Book #34: Blue Nights by Joan Didion

I have a soft spot in my heart for Joan Didion. I wrote the best paper of my undergraduate career on her book Democracy, a paper that I poured hundreds of hours and all of my effort into and that I used for my grad school applications. I think all of the ambition and effort that I had for school was used up on that one paper--but man, it was a really good essay.

Democracy was fiction, but I really love her non-fiction as well. I asked for her A Year of Magical Thinking a few years ago for Christmas, and Blue Nights is something of a companion book to that first one. AYMT is about the death of her husband and the year that she had after that horrible experience, and Blue Nights is about the subsequent sudden death of her daughter and their relationship and her feelings of being bereft with the loss of these two people. Didion communicates her feelings and fears and sadness very well, and really gives a good idea of what going through a period of bereavement is like. I can't help but feel so sorry for her, though. She seems so very alone in the world now, with her husband and her one child dead before her. This was kind of a depressing book to read while pregnant (about her child dying), too. I started and finished it in one day, though, so it didn't take very long. It made me remember about my continual goals to read everything she's written.

Book #33: The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas

It's amazing how different the book is from the movie. I haven't read the book or seen the movie for a few years, so I didn't really remember anything that happens after he finds the treasure. Pretty much EVERYTHING is different; understandably so, because I don't think the book's plot is quite so family-friendly or moviegoer-appropriate as the movie ending. I'm not quite sure what the moral of the story is supposed to be, when it's all said and done. The count worries for a little bit that he's gone too far with all of his punishments, but then concludes that he didn't. But I think he did--his vengeance destroyed the lives of so many innocent people in addition to those men he wanted to destroy. Pretty much all the wives and children of those men were either dead or dishonored by the end of the book, and that really seems like he went too far.

Of course, it's a very exciting book. It's one of Tommy's favorites--he read the unabridged version a while ago. I'm not really tempted by the unabridged version any more--I'm happy to have read this 500-page version and call it good.

Book #32: The Firm by John Grisham

I went through a John Grisham phase for a few months when I was in high school. I read all of the six or seven Grisham books I could find around the house, and after the last one I felt like I'd read six of the same books. THEY WERE ALL THE SAME! The same storyline, over and over again. But it's been long enough (I can't remember even the names of any of the books I read) that we decided a John Grisham book would be a good choice for our road trip. And it WAS--we were on the edge of our seats all the way from North Carolina through Oklahoma. The main character, Mitch McDeere, gets hired by this small Memphis firm (and we drove through Memphis while we were listening to the book, which was pretty awesome) and ends up finding out that the firm is a front for the Mafia. He ends up helping the FBI catch them and outsmarting both the Mafia and FBI by escaping to the Cayman Islands (spoiler alert!). It was pretty intense listening, though. A great choice for a road trip, for sure.

Books #25-31: Harry Potters 1-7 by J.K. Rowling

No explanation needed. Pure awesomeness.

**One question I had this read-through: How is it even POSSIBLE that wizards (like Mr. Weasley) have NO associations with Muggles or Muggle money? Aren't they citizens of England? Don't their kids have to go to school or at least get tested in math and English and stuff? Don't they have to pay taxes? It's far more believable that there are wizards that Muggles don't know about than that there are wizards who don't know ANYTHING about Muggles. I know, I know--suspension of disbelief. But still.

Book #24: I'm a Stranger Here Myself by Bill Bryson

This is another re-read. I brought it with me on our trip to NYC this weekend to read on the plane, and thoroughly enjoyed it. It's the perfect vacation book--each chapter is a separate, short essay, so it's easy to get through and a quick read. The book is a compilation of a column he wrote for a local paper in the late 90's.

All I need to say about this book is that Bill Bryson really is hilarious. I want to write memoirs just like him. There are always parts that make me laugh out loud whenever I read his books, and this one is especially funny. Here's the part that made me giggle for about ten minutes straight on the plane while Tommy looked concerned at my lack of control:

(While complaining about his computer): "Never mind that many of these keys duplicate the functions of other keys, while others apparently do nothing at all (my favorite in this respect is one marked "Pause," which when pressed does absolutely nothing, raising the interesting metaphysical question of whether it is therefore doing its job), or that several keys are arrayed in slightly imbecilic places. The delete key, for instances, is right beside the overprint key so that often I discover, with a trill of gay laughter, that my most recent thoughts have been devouring, PacMan-like, everything I had previously written."

So excellent, and so true! (I've always wondered what the Pause button is for, haha.)

Book #23: The Killer Angels by Michael Shaara

I'd read this before, actually. But the last time was probably eight years ago, so I picked it up again and re-read it this week. It tells the story of the Battle of Gettysburg. Each chapter is told from the perspective of different generals or officers, from both armies, and how the entire battle was planned and happened.

Growing up, I for some reason thought of Robert E. Lee as the epitome of evil, as the general of the BAD SIDE of the Civil War. But everything I've learned about him shows that he was the most amazing person who was absolutely worshiped by his men. This book reinforces that, but also shows how human he really was--the Battle of Gettysburg was a big mistake and his right-hand general tried to convince him out of it repeatedly, but he kept going and ended up losing the war partly because of it. Honor was the biggest motivator in this book, and Lee had to keep his honor by not retreating.

Also, Shaara really emphasizes how many people had friends and family on both sides of the war. All of the men who were professional soldiers, who'd attended West Point (which was pretty much all of the major officers), had served together in the U.S. Army before it broke up into two opposing sides. The saddest story in the book (to me) is Armistead (a Southern general) and Hancock (a Northern general) who were best friends and had planned to meet up after the battle.

I'll be honest--I cried the entire last two chapters describing the final attack by the South. (I think it's the hormones.) It's just so pathetic and sad and awful. Especially when Armistead died--that's what did it for me.