WHAT I AM READING

My oh my. It has been two weeks since I have posted. Bad blogger.

But I have been reading, of course. And I have been writing! I mean real writing, not just my journal and my micro reviews. Because of the book on writing which I mentioned last time, I finally got going again on my novel, reworking the first chapter. I also helped a friend from one of my reading groups get her writing group going again by hosting it at my house. We had our first meeting last night and it was super great. Four out of five people read things and they were all good. I polished up the first half of a short story I had started long ago and now I am inspired (by their kind and helpful comments) to finish it and maybe even submit it somewhere.

Meanwhile I scaled the mountain of huge books and actually finished Andersonville, by MacKinlay Kantor. It was a bestseller in 1955 about a POW camp in Georgia during the Civil War. Gruesome, long but quite good. Then I read The Historian, by Elizabeth Kostova, which I had been wanting to read since it was published. After Andersonville at 760 pages, it was almost 100 pages shorter at 642, but dense, full of history and situated in eastern Europe, where my geography is sketchy at best. I learned lots but also loved the story. It is about the legend of Dracula and these are not your Stephenie Meyer vampires. Oh no.

I also read two other books from 1955 by Robert Heinlein and Norman Mailer and I am almost through one by Robert Penn Warren. Veering back and forth in a span of 50 years does make my head spin at times. Then there is the fact that I have been alive through all those years and more.

I still have not finished The Second Sex. Hopefully this week. Another goal this week is to finish the long overdue next chapter of my memoir. Why oh why do I have to go to work, cook, do laundry, etc, etc, etc?

As always, I would love to hear what you are reading. Has anyone read The Story of Edgar Sawtelle yet? Even more exciting to me is the new Toni Morrison which comes out in a few weeks I believe.