Tuesday Teasers ~ Q&A style

Question #1:  Noah asked the two owls, cramped in their little compartment, "Why don't we hear any sound from you?"  What was their palindromic retort?  (Gen.7:9)
Answer:  "Too hot to hoot."

Question #2:  On which day of the week were the twins, Esau and Jacob, born?

Answer:  On two's-day.

Question #3:  Why is a trip to Egypt only for the very old?  (Exodus 7:17)

Answer:  It is a see-Nile experience.

Quotes are from pages 42, 72, and 92 of Encyclopedia of Biblical Humor by Rabbi Maurice Lyons, 1990, humor

One more laugh:  There's a typo on the cover.  The rabbi's calligraphy wasn't perfect, so some e's look like a's.  In the Prologue he wrote:

"Zeyde (never "Grandpa"), how about composing a Bible riddle-book and general, humorous observations of the Bible?"

The cover says "Zeyda Moshe," but Zeyda means Grandma.  The two words together say "Grandma Moses."  But she's an American folk artist who has absolutely nothing to do with this book.  Maurice Lyons was a rabbi in St. Louis.

Teaser ~ a memoir I recommend

Small Steps: The Year I Got Polio ~ by Peg Kehret, 1996, memoir, 9.5/10

"Why were you out of bed?" ...
"I was doing the hula," I said. ...
"The hula?"
"Alice didn't know what the hula is," explained Renée.
"So Peg was going to show her," Dorothy added.
Shaking her head in disbelief, Willie helped me into bed and warned me to stay there.  "In all my years of nursing," she said, "I've never had a polio patient try to dance the hula" (p. 102).

Peg Schulze became Peg Kehret when I married Carl Kehret.  We have two children, Anne and Bob, and I wept for joy the day they got their first polio vaccinations" (p. 172).

I saw this on Donna's shelf, borrowed it, read it straight through in one sitting, and have already returned it to Donna.  Here's what the book is about:

In a riveting story of courage and hope, Peg Kehret writes about months spent in a hospital when she was twelve, first struggling to survive a severe case of polio, then slowly learning to walk again.

I don't want to talk yet

"I turned to Mark, then one and a half, and asked, 'Mark, why don't you talk yet?'  As we expected, he said nothing.  But later that evening, while I was giving him a bath, and he was maneuvering plastic boats and small floating dinosaurs, he suddenly stopped, looked at me, and said, 'I don't want to talk yet.'  Astonished, since I'd never heard him speak a complete sentence, I burst out laughing, then sang him a song from the Mikado, about a bird that didn't want to talk" (p. 73).

Why Religion? : A Personal Story ~ by Elaine Pagels, 2018, memoir

Why does religion still exist in the twenty-first century?  Why do so many continue to argue about the questions it raises?  What purpose does it serve in our lives?  In the wake of great personal tragedy, Pagels reflects on the persistence and nature of belief and why religion matters.

I'm "teasing" you with a bit of a paragraph from the book I'm reading.  Her little boy has a mind of his own!

Teaser Tuesday ~ reluctant centenarian

The 100-Year-Old Man Who Climbed Out the Window and Disappeared ~ by Jonas Jonasson, 2012, fiction (Sweden)

First, the teaser

You might think he could have made up his mind earlier, and been man enough to inform his surroundings of his decision.  But Allan Karlsson had never been given to pondering things too long.

So the idea had barely taken hold in the old man's head before he opened the window of his room on the ground floor of the Old Folks' Home in the town of Malmköping, and stepped out ― into the flower bed.

This maneuver required a bit of effort, since Allan was 100 years old, on this very day in fact.  There was less than an hour to go before his birthday party would begin in the lounge of the Old Folks' Home.  The mayor would be there.  And the local paper.  And all the other old people.  And the entire staff, led by bad-tempered Director Alice.

It was only the Birthday Boy himself who didn't intend to turn up.

Synopsis

A reluctant centenarian much like Forrest Gump (if Gump were an explosives expert with a fondness for vodka) decides it's not too late to start over.  After a long and eventful life, Allan Karlsson ends up in a nursing home, believing it to be his last stop.  The only problem is that he's still in good health, and in one day, he turns 100.  A big celebration is in the works, but Allan really isn't interested (and he'd like a bit more control over his vodka consumption).  So he decides to escape.  He climbs out the window in his slippers and embarks on a hilarious and entirely unexpected journey, involving, among other surprises, a suitcase stuffed with cash, some unpleasant criminals, a friendly hot-dog stand operator, and an elephant (not to mention a death by elephant).

