mountainous area where an estranged couple try to patch things up.

"Rain Gods" by James Lee Burke (Simon & Schuster, $25.95). Crime novel in dusty Texas with a new Burke character, Hackberry Holland.

"Best Friends Forever" by Jennifer Weiner (Atria Books, $26.95). Another ugly duckling comedy from the Philadelphia writer.

"Jericho's Fall" by Stephen L. Carter (Knopf, $25.95). Author of "The Emperor of Ocean Park" tries a spy thriller.

"Brimstone" by Robert B. Parker (Putnam, $25.95). Prolific crime-story writer goes the sagebrush route again in this sequel to "Resolution."

"American Adulterer" by Jed Mercurio (Simon & Schuster, $25). Despite tawdry topic (JFK's sexual gamboling), advance comments praise this novel.

Untitled by Eric Jerome Dickey (Dutton, $25.95). More "sizzling action" is vowed from the "king of seduction" and, we hope, a catchy title.

"The Crowning Glory of Calla Lily Ponder" by Rebecca Wells (Harper, $25.99). Here is a catchy title on a novel by the author of "The Ya-Ya Sisterhood." Calla Lily finds sweet love with a guy named Tuck, then it's heartache time.

"Inherent Vice" by Thomas Pynchon (The Penguin Press, $27.95). The druggy 1960s occupy the legendary author in this detective-genre knockoff.

"The Eleventh Victim" by Nancy Grace (Hyperion, $25.95). Yes, the CNN legal meanie has written a thriller about a woman whose fiance is killed. Wait, wasn't Nancy Grace's fiance ... Oh, forget it.

"Intervention" by Robin Cook (Putnam, $25.95). It sounds like medical-thriller master Cook is channeling -- or following -- Dan Brown in his mix of science and religion.