Summer Reading Challenge Update

Done

The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins

"Do you really mean to say that you don't feel any interest in what we are going to do?" he asked. "Mr. Bruff, you have no more imagination than a cow!"

"A cow is a very useful animal, Mr. Blake," said the lawyer.

In Progress

One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez

On June 5th I wrote: "I am on page 200, but I have come to the conclusion that it will take me one hundred years of solitude to be able to understand the importance of this novel. I should have been suspicious when I saw it was an Oprah choice...sigh."

Two readers wrote with their sympathy, having read Solitude without much satisfaction, but Mrs. M-mv wrote these words:

When I read Marquez (or Tolstoy or Gogol or Chekov, for that matter), I am confronted by a concern for all that is lost in translation. Oh, to be able to read the works in the native languages of their authors.

We can meet good (or great) books at the wrong time, just as we can meet good people at the wrong time. Perhaps this just isn't Marquez's time with you. I confess to feeling like a friend rushing in to ensure that you don't write so-n-so off simply because she neglected to call before stopping by. (*wry grin*) Set it aside for some other time, but don't dismiss Solitude as an Oprah choice. There are too many other books in her club that fit that moniker (Crown River? Icy Sparks? Back Roads? The Pilot's Wife?); I felt compelled to rescue the few don't-miss selections from suspicion!

Rest assured, Solitude will be in my vacation stack, and I believe it will benefit from the longer reading stretches those lazy days will provide. Right now, as we bob and weave between piano recitals, home projects, summer school and visiting friends, my reading is done in snatches. These days are perfect for the likes of Sayers' book of essays, but Solitude's demand for an hour or two at a time will have to wait until next Saturday.

So, thanks for the sympathetic emails, my friends; it's nice to know I am not the only one who has struggled through this book. Thanks as well to Mrs. M-mv for standing up for beautiful writing. Marquez DOES write beautifully; I just need time to hear the music.

Letters to a Diminished Church: Passionate Arguments for the Relevance of Christian Doctrine by Dorothy Sayers.

A chapter or two a week is my pace, and it is working perfectly. I love how Sayers writes.

Murder at Markham by Patricia Houck Sprinkle

Last night I had a rare bit of insomnia, and Ms. Sprinkle kept me company in the wee hours of the morning. Not gripping enough to stay awake, but enjoyable.

The Vacation Stack

Founding Brothers by Joseph Ellis

The Red House Mystery by A.A. Milne

Norms and Nobility: A Treatise on Education by David Hicks

Two of the days of our vacation will be spent in a get-away to the coast for our 20th anniversary. This may not be your idea of reading on a romantic get-away, but we can't wait. If that is strange, then I will revel in the fact that I had the good fortune to marry an equal in strangeness.

On the Art of Writing by Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch.

A good portion of our first week of vacation will be spent enjoying the company of Miss Autumn Rain and her family, and this is on her summer reading list, too. I am hoping for afternoon tea time spent reading a chapter or two (as long as I can have coffee.)

And, can any summer reading challenge be complete without adding books to the list? Of course not.

When All the World Was Young by Barbara Holland, thanks to this entry at Mental multivitamin

and

A Cat Named Darwin: Embracing the Bond Between Man and Pet by William Jordan, thanks to a recommendation by reader Ann Marie.