It would be the adventure of a lifetime for anyone else, but Allan has a larger-than-life backstory:  Not only has he witnessed some of the most important events of the twentieth century, but he has actually played a key role in them.  Starting out in munitions as a boy, he somehow finds himself involved in many of the key explosions of the twentieth century and travels the world, sharing meals and more with everyone from Stalin, Churchill, and Truman to Mao, Franco, and de Gaulle.  This book is quirky and utterly unique.

If this video quits working, view it on YouTube.

What teased me about this book

That teaser up above is the book's beginning.  As a matter of fact, it's the whole first chapter.  It immediately brought to my mind the picture of a Confederate soldier named Inman, who stepped out of a hospital window and started walking back home to Ada, the woman he loved.  That was in Cold Mountain, Charles Frazier's 1997 book.  There was nothing humorous about Inman's walking away, no stepping into a flower bed outside the window, no discovering (two sentences into the next chapter) that he was wearing indoor slippers and had forgotten to bring his hat.  Would you have kept reading?  I was hooked and bought the book for my Kindle.

Beginning ~ with a decision

Do One Thing Different: And Other Uncommonly Sensible Solutions to Life's Persistent Problems ~ by Bill O'Hanlon, 1999, psychology

I came to the solution-oriented approach by a very personal route.  In 1971, I decided to kill myself.  Now, this may seem like a strange introduction for a book designed to inspire you, but that's where it all began for me.

These are not the first lines of the book, since they are near the bottom of the third page.  But this feels like where the book begins.  The author even calls these words "a strange introduction for a book."  At the beginning of the first chapter (on page one) is this epigraph.

Chapter 1
ANALYSIS PARALYSIS
From Liabilities to Possibilities

Socrates said the unexamined life is not worth living.  But
the (over)examined life makes you wish you were dead.
Given the alternative, I'd rather be living. — Saul Bellow

"Makes you wish you were dead" connects with what I think of as the beginning, where O'Hanlon says, "I decided to kill myself."  Yes, definitely a connection there.  And I definitely want to keep reading to find out how to "move quickly from stuck to smooth sailing in all aspects of [my] life."

Gilion at Rose City Reader hosts Book Beginnings on Fridays. Click here for today's Mister Linky.

Teaser Tuesday 1/3/17

Why Are There More Questions Than Answers, Grandad? ~ by Kenneth Mahood, 1974, children's, 10/10

This is a picture book, so the best way to "quote" it is by showing a picture.  The book is about a boy who asks too many questions and is given, by his badgered grandad, an overwhelming task to keep him quiet and out of mischief.  Poor Grandad carries an umbrella (see it on the cover?) to keep from being drenched from Sandy's unending questions.  It turns out that the red book in the attic really does have all the answers!  And here are some more "random" pages.

Click the images to enlarge them.  Sandy gave up on his Grandad's "impossible task" of having this huge room spic and span before dinner.  Instead of cleaning, he opened a large red book he had found.

In the book were "pictures of everything from ARKS to ZULUS, and a lot more besides."  Finding a parrot, Sandy began his usual questions.  "I wonder if parrots can really talk?"  Oh, yeah!  The parrot flew up out of the book saying, "Properly perspicacious parrots prattle perfectly."

And Paddy the parrot knew the book had the answer to Sandy's problem under CLEANING.  They dusted and vacuumed and one thing led to another, until (please excuse my adult language) all hell burst loose.  Soldiers arrived, but their cannon started a fire, which necessitated firemen, of course.

But the firemen flooded the place, and Grandad could be heard coming up the stairs.  Now what?  "It would take a magician to get me out of this!" moaned Sandy.  See the parrot opening the book to M for magician?

For Teaser Tuesday, we're supposed to share two “teaser” sentences from a random page in the book we are reading, without giving away any spoilers.  This is a children's book and preschoolers don't care about spoilers, since they love to read a book over and over and over again.  On the last page (notice that I'm giving you another spoiler), Grandad is the one asking the questions:

"How on earth did you do it? ... What was all that noise about? ... Did I hear shooting? ... Who was playing the violin? ... How did you move all that furniture? ... Where did that parrot come from? ... Did I hear a fire engine? ... Who were you talking to? ... Am I imagining things, Sandy?"  And Sandy tells him, "The answers are all in the book, Grandad!"

