BBC weather is saying that Britain's got about three more days of summer before the rain comes back for a second miserable pummelling. Yes, that's right, there's only three days left to brown your biceps, BBQ the most obscure meat you find at Tesco and swoon at fit girls in floaty dresses – time is running out, you need to use these next 72 hours wisely.

That means spending lunchtime down the park, checking out the sunbathing babes and expanding your mind with an epic summer read. And who better to recommend a book that'll get the ladies thinking you're a deep, mysterious character than FHM footie fave, Joey Barton.

Check out Joey's list of pontificating page-turners then nip down to Waterstones to buy all five, nab the best bench at the park, arrange your reading material about your person and watch the ladies come a-running.

Joey Barton’s Top 5 Summer Reads

1. Horsetrader : Robert Sangster and the Rise and Fall of the Sport of Kings by Patrick Robinson with Nick Robinson

“It was a really fascinating read, socially to see what was going on and the way of the world back then. And obviously because I’m interested in horses.”

2. Nineteen Eighty-four by George Orwell

"It reminds me so much of what I see in society. I think I’m very Orwellian, I love the way I think about the system. I think corporate structure has replaced what the government and the state used to be."

3. Bounce by Matthew Syed

"Bounce is one of the best books I’ve read. It just advocates the right mindset to be good at whatever it may be, whether that’s being a butcher or a tennis player or a golfer or a journalist. It is literally giving you the fundamentals of what it takes to succeed. The book is basically about the fact that talent is a myth that doesn’t exist."

4. Open Season by George Galloway

"It’s about the Irish catholics in Scotland and the fact he thinks there is still a massive element of racial abuse in Scotland. It gave me a really good understanding of that Irish heritage. Everyone in Liverpool can trace their ancestry back to Ireland, and my great great grandfather was Irish so there’s an element of it in me. I’m not Irish at all, there’s nothing about me that’s Irish although you grew up in that culture so obviously it is there somewhere in your lineage."

5. Steve Jobs: The Exclusive Biography by Walter Isaacson

“He’s a really intriguing character. I’d seen a documentary on him but there was a lot I didn’t know. He almost seems semi bi-polar. He’d walk round Apple in no shoes, he wouldn’t use deodorant to the point where they had to throw him out of the office, he was that bad. He built a factory when Apple got big and he painted the machines a certain colour and he went apeshit because the colours weren’t a certain tone. He was obsessive about the smallest detail which can obviously be infuriating but is also a mark of the man’s genius in terms of the products that he has put out. But you look at him and think, ‘Fucking hell, he must have been a right fucker to work with’."