Musings, Malapropisms, & More

When I encounter a book that I enjoy or can’t get out of my mind, I want to share it.  Sometimes I take it to school and tout it in the classroom, urging certain students to read it.  Here I can shout out about books that touched me and/or kept me up at night.

First, I have to say that this book disturbed me, but I couldn’t put it down.  I read a book galley copy that a wonderful independent store gives teachers when they buy a certain dollar amount.  Rich King wrote a memoir or tribute to his wife in My Maggie. What did I like about it?  His voice throughout the book was like a new friend who meets you and updates you about life’s tragedies.  Hmmm.  That doesn’t sound like a promising theme does it?  Reading this book kept me wanting to know who Maggie really was and how she coped and how she died.  Knowing the ending didn’t make the book less powerful to me.

This second book I found the same way.  It’s a futuristic look at what might happen to the world if oil production declined to the point of reducing the industrialized nations to tatters.   World Made by Hand written by James Howard Kunstler has the potential to cause the reader to ponder not only the meaning of life, but the meaning of being human or civilized.  “We’re building our own New Jursalem up the river.
It’s a world made by hand, now, one stone at a time, one board at a time, one hope at a time, one soul at a time…”  (142).    Yes, man, society, religion, hope, and survival all are interwoven in this tale.

A light read is The Writing Class by Jincy Willett.  As a closet writer, I was intrigued by the title and was eager to read the blurbs.  The protagonist, Amy Gallup, is a gifted writer who peaked too soon.  Now she’s a writing workshop leader who trudges through her classes.  Until now.  A prankster seems to be stalking her writers.  The class falters then regroups.  Murder, mayhem, and more.