Now the surprise I found online.  Amazon has a "poor copy" for £490.00 in the UK, and AbeBooks has a copy for US$ 796.86 shipped from the UK (maybe the same book?) and two in "very good" condition for US$ 334.71 and US$ 15.38.  My copy, found in a free bin at a used book store several years ago, is in poor shape.  Some pages have been torn (but none ripped out), and the book was discarded from a library in Louisiana.  My cover is in good shape compared to the image above that I found online, with only bumped corners.  The pages could be taped back together, and all the words and pictures are there.  Neither of my libraries has a copy.  What would you pay to own this book?

Teaser TWOsday ~ Recycled Reads

Two teasers on TWOsday from The Hidden Stairs and the Magic Carpet by Tony Abbott, 1999, children's chapter book.

(#1)  "Thginot Dekcatta Eb Lliw Frodnefroz" (p. 30).

(#2)  "Neal started running along the path.  He rushed into a clearing.  And he bumped his nose on something that wasn't there" (p. 31).

"The Secrets of Droon" is a fantasy book series by Tony Abbott with illustrations by Tim Jessel that's aimed at elementary school-age children.  The princess in the book is ten years old.

Underneath the steps leading down to Eric’s basement is a hidden storage space.  It’s dusty and old — nothing special  at all.  But when Eric, Julie, and Neal all huddle inside the gray room together, something unbelievable happens.  A glittering light and then a rainbow-colored staircase appear.  And as the kids take their very first step down to the mysterious land of Droon, they know that only magic and adventure await them!

Here's the story of how I came to have this book in my hands.

I was shelving books in the small library in the Crown Center, which is a "senior living" facility.  In other words, we're all old folks who live here.  Yet there on the counter was this small book someone had left there among books to be shelved.  For starters, we don't have a children's section, obviously.  I noticed a big sticker covering the author's name.

It's similar to this one I found on the St. Louis County Library website.

SLCL is excited to introduce Recycled Reads.  The program takes surplus library materials and gives them another life by circulating them throughout the community, encouraging people to read while they wait.  Displays will be set up at over 60 locations throughout St. Louis County where people typically spend time waiting including laundromats, hair/nail salons, health care providers, auto care shops, and more.  A complete list of Recycled Reads locations is below.  No library card will be required to borrow the materials. There are no fines or due dates. Individuals are asked to return the items whenever they’re finished to the original locale.

The actual sticker on this book says:  "Return it to any SLCL location or Recycled Reads site."  So I plan to take it to my Mid-County branch the next time I go.  What a great idea, huh?  Oh, by the way!  Did you figure out the secret code in the #1 teaser above?  It's easy to do if you're ten years old.  Simply spell everything backwards, and "Thginot Dekcatta Eb Lliw Frodnefroz" ... becomes ... "Zorfendorf will be attacked tonight."

Tuesday teaser ~ inextricably connected

The Gifts of Imperfection: Let Go of Who You Think You're Supposed to Be and Embrace Who You Are ~ by Brené Brown, 2010

Quote from the book:  "Spirituality is recognizing and celebrating that we are all inextricably connected to each other by a power greater than all of us, and that our connection to that power and to one another is grounded in love and compassion.  Practicing spirituality brings a sense of perspective, meaning, and purpose to our lives."

I like this recognition of connection.  Since we are all connected, we could say we are one.

Islam
"Have you not considered how Allah sets forth a parable of a good word being like a good tree, whose root is firm and whose branches are in heaven?"
— Qur’an 14:24

Hinduism
"I am the fragrance of the Earth, the heat in fire. I am the life of all that lives."
— Lord Krishna, Bhagavad Gita 7.9

Judaism
"When God created the first human beings, God led them around all the trees of the Garden of Eden and said: ‘See my works how beautiful and praiseworthy they are! Think of this, and do not corrupt or destroy My world.’ "
— Ecclesiastes Rabbah 7

Christianity
"What is the kingdom of God like?… It is like a mustard seed that someone took and sowed in the garden; it grew and became a tree, and the birds of the air made nests in its branches."
— Jesus, Luke 13:18

