BOOK REVIEWS

I know it’s been a really long time since I’ve written here. As I explained in my last entry, Russ and I have been rather pre-occupied with the search for a new home. That’s really no excuse, though. Life needs to go on. But writing anything at all has just been on the back burner for some time now. But starting right now, I’d like to change that, I’d like life to feel a little more….shall we say….balanced? And one of the things I’d like to do is to get back to my LJ. So here I am, ready to say….”Hmmm…what’s on my mind?”

Besides my new house, I mean!!! I could go on and on about my new house, but I don’t want to be a bore. It struck me the other day that Russ and I may be in danger of exhibiting the “New Parent Syndrome” — not because we have a new baby, but because of the new house! In many ways, a new house is somewhat like a new baby. There’s this kind of obsessiveness that overtakes when something this big comes into your life, especially after you’ve been waiting for it for so long. But I will try not to be too boring, and move on to some other things that are going on in my life.

Well, what else is going on? Besides the new house, not too much. But I can say this: I have been reading some pretty good books lately. And I’ve been enjoying that sense of escape and relaxation that you get from reading a good book. It’s one of life’s chief joys, I think. Television and movies are good too, but they’re not the same as books. I love that books are so portable, and so “low-tech.” You can take a book with you anywhere. You can read as much or as little as you want (or have time for!) during a single session. Books are at YOUR command. They are always there, always waiting, always the same. Dependable. And they also usually smell really good.

Right now I am reading two books. One is The Cat Who Went Underground, which is several books into the series of “Cat Who” books by Lillian Jackson Braun. It was my Mom who got me started with the Cat Who series. The main character is Jim Qwilleran, a fiftyish newspaper reporter who has a “luxuriant” moustache, and so of course he looks like Tom Selleck (in my mind, anyway.) Anytime I can have Tom Selleck on my mind is an okay time as far as I’m concerned.

The stories are not really that intense or involved. Basically you follow Qwilleran around his little town, meet the people he knows, enjoy the antics of his two Siamese cats, and somewhere along the way, there will be a murder (or two or three), which Qwilleran will eventually solve. The murders are pretty much besides the point, though. The whole point in reading these books is simply to enjoy spending some time in this very specific world, and being amused by the cats, Koko and Yum Yum. I think if you are a “cat person,” like I am, you get a little extra warm fuzzy feeling from these books.

Oh yes! There is another reason for reading these books. To see what Qwill eats. Food always plays a major role in every story. Since he’s a bachelor, and at this point quite wealthy, he’s always going out to eat, so you’re always getting good descriptions of food and restaurants. There are also several women characters who are excellent cooks, and they all always seem to delight in serving him dinner. In fact, someone has put together a Cat Who Cookbook in which they have tried to re-create many of the meals and specialties mentioned in the book. If I was more interested in cooking, I might like to give a few of these recipes a try. Hey! Maybe once I have my new kitchen… 🙂

Now, I do have one complaint about these books. I mentioned that you “meet the people” that Qwill knows. And believe me, there are a LOT of people! A lot of characters! Some of them remain from book to book, but some of them come and go. Sometimes it feels like a cast of thousands! Sometimes it’s hard to keep track of who’s who. But like I said, it’s not really about these extra characters, or the murders, it’s about Qwill and the cats. As long as you’re not expecting great literature, and all you want is to visit a cozy, comfortable place, these Cat Who books serve quite well.

Now, I am also reading another book. This one was recommended by Mary. No, let me rephrase that, and give the background. Last year, at some point, for some occasion which I don’t remember, though it may have been my birthday, I told Mary that for a gift I would like her to choose some of her favorite books, go to half.com and buy and send me a couple of those books. So that’s what she did.

One books she sent me was So You Want to Be a Wizard. I tried. I honestly tried to read this book, but I just found it a bit juvenile. Mostly, I objected to the fact that since the theme of the book is, in fact, wizardry, the author seemed to think that she could just make stuff up as she went along. All kinds of crazy stupid stuff was happening, and the only explanation was “wizardry.” I didn’t know if I was coming or going. I almost felt like the author was making fun of me, for not thinking this stuff up first. I just didn’t go for that.

So I put down that book and picked up the other book Mary had sent me, Bloody Jack, by L.A. Meyer. And I was entranced from the first sentence. Bloody Jack, (Being an Account of the Curious Adventures of Mary “Jacky” Faber, Ship’s Boy)is a first person account of a London “guttersnipe” who poses as a boy in order to get onto a Royal Navy ship in the 1800’s, simply so she’ll know where her next meal is coming from. She’s a pip, that’s for sure, a very interesting and likeable character. She makes her own trouble, then laments and cries, “Oh why can’t I be good? Why can’t I be good?” She’s high spirited, and a lot of fun, as you watch her growing up in her unusual circumstances, always using her wits and her talents to better her situation. She claims she’s not brave, and yet she does a lot of brave things.

I’ve finished that first book, and am now working on the second installment in the series, The Curse of the Blue Tattoo. A rolling good time! I highly recommend.

It’s such a joy to find that the books I’m reading and enjoying are part of a SERIES, that there are in fact “lots more where that came from.” Nothing worse than coming to the end of a good book. And nothing better than picking up the next book in the series, and once again settling down in that familiar world, with those same familiar characters.

Well, I could go on and on, if I started to talk about P.G. Wodehouse, and I could even mention the Twilight series which I recently finished. But that’s enough for now. It feels good to be writing again, even if it’s only to write about what other people are writing.