Reading

Consolations by David Whyte

/ ★★★★★, Essays, Philosophy, Reading

★★★★★ | Philosophy | Print | Own | StoryGraph | Goodreads 

Ah, what a treasure. Two to three page poetic essays on 52 commonplace words or themes like Curiosity, Heartbreak, and Forgiveness. I’ve been ruminating on this definition of Beauty for the past month:

Beauty is the harvest of presence.

Whyte often shared a take that surprised me, and sometimes changed my very paradigm of a long-fixed, but one-sided belief. I can see spending a year with this book, one theme per week, and digging deep, deep, deep into the purpose of life. This one is a permanent addition to my bedside table.

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Frankenstein by Mary Shelley

/ Horror, Literature, Reading

★★★☆☆ | Horror | Print | Own | StoryGraph | Goodreads

This book was nothing like I expected. Frankenstein (the scientist) is arrogant, self-absorbed, and makes incredibly bad decisions. The story itself is unbelievably far-fetched. There were times I wanted to throw my Kindle on the floor at the dumb-assedness of our unreliable protagonist.

Taken more broadly, it’s a cautionary tale about mankind’s continual push for scientific advancement, which feels more relevant today than ever.

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David Copperfield by Charles Dickens

/ ★★★★★, Literature, Reading

★★★★★ | Literature | Digital + Audio | Own | StoryGraph | Goodreads 

Stepping into a Dickens novel requires a certain faith that the vocabulary and style and flood of characters you meet will eventually make sense.  I was distrustful at first, my head spinning with each new character, some appearing for such a short visit that I complained to myself that Dickens was being indulgent.  I was wrong to be critical of the master. By the end of this story, every character, no matter how minor, was reintroduced and I understood their purpose in the story. Sure, this involved a lot of happy coincidences for our protagonist, but it brought me happiness to have these loose threads woven together.

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84, Charing Cross Road by Helene Hanff

/ Books and Libraries, Literary Fiction, Reading

★★★★☆ | Reading and Books | Print | Own | StoryGraph | Goodreads 

I read the first half of this short epistolary book as an excerpt in Stories of Books and Libraries by Jane Holloway. I bought the print edition because the library didn’t offer it and the Kindle version cost too much.  I read the rest of it over the course of an hour or two.  I suspected it couldn’t end on a bright note and I was right. I shed a few tears at the sudden ending. Such is the way of life.  Helene, as the crazy, run-at-the-mouth American contrasts nicely with the British reserve of Mr. Frank Doel.  We learn all these bizarre details about Helene’s life, but have to coax the smallest of things from Frank. The spare book without any explanatory text to accompany the letters worked perfectly.

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