Shintoism
"Return the thing given to the human as a gift of nature to its original place."
— Ancient Japanese Saying

Native Spirituality
"Great Spirit, help us learn the lessons you have hidden in every leaf and rock."
— Native American Prayer

Sikhism
"Air is the Guru, Water is the Father and Earth is the Great Mother of All."
— Guru Granth Sahib p. 8

Confucianism
"Does Heaven say anything?  The four seasons pursue their courses, and all things are continually being produced.  Does Heaven say anything?"
— Confucius, Analects 17:17

Jainism
"Nonviolence is the supreme religion. One who looks on the creatures of the Earth, big and small, as one’s own self, comprehends this immense world."
— Lord Mahavira

Zoroastrianism
"Who created the waters and the plants? Who yoked the swiftness of the winds and the motion of the clouds? For I beheld Ahura Mazda (Wise Lord) as the primeval source of creation."
— Gatha Ushtavaiti 44.4

Taoism
"In harmony with the Tao, the sky is clear and spacious, the Earth is solid and full, all creatures flourish together…"
— Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching 39 (Stephen Mitchell's translation, 56:13-32)

Buddhism
"Cut down the forest of desire, not the forest of trees."
— The Buddha, Dhammapada 283

Bahá’í Faith
"Know thou that every created thing is a sign of the revelation of God."
— Bahá’u’lláh, Gleanings 177

Unitarianism
"We affirm and promote respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part."
— Seventh Unitarianism Principle

The Green Rule
Do unto the Earth as you would have it do unto you

Teaser Tuesday ~ flying fast and flying high

Jonathan Livingston Seagull: A Story ~ by Richard Bach, photos by Russell Munson, 1970, fiction, 10/10

This is a story for people who follow their hearts and make their own rules, people who get special pleasure out of doing something well, even if only for themselves, people who know there's more to this living than meets the eye.  They’ll be right there with Jonathan, flying higher and faster than they ever dreamed.

I first read this book more than forty years ago, in the early 1970s.  Yesterday, I saw it on the library's sale shelf and paid a whole quarter for it.  I'd forgotten how few words make up this novella, with its plethora of black and white photos taking up page after page.  I flew through the book (yes, pun intended) and want to share this single quote with you:

"Look with your understanding, find out what you already know, and you'll see the way to fly" (p.125).

Nah, I think I'll share some more quotes I found online as images.  I see I'm far from the only one impressed with this book.

"Overcome space, and all we have left is Here.

Overcome time, and all we have left is Now" (p. 87).

Now I think it's time to give away this copy to someone who needs to read it.  Or maybe someone who needs to re-read it.

Prayers for a Planetary Pilgrim ~ teaser

Prayers for a Planetary Pilgrim: A Personal Manual for Prayer and Ritual ~ by Edward Hays, 2008

"Christianity is an indoor religion. The windows of our churches are stained, and while beautiful, they prevent worshippers from seeing and praying in communion with creation."

— from the Preface to the New Edition, page vii

Teaser ~ The Politics of Experience

The Politics of Experience ~ by R. D. Laing, 1967

Laing was a young British psychiatrist who attacked the Establishment assumptions about "normality" with "a radical and challenging view of the mental sickness built into our society."  I've quoted from the back cover of this book that I read in the early 1970s.  Wow, that's 40 years ago!  Unpacking boxes of books, I ran across this dusty paperback and decided to share some quotes from it as today's teaser.

"As we experience the world, so we act.  We conduct ourselves in the light of our view of what is the case and what is not the case.  That is, each person is a more or less naive ontologist.  Each person has views of what is and what is not" (p. 142).

Okay, I suppose I should define ontologist for you, since I'm probably the only philosophy major here.  Ontology is the philosophical study of the nature of being or reality.  It deals with questions about what is.  So an ontologist is one who investigates what makes a human, human.  Have I lost you?  Okay, let's try another quote.

"Psychotherapy must remain an obstinate attempt of two people to recover the wholeness of being human through the relationship between them" (p. 53).

I never took a class in psychology, so I asked a professor of social psychology about taking his beginning class — he was visiting at my house with one of my friends.  He had been reading the titles on my bookshelves and said, with a wave toward my books, "You don't need it."  This book was probably right there on those shelves that day.

