Purchase

Tomorrow I get to go to the bookstore and pick up Sandra Dallas's True Sisters, which I'm crazy excited about because I've read bits and pieces about the great Mormon handcart migration and how kind of nutty and dangerous it was, and I'm really excited to get into the meat of this story.  Also, buying a book!  I hope I read it soon.  Doesn't usually work that way, but I think, with determination, I can do it.

My elaborate February line-up has been foiled by the snail-like pace of the public library system, as well as my perhaps-too-high hopes for some of those books.  Magic Under Stone is one of the few books I've already gotten my hands on, and it started annoying me about 10 pages in.  There was some heavy-handed reminder exposition from the first book, some references to things I couldn't piece together because I couldn't remember them from the first book, and some wild coincidences.  Basically, it just feels more juvenile than I'm interested in right now.  I don't think I'm going to read it, and I don't really have any regrets about that.

The Shape of Desire is finally on its way, which fills me with glorious hope, because Sharon Shinn, love you!  I think its about werewolves, which gives me pause, but only a little.  Author trust is such a huge element in my enjoyment of a book, from anticipation of the book right up through the reading and into the potential anticipation of the sequels.

Overall, though, I'm poking through a few things to see what catches.  I was devouring Buddha In the Attic until it got to the part about having children, at which point the sadness of the story just overwhelmed me and I found myself not picking it up as often.  I picked up All Creatures Great and Small, which is really fun in the way that you might expect anecdotes about a vet in the 1930s English countryside would be fun--like watching PBS, which I fully intend to go back and do (on Netflix, most likely) when I finish the book.  I finally started reading Jon Ronson's* The Psychopath Test, which did itself a huge favor by starting off with an intriguing anecdote that doesn't clearly relate to the topic of the book, keeping me reading to see what the heck is going on.

And today, I finished up Tuesdays at the Castle, by Jessica Day George.  I'm not sure if it was just the right book for the mood I was in, but I loved, loved, loved it.  I loved Celie, and how she was brave and smart and yet so very, very eleven.  I loved how much the characters took care of each other, and was excited every time we found out someone was on their side.  I loved the castle, and I got a little teary--yes, really!--when something bad happened to it.  I don't usually feel this way about books at this age level (middle grade, maybe?), but I really wish I could have written this book. 

So this is the state of the union.  I feel like I've put all my thoughts down here, so I can't imagine what I might have to say tomorrow, but I suppose that's what tomorrow is for, right?

*Incidentally, doesn't his name sound vaguely dirty?  I can't quite figure out why.