Reading report
Due to all the snow, it’s time to list the most entertaining books I’m reading.
(1) Henry Fielding, Tom Jones. This’ll last forever. I average just one or two little chapters each day. I believe there are over two hundred. Daniel, roughhousing, caused me to drop the unread paperback I’d owned for twenty years; the cover and spine broke. The cover of my replacement copy shows Tom leching. I haven’t gotten there in the story. Tom is still an infant nearly a hundred pages in. He’s clearly on his way to ignominy, due to the circumstances of his birth. I plan to alternate between Fielding and Richardson: Tom Jones; Pamela; Joseph Andrews and/or Shamela; and, finally, the grandmommy, Clarissa. Wish me luck.
BTW, Daniel says dozens of words but just started saying “no!” this week. It’s his favorite word.
Back to the books.
(2) Michael Lewis, Going Infinite, about Sam Bankman-Fried. One chapter per day, most days. It’s a library book, so I can’t dawdle over it indefinitely.
(3) Nancy Mitford, Highland Fling (just completed) and now Christmas Pudding. Delightful. The scenes of old nobles and ex-military shooting grouse are especially compelling. I may race through all these novels and Mitford’s aristocratic histories and then finish reading the journalism and memoirs of her sister, Jessica, which I began some years ago and then put off. I think I’ve got the correct order now. One ought to read Nancy to appreciate Jessica, not vice versa.
(4) H. Rider Haggard, King Solomon’s Mines. I read half of this many years ago. I enjoyed it but am a chronic unfinisher of books. Until I’m not. It can take decades.
(5) Dolores Hitchens, Sleep with Slander. I read Sleep with Strangers in October. This second novel is ten times better. The private eye is hired to track down a young adoptee who may or may not be suffering abuse. The search should be straightforward. But everyone lies to the P.I. – even the people who have the child’s interest at heart. I dread what’s to come.
I regret to say I’m dragging my feet over the not-very-entertaining Coriolanus. It does have this going for it, that although the hero’s friends and enemies alternately tediously praise and condemn him, he isn’t very interested; he shows up, hears some praise or condemnation, and then is like, I’m bored with you morons, and exits. The Shakespeare-hating Sam Bankman-Fried might have enjoyed this. No, probably not.
(1) Henry Fielding, Tom Jones. This’ll last forever. I average just one or two little chapters each day. I believe there are over two hundred. Daniel, roughhousing, caused me to drop the unread paperback I’d owned for twenty years; the cover and spine broke. The cover of my replacement copy shows Tom leching. I haven’t gotten there in the story. Tom is still an infant nearly a hundred pages in. He’s clearly on his way to ignominy, due to the circumstances of his birth. I plan to alternate between Fielding and Richardson: Tom Jones; Pamela; Joseph Andrews and/or Shamela; and, finally, the grandmommy, Clarissa. Wish me luck.
BTW, Daniel says dozens of words but just started saying “no!” this week. It’s his favorite word.
Back to the books.
(2) Michael Lewis, Going Infinite, about Sam Bankman-Fried. One chapter per day, most days. It’s a library book, so I can’t dawdle over it indefinitely.
(3) Nancy Mitford, Highland Fling (just completed) and now Christmas Pudding. Delightful. The scenes of old nobles and ex-military shooting grouse are especially compelling. I may race through all these novels and Mitford’s aristocratic histories and then finish reading the journalism and memoirs of her sister, Jessica, which I began some years ago and then put off. I think I’ve got the correct order now. One ought to read Nancy to appreciate Jessica, not vice versa.
(4) H. Rider Haggard, King Solomon’s Mines. I read half of this many years ago. I enjoyed it but am a chronic unfinisher of books. Until I’m not. It can take decades.
(5) Dolores Hitchens, Sleep with Slander. I read Sleep with Strangers in October. This second novel is ten times better. The private eye is hired to track down a young adoptee who may or may not be suffering abuse. The search should be straightforward. But everyone lies to the P.I. – even the people who have the child’s interest at heart. I dread what’s to come.
I regret to say I’m dragging my feet over the not-very-entertaining Coriolanus. It does have this going for it, that although the hero’s friends and enemies alternately tediously praise and condemn him, he isn’t very interested; he shows up, hears some praise or condemnation, and then is like, I’m bored with you morons, and exits. The Shakespeare-hating Sam Bankman-Fried might have enjoyed this. No, probably not.