"Human beings seem to have an almost unlimited capacity to deceive themselves, and to deceive themselves into taking their own lies for truth" (pp. 72-73).

On the previous pages, Laing was describing the way our teachers teach — or taught back then, 40-some years ago, before "common core" and "teaching to the test" became the norm.  Reading snippets of this book, I notice it seems very dated.  Or maybe I just haven't thought about these ideas in decades.  Has anyone else read this book?  Or even heard of it?

Sunday Salon ~ fortune cookie edition

BOOKS

Last week I wrote about buying a book I already had, and Helen @  Helen's Book Blog commented:

"That's really funny that you have bought the same book twice (and from the same store!). Even better is that you haven't read it yet, right? Maybe it's a sign that it should be your next read."

What do you think?  Is it a sign?  Should that book be at the top of my TBR (to be read) stack?  How do you choose what comes next?

And more BOOKS

Three books found their way home with me this past week:  one bought, one found, one a repeat.  I'm at different stages of writing a couple of books, one on Women Unbound and one on prayer (which is not, in my opinion, what most people think it is).  That may explain these titles, and the teasers I've pulled from each one:

The Feminine Mistake: Are We Giving Up Too Much? ~ by Leslie Bennetts, 2007, women's studies

"And I'll freely confess that some of my contributions to school bake sales were store-bought.  So what?" (p. 171).

"It has become inescapably clear that choosing economic dependency as a lifestyle is the classic feminine mistake.  No matter what the reasons, justifications, or circumstances, it's simply too risky to count on anyone else to support you over the long haul.  In an era of disappearing pensions, threats to Social Security, high divorce rates, a volatile labor market, and attenuating life spans, the social safety net continues to erode even as the needs grow -- particularly for women, who are twice as likely as men to slide below the poverty line in their later years" (pp. xxiii-xxiv).

I've Got to Talk to Somebody, God: A Woman's Conversations with God ~ by Marjorie Holmes, 1969, prayer

"Oh, God, how I dread cleaning the refrigerator.  And I mean that not as an oath, but a prayer.  There it stands, singing away so faithfully, keeping our foods fresh for us.  Reluctantly I open it, and instead of being grateful for its overflowing plenty, I want to back away and slam the door."

The Faith Club: A Muslim, A Christian, A Jew — Three Women Search for Understanding, by Ranya Idliby, Suzanne Oliver, and Priscilla Warner, 2006, religions

In 2009, I used a quote from Priscilla (the Jew) as a teaser, so this time I'll let Ranya (the Muslim) speak about her children:

"I hadn't thought much about their religious identity.  To me, one's religion is primarily an accident of birth.  Yet, after 9/11, I becane concerned that our Muslim religion meant more than that.  I felt that being Muslim and American might be more of a challenge than a privilege that my children were inheriting" (p. 91).

FORTUNE COOKIE : a story

I had lunch with my friend Emily at a Chinese buffet this week, and we got fortune cookies with the bill.  She opened one and said, "I think I got yours."  That's a funny reaction, so I reached for it, but she said, "No, open that other one first."  It was pretty non-descript, since I can't even remember what it said, so she swapped with me.  Here's the one Emily said was mine:

"You have a friendly heart and are well admired."

How nice!  Emily says she's shy, and it's true that she is less likely to become instant friends with anybody within the sound of my voice.  Last week, for example, my other friend, Donna, went to the ladies' room before we left a restaurant and I had made friends with our waitress and the manager while waiting for her.  I'd already learned the manager had to reprimand his own mother once — for insubordination, no less — when he hired her to work for him in a restaurant in another state.  I asked him, "What did you get for Christmas (or your birthday) that year?"  The question surprised him, and he got a look on his face, saying, "Good question!  Hmm, I don't remember."

Anyway, as we walked out to the car, Donna shook her head and said,

"I leave you alone for just one minute...."

Maybe Emily's right, that it was my fortune cookie that said, "You have a friendly heart."

FAMILY

My granddaughter wrote about her daughter playing with her daddy, "Cheetos!  I guess I should get on to them for playing with their food."  One of my daughters commented, "I would tell you that they will out-grow that, but probably not."

