The wheels have really come off of my plans for the week–boh in terms of writing and reading. Real Life can be such a drag, you know? But we’re at the mid-point, and hopefully, I can recover a bit. And if not? At least I’m spending some time with these good books that I’m about to talk about in this WWW Wednesday.
This meme was formerly hosted by MizB at A Daily Rhythm and revived on Taking on a World of Words—and shown to me by Aurore-Anne-Chehoke at Diary-of-a-black-city-girl.
The Three Ws are:
What are you currently reading?
What did you recently finish reading?
What do you think you’ll read next?
Easy enough, right?
What are you currently reading?
I’m reading the third DetectiveEve Ronin thriller, Gated Prey by Lee Goldberg, and am listening to book about a woman on the other side of the law, Finlay Donovan Is Killing It by Elle Cosimano, Angela Dawe (Narrator) on audiobook.
What did you recently finish reading?
I just finished Stephan Pastis’s Squirrel Do Bad, a MG Graphic Novel, and Dark Arts and a Daiquiri by Annette Marie, Cris Dukehart (Narrator), another adventure for Tori and her mystik pals on audio.
What do you think you’ll read next?
My next book should be Dust & Grim by Chuck Wendig—which might be a bit too much MG in one week for me, but library due dates are calling the shots, you know? My next audiobook should be Fallen by Benedict Jacka, Gildart Jackson (Narrator), as I get close to wrapping up this re-read through the series.
How are you spending the last week of October?
Allyson Johnson
I haven’t finished anything since last time I commented – still slogging through Milton’s “Paradise Lost” (I’d be enjoying it more if I didn’t know how it turns out. ) Milton does have a way with a word, and his portrait of the marital relationship between Adam and Eve hints that there may have been trouble in Eden even before the serpent wriggled between them. Of course, Milton wasn’t too successful at marriage himself, so he may have had a hard time depicting a perfect one.
I’m within the last 150 pp of Tartt’s “The Goldfinch.” After 600 pages committed to Theo, the progagonist, I REALLY want a Happy Ever After for him, but at this point (about to rendezvous with a nervous gangster swindler in a remote warehouse outside of Amsterdam) things don’t look good. Tartt’s writing is engaging, the plot is constantly swerving in new directions (that’s why the hint above is not really a spoiler, since five pages earlier I could have had NO idea how this came about), and Theo is a sadly human protagonist, dealt a bad hand by Fate at the beginning of the book and playing it poorly. Echoes of “Oliver Twist” throughout.
Next I might read Ann Packer’s collection of short stories, “Swim Back to Me.” Ann’s mother Nancy H. Packer is one of our great short story writers whom I happened to know personally for awhile. I wanted badly to like Ann’s “Dive from Clausen’s Pier” more than I did, but I was disappointed in the ending. (Endings are hard for any writer; look at the mess Wallace Stegner made of ending “Angle of Repose” and “Rock Candy Mountain.”) Maybe I can love Ann’s short stories as much as I do her mother’s. Worth a try.
Allyson Johnson
I breezed through “The Nine Tailors”, one of Dorothy Sayers’ Lord Peter Wimsey mysteries. The opening is terrific, with Lord Peter at his most breezily charming, His man Bunter at his imperturbable and resourceful best, and a supporting cast of great vintage characters.
Dorothy does go overboard occasionally in arcane explorations. In this case, it’s the art of English change-ringing. (Don’t bother to look it up – it’s the first time Wikipedia and Google Search have let me down.) But you can skim throught those parts without missing the gist of the mystery.
I’m still plugging away at Milton’s “Paradise Lost.” Books 7 and 8 are mostly a lot of mansplaining between Adam and Archangel Rafael, and there are a few hints in Milton’s description of the relationship between Adam and Eve which indicate there may have been trouble in Paradise before the serpent got there. I would probably enjoy it more if I didn’t know how it was going to turn out.
And I just finished “The Goldfinch” by Donna Tartt. Very Dickensian, both in characters (there is a lot of Oliver Twist and of David Copperfield in protagonist Theo Decker) and in plot (but not to give away spoilers). The ending is difficult – but then if you have been with a set of characters for over 700 pages, it must be as hard for the author as for the reader to wind them down.
Next, I’ll probably read “Swim Back to Me”, a collection of short stores by Ann Packer. Ann’s mother, Nancy H. Packer, was one of the greatest short story writers/ memoirists of all time, in my view. I knew her personally for awhile, and I REALLY wanted to like Ann’s “Dive from Clausen’s Pier.” Again, I was disappointed in the ending, but maybe I love the short stories.