You know it's really hot when I don't even have the energy to complain about how disgusting the weather is at the moment. I can't even concentrate on writing a proper post, so just a few reading notes to kick off the weekend and then the computer can rest and so can I!
I've been spending most of my reading time with a very few books (can you believe it, neither can I!). In part I really want to finish a few more books before the end of the month and make a few inroads into that towering in progress pile, in part because I have other books at the ready to start when I finish them, and in great part because it is too hot to schlep a heavy bookbag home from work these days.
First up and I hope to finish before the end of July, Jane Smiley's Some Luck, which I have been greatly enjoying. In case you aren't familiar with it, it is the first of three books covering a century in the lives of one Iowa farm family. I am just starting 1942. It's the sort of read where not a lot happens but a lot happens. Maybe it is like looking through a macro photo lens rather than a micro lens since not much detail can be shared when each chapter is one full year. This first book stops at 1953 so I've only about a decade left. I am liking the story more and more the further into it I get.
Then moving on to the mid-1970s is Judith Rossner's Looking for Mr. Goodbar, which is a really interesting story. It certainly has that 70s feel yet it is the portrait of this young woman that I am most intrigued with. She is a very complex character. In many ways I don't necessarily like her or understand her, yet I am still very sympathetic towards her, too. It makes for very compelling reading.
And then there is Lisa Jewell's The Girls in the Garden which is easy and I am finding that I am flying through it. There is a feeling of menace to the story. The reader is presented with a crime and now the possible suspects are coming out of the woodwork. So many devious characters with potentially so much to hide. It has a Rear Window-ish feel to it since it is set in a small community of houses overlooking a common green space where the young people mingle. I'm just not sure if the presentation of so many possible suspects isn't a little too obvious. However, it is certainly not stopping me turning the pages quickly. Really you couldn't ask for a better story to read on a sultry summer night.
I've finished the last stories in my Sylvia Townsend Warner collection but fear those last few weren't just a little rushed. As much as I enjoyed the stories I was just ready to be done. I have a few collections in mind and something new on the way in the mail, but I think for this weekend it will be a story from the Alice Hoffman collection and a couple of random stories I found in an anthology in the library, which I will share more about next Monday. A little palate cleansing before embarking on the next volume of stories.
And a few books on my radar this weekend (and hopefully to be explored more next week when it will hopefully at least be less suffocating weather-wise), a book by Zen Cho, the new one by Ruth Ware and some excitement involving Richmal Crompton. Oh, and I've been thinking about vacation reading--both in preparation for Estes Park, Colorado and what might be going with me for that long drive there and back (and maybe a little time spent reading by a nice, Cool, rushing river. So, a few teasers of good bookishness to come. I hope you have a cool and breezy (and book-filled) weekend!