The first book I started reading was the wonderful book: Under the Tuscan Sun." In this memoir of her buying, renovating, and living in an abandoned villa in Tuscany, Frances Mayes reveals the sensual pleasure she found living in rural Italy, and the generous spirit she brought with her. She revels in the sunlight and the color, the long view of her valley, the warm homey architecture, the languor of the slow paced days, the vigor of working her garden, and the intimacy of her dealings with the locals. Cooking, gardening, tiling and painting are never chores, but skills to be learned, arts to be practiced, and above all to be enjoyed. At the same time Mayes brings a literary and intellectual mind to bear on the experience, adding depth to this account of her enticing rural idyll. I loved the book so much I purchased it for myself and immediately after getting it and finishing half of it...I put it down and can't seem to get reading it again.
And then it was a children's fantasy, "First Test." Pierce begins a new sequence of books set in her imaginary kingdom of Tortall with a new heroine, 10-year-old Keladry, who must fight her way through her first year of knight training as a page. Despite Alanna's success years before (recounted in The Lioness Quartet), both the knight trainer, Lord Wyldon, and Kel's fellow pages oppose a girl being introduced into the program, so Kel uses her wits and courage to overcome the many obstacles set for her in her probationary year. Pierce takes small liberties with her medieval setting (Kel has a privy and eats with cutlery) but does a fine job making Kel's perceptions of the concrete details come to life. Part school story, complete with bullies; part fantasy with powerful evil creatures such as the disgusting Spidren; and part animal story as Kel makes friends with a flock of sparrows and bonds with her balky gelding Peachblossom, this is a splendidly rousing feast. I bought the series years ago and had not read it. I purchased the audiobook of "First Test" and after listening to half of it decided to read the book. I am about half way through this book also and I have put it down, too.
The last book I read about 100 pages of was "The Devil Wears Prada." It's a killer title: The Devil Wears Prada. And it's killer material: author Lauren Weisberger did a stint as assistant to Anna Wintour, the all-powerful editor of Vogue magazine. Now she's written a book, and this is its theme: narrator Andrea Sachs goes to work for Miranda Priestly, the all-powerful editor of Runway magazine. Turns out Miranda is quite the bossyboots. That's pretty much the extent of the novel, but it's plenty. Miranda's behavior is so insanely over-the-top that it's a gas to see what she'll do next, and to try to guess which incidents were culled from the real-life antics of the woman who's been called Anna "Nuclear" Wintour. For instance, when Miranda goes to Paris for the collections, Andrea receives a call back at the New York office (where, incidentally, she's not allowed to leave her desk to eat or go to the bathroom, lest her boss should call). Miranda bellows over the line: "I am standing in the pouring rain on the rue de Rivoli and my driver has vanished. Vanished! Find him immediately!" I bought the book at the airport a week ago, since of course as a book lover and a librarian I cannot be without a book. I had two in my suitcase, but what did that matter?
What is the moral of this story. "All of these books are interesting and I would suggest them to a patron or a friend. I probably will go back and finish them someday. But as my daughter Jennifer (a reader of everything from Darwin to "Garlic and Sapphires: The Secret Life of a Critic in Disguise") said to me; "Mom, maybe its time to take a break from reading...remember you are supposed to enjoy reading...it should not be a chore."
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