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Teaser ~ The Enoch Factor

This paragraph from page 30 will probably surprise many Christians.  The author says:

I am sometimes asked, "If there are many ways to God, how do you understand Jesus' instruction to 'Go and make disciples' (Matt 28:19-20)?"  When Jesus said, "Go and train everyone . . . in this way of life" (Matt 28:19), he meant, as it is correctly paraphrased here in The Message, that we are to teach people his way of life, his way of thinking and living.  Jesus did not say, as most Christians have mistakenly thought, "Go and train everyone to believe in me," or worse, "Go and train others to believe as you believe."  Jesus said to spread around his "way of life."  The world around you will never change until the world within you does.  That's the message Christians know as the good news.

This quote is from The Enoch Factor: The Sacred Art of Knowing God by Steve McSwain (2010).  The book "has been described as a candid memoir on how misdirected religion can become.  It calls for an end to religious dogmatism and fundamentalism and the consequential crisis of faith that is driving millions to question lifelong beliefs, change religions, or abandon faith altogether."

Teaser ~ love in the Bible

While reading The Gifts of the Jews: How a Tribe of Desert Nomads Changed the Way Everyone Thinks and Feels by Thomas Cahill (1998), I was surprised by the sentence about Abraham and Isaac (p. 84).

Indeed, the first time the Bible uses the word love is in this very episode:

Pray take your son,
your only-one,
whom you love,
Yitzhak . . .

Cahill uses Everett Fox's translation (from The Five Books of Moses, 1983), which uses a more Hebrew spelling of names.  Yitzhak is Isaac in most English translations of the Bible.  The NRSV (New Revised Standard Version) of the Bible says:

"Take your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love..." (Genesis 22:2).

But back to my surprise and the question it raised for me:  Is this really the first time the word love is used in the Bible?  I did a search and discovered it's true.

Are you familiar with the story about Abraham's willingness to sacrifice his son Isaac?  Abraham had an older son, but Isaac was his only son by Sarah, his wife.  Ishmael, his first son, was by Hagar, a concubine or slave belonging to Sarah.

(If we want to get technical, Abraham could not really claim an "only" son except for his first one, and that's why it makes sense that the Qur'an says the son Abraham almost sacrificed was Ishmael.  They only other way I can imagine Isaac as Abraham's only son would be if he considered him the "only son left" once Hagar and Ishmael had been sent away after the birth of Isaac.  The descendents of the two sons are still at odds four thousand years later — Isaac's side of Abraham's family became the Jews, and Ishmael's side the Arabs.)

Sunday Salon ~ East meets West

NEXT UP

Great Buddha of Kamakura

Jan @ Yearning for God plans to read Thích Nhất Hạnh's Living Buddha, Living Christ with me.  Would you like to join us?  You may be able to buy a used copy or borrow it from your library.  Opening the book at random, I found this teaser about women:

"The Buddha accepted women into his Sangha and they became teachers, transmitters of precepts, playing the same roles as the monks.  The first person Jesus revealed Himself to after His resurrection was a woman" (p. 71).

WHAT I'M READING

Just finished

1.  Into the Tangle of Friendship: A Memoir of the Things That Matter ~ by Beth Kephart, 2000, memoir,  8/10

Currently

2.  The Homesick Restaurant ~ by Anne Tyler, 1982, fiction (Maryland)

Concurrently

3.  The Gifts of the Jews: How a Tribe of Desert Nomads Changed  the Way Everyone Thinks and Feels ~ by Thomas Cahill, 1998, history (Israel)

Next

4.  Living Buddha, Living Christ ~ by Thích Nhất Hạnh, introduction by Elaine Pagels, 1995, religion

LIFE

Thursday was my birthday, so now I'm 72.  My twin daughters took me to lunch, and my best friend took me to dinner that evening.   My son tried to visit the night before, but when he called, I was across town trading in books at the big used books store (Thursday's post shows what I brought home).  He found a way to get his card and gift to me on time.  I have great kids!

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Teaser ~ from Antarctica

I've already posted the beginning of The White Darkness by Geraldine McCaughrean (2005).  Now I've read to page 67, where I found a teaser I want to share.  The characters are arriving in Antarctica, where these Adelie penguins live.  Symone, the 14-year-old narrator, thinks:

"By traveling west on the way here, we gained the best part of a day.  Does that mean that by the time noon gets to England, it will be secondhand really, covered in our footmarks and fingerprints?"

