[413] Where the Angels Fear to Tread – E.M. Forster

” He was sure that [his mother-in-law] was not impulsive, but did not dare to say so. Her ability frightened him. All his life he had been her puppet. She let him worship Italy, and reform Sawston—just as she had let Harriet be Low Church. She had let him talk as much as he liked. [...]

Horror

Halloween is tomorrow, but Halloween parties had begun Friday night. It’s been a parade of alter-personalities all weekend. A mummy behind the wheels. Alice with long eye-lashes walking through la-la-land. Cross-dressers and people of ambiguous gender. The walk up Buena Vista Park with the dogs this morning afforded some dreadful sights: stilettos with gnarled straps, [...]

[412] Snow Angels – Stewart O’Nan

” I heard the door open and my mother outside, her voice tiny and stretched, screaming at him as he made for the Nova. I sat on the edge of my bed, calmly parting my hair. Like everything else that had happened that winter, I was not going to let this stop me from being [...]

24/30 Day Book Meme: Most Overlooked Book

Day 24: A book that you wish more people have read I wish to say The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov but one book that deserves much more publicity and attention is Shadow Without a Name by Ignacio Padilla. The book made a quiet, clandestine release back in 2004, escaping the radar of almost [...]

Most Difficult Book

What’s the hardest/most challenging book you’ve ever read? Was it worth the effort? Did you read it by choice or was it an assignment/obligation? Ulysses by James Joyce. It was required for a literature seminar during my junior year in college. That Ulysses was on the reading list actually made me muster up to sign [...]

[411] The Night Country – Stewart O’Nan

” Didn’t I tell you? There’s a reason we call on you, why this night comes again and again, bad dream within a dream. You think it’s torture but you know it’s justice. You know the reason. You’re the lucky one, remember? You live. ” (Something Wicked, p.7) My first Stewart O’Nan novel, unexpectedly, turns [...]

23/30 Day Book Meme: It’s About Time

Day 23: A book you’ve wanted to read for a long time but still haven’t I consider finishing The Fountainhead a high-flying accomplishment because I have procrastinated since 11th grade. Now that automatically bumps up Atlas Shrugged in my TBR pile. I have decided it’s impractical to write down all the books I have intended [...]

22/30 Day Book Meme: Treasure

Day 22: Favorite book I own I own all my favorites. Without hesitation my favorite book in the collection is a beautiful, hardbound, illustrated copy of The Master and Margarita published by The Folio Society. As you might have recognized, it is my all-time favorite novel. It is absorbing, brilliant slapstick, and looks deep into [...]

[410] The Sweetness of Tears – Nafisa Haji

” It took a lot to keep my face clear of all that I felt in response to what he told me—pity, disgust, revulsion. Until the end, when his eyes . . . I left him as fast as I could, chased away by the questions I didn’t give him a chance to ask. I [...]

21/30 Day Book Meme: Childhood Book

Day 21: Favorite book from your childhood I have to search carefully my memory of the very first book that I liked and re-read. That was Hop on Pop by Dr. Seuss. It was actually a reader book my aunt found in the library. It wasn’t my mom but her older sister, who was a [...]