My husband read BOUND TO PLEASE by Michael Dirda, which is called “Essays on Great Writers and Their Books”. After he finished, I started reading it.
Kids, do.
Dirda is a literary critic, the kind who seldom reviews the books he dislikes. He says he’s a slow reader, “still moving my lips and sounding out every word,” which makes his output all the more remarkable.
The result is that these essays are short, punchy, enthusiastic, packed with information and flavor, and great tremendous fun.
On Dirda’s say-so, my husband asked to read Terry Pratchett’s MAKING MONEY. I’m sorry to say he (Charlie, I mean, not Dirda) hated the book and didn’t finish it, which is unusual for Charlie. Charlie reads a lot of economics, and MAKING MONEY is all about economics in a fantasy world, but the fantastical outweighed the economics for Charlie.
So far, I want to read everything by everybody Dirda talks about, he makes it all sound so delicious! Since all I’ve read so far is the Old Masters section, I’m in luck: Most of it is free online.
Dirda made William Tyndale’s translation of The Bible sound like the bee’s knees, so I went looking for it. I found a PDF of it at The Wesley Center Online. Downloaded it. But who wants to read a PDF on an eReader? Not I. So know what I did? I downloaded a free Mobipocket eBook Creator and ran the PDF through that, created a Mobi file (which Kindle reads). Now I’ll transfer that puppy to my Kindle and Bob’s your jolly old uncle!
Just what I needed — MORE BOOKS! 😀
Speaking of books, the blog book tour for THE CORNER CAFE continues today at Chris V’s blog with an excerpt and a post about dogs (Yay, dogs!) AND at Kathy Wheeler’s.
A WRITING PROMPT FOR YOU: A character recommends a beloved book to someone close to him or her who turns out to hate the book. How does this affect their relationship in the short run? In the long run?
MA