I like the way this quirky English girl thinks.  What a concept, to think of a day that's already covered with footmarks and fingerprints!

Y-chromosome teaser

This teaser is from page 82 of The Art of Mending by Elizabeth Berg, 2004.

"If there is one thing I can't stand, it's being in dire need of talking to a girlfriend and having her husband answer the phone and say she's not there.  Then you have two problems:  the person you so much need to connect with is not available, and you have to rearrange your emotions to converse with a man.  There is not a thing in the world wrong with Maggie's husband.  Doug is affable and generous and a good cook to boot.  But he is of the Y-chromosome school of emotional receptivity."

Teaser from the Midwest

The Year of Pleasures by Elizabeth Berg, 2005

"I had been right to want to drive to the Midwest, taking only the back roads.  Every time my husband, John, and I had taken a trip more than a few miles away, we'd flown, and had endured the increasingly irritating airport protocols.  I'd finally begun to wear what amounted to pajamas so that I wouldn't have to all but strip before security guards who seemed either worrisomely bored or, equally worrisome, inflated with a mirthful self-importance.  It was hard to believe that air travel had ever been considered glamorous, when now what most people felt was a seesawing between anxiety and exasperation" (p. 3).

After reading this, I had to find out where she was going -- and why. This is a great book beginning. It kept me reading.

On the home front
Yesterday, I stretched out on the bed to read, and Kiki joined me.  She looked at me with begging eyes, realized I didn't plan to jump up and feed her, turned around to snuggle her back up against me, and fell asleep with her head on my extended arm.  I love how she hugs my arm and loves me even when she is "starving."  Yes, I read where she posted that "I'm suffering" plea on Caturday because she's on an unwanted diet.  She sits by her food dish and gazes longingly at the cabinet up above, apparently wondering if the cupboard is empty.  But she still hugs my arm.  (It's hard to get a good photo with a cell phone, when I'm guessing at the angle.)

True to Form ~ teaser

Here's a teaser from Elizabeth Berg's 2002 novel, True to Form, pages 76-77:

"Well, studying anthremology is the dumbest idea I ever heard of," Cherylanne said. "If you don't mind my saying so. I mean, going to school to learn about people, when you are one!"

"But there are many different types," I said.  "You know, like different cultures.  Have you ever heard of Margaret Mead?"

Cherylanne frowned.  "What was she in?'

"In?"

"What movies?"

"She's not an actress.  She's an anthropologist.  Like a woman scientist."

"Well, there you go, right there is trouble," Cherylanne said.  "Any woman scientist is going to be one ugly and bitter woman."

I sighed, turned my head away from her to look at the playground we were walking past.

My whole library system will be down from February 3-8, so I got a bunch of novels by authors whose writing I enjoy. Four novels by Elizabeth Berg will help tide me over the next week.

I have already read and returned one book I picked up yesterday:  Noah's Compass by Anne Tyler (2009), another excellent novelist.

Just teasing ~ but freedom is no joke

Today's teaser comes from Ken Follett's novel A Place Called Freedom (1995), page 109:

"She knew she ought to leave.  Only trouble could result from her staying here and watching a naked man swim the river.  Nevertheless her curiosity was too much for her, and she stood motionless, seeing his head move slantwise across the torrent at a steady speed.  The strong current forced him into a diagonal course, but his pace did not falter; he seemed strong.  He would reach the near bank at a point twenty or thirty yards upstream from where Lizzie stood."

This novel was standing on my shelf beside Follett's The Pillars of the Earth, a chunkster (973 pages) I had decided to start reading that evening.  A Place Called Freedom is a considerably smaller mass market paperback (only 437 pages) that I'd seen mentioned favorably on several blogs lately.  You can guess which one I picked up.  Ken Follett mentions that same scene on his web site:

"Hidden by a Scottish river bank in the winter of 1767, Lizzie Hallim watches a naked figure emerging from the icy water. Mack McAsh is a slave and Lizzie is helping him escape. Mack challenges the mighty Jamisson family, which enslaves whole families to work their mine. Mack soon finds himself wrongly sentenced to death. Rescued from hanging, he is transported to America, where he continues to struggle for freedom."

Follett says, "It blows my mind to think of the sheer nerve of eighteenth-century pioneers who went to America in tiny boats and set off to explore unknown territory, having not the least idea what was ahead of them."