Weekend picks for book lovers, including 'Seduced by Mrs. Robinson'

What should you read this weekend? USA TODAY’s picks for book lovers include Seduced by Mrs. Robinson, a look at the classic film, and Spy of the First Person, Sam Shepard's final book.

Seduced by Mrs. Robinson: How "The Graduate" Became the Touchstone of a Generation by Beverly Gray; Algonquin, 245 pp.; non-fiction

It was the sexy suburban affair that broke box office records and sent its cast to the Oscars.

In Seduced by Mrs. Robinson, Beverly Gray’s new in-depth look at The Graduate, fans can take a deep dive into how the 1967 film about an unlikely May-December affair has etched itself into our collective memory for the past 50 years.

In an early passage, Gray cannily pinpoints why Benjamin Braddock (played by Dustin Hoffman), a lethargic and malleable 21-year-old whose apathy has no apparent source, took root in ticket-buying Baby Boomers.

“We too — those of my generation — didn’t much want to face a life built on the bedrock of our elders’ choices,” Gray writes. “In Benjamin we found a hero willing to turn his back on the kind of bright, upper-middle-class future we weren’t sure we wanted.”

Gray makes hay of the casting brouhaha that surrounded the then-scandalous film, directed by Mike Nichols. Doris Day was first pursued for the role of Mrs. Robinson, with an interest in subverting her wholesome image. (Anne Bancroft got the role.) And Robert Redford, who’d been directed by Nichols in the Broadway comedy Barefoot in the Park, was originally considered for Benjamin (though Nichols found him to be too attractive for the part).

Nichols fought to cast the short, more homely Hoffman against type, and Gray recalls a spate of nasty commentary about the up-and-coming actor’s looks when the film was released.

USA TODAY says ★★★ out of four. “Fascinating.”

Spy of the First Person by Sam Shepard; Knopf, 82 pp.; fiction

In this slender, cryptic, almost hallucinatory work of autobiographical fiction, an unnamed narrator grapples with an ALS-like illness; Shepard died of complications of the disease (also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease) at age 73 on July 27.

USA TODAY says ★★★. “Unsettling, yet brave.”

The Best American Comics 2017; Ben Katchor, guest editor, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 371 pp.; fiction/non-fiction

This year’s roundup of indie comics from graphic novels, magazines and the Internet includes plenty of interesting oddities, such as Ben Duncan’s “Get In Where U Fit In,” which imagines a guy trying to find his way in an orgy where everybody looks like a balloon animal.

USA TODAY says ★★★. “A mix of the surreal and the real…the autobiographical entries are great.”

The Best American Short Stories 2017; Meg Wolitzer, guest editor; Mariner, 280 pp.; fiction

Sex, sexuality and every storyteller’s favorite meme, ambiguity, dominate this year’s story collection.

USA TODAY says ★★★ . “Well-written…for comic relief, try T.C. Boyle’s ‘Are We Not Men?’, a satirical gem."

The Best American Essays 2017; Leslie Jamison, guest editor; Mariner, 282 pp.; non-fiction

In her introduction, American novelist Leslie Jamison works to answer the question: Why does the essay matter? This collection proves that essays matter quite a lot.

USA TODAY says ★★★ ½. “A remarkably diverse anthology… These essays challenge personal and political assumptions and show us life in all it complexities and contradictions.”

Contributing reviewers: Andrea Mandell, Jocelyn McClurg, Brian Truitt, Alia E. Dastagir