Memories

So, last Wednesday afternoon/evening I finished The Lost Symbol. It was similar to both Angels and Demons and The Da Vinci Code, which I suppose shouldn't surprise me too much as they are both in the same series. Near the end of the book, when the fact that the whole adventure started only about ten hours earlier appears, I found it hard to believe at first. So much was packed into that time frame that I wanted to say it just wasn't possible. I suppose in general it might not actually be possible, but according to the story it was exactly the truth. This book didn't seem to have quite the same glaring inaccuracies that the other two books had, but it is still merely a story. I am still interested in learning more about Katherine Solomon's research - Dan Brown says at the beginning of the book that it really is a field of study, so I'll have to look into it at some point. For much of the second half (last third?) of the book I was sure that the Washington Monument was important in some way - was maybe the large rock/stone mentioned - but didn't know for sure why I thought that. Now, in thinking back on it, I think it hearkened back to an early passage in the book when Langdon is flying over DC, the plane about to land, and he reflects on it.

After finishing this book, I read The Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Last Straw by Jeff Kinney. I'd already read the first two books in the series and was a bit intrigued to see where the story would go next. Sometimes I found it hard to understand and/or sympathize with Greg - especially as regards his trouble with clean laundry - it's not that hard to do laundry and clean clothes are so nice to have. The story was about as I expected based on the other two. It wasn't bad enough for me to quit reading, but it's not really that great of a book - granted the fact that it's intended for a much younger audience might make a difference in that. As I'd hoped, I also finished this Wednesday evening - I could sort of be under the ten items checked out at a time limit I'd imposed on myself - officially I had a book for Mom and a book for Dad both checked out, but as I'd already read them I didn't worry about including them in the list.

Having finished that book, I started the other book I'd had on hold at the library that came in the same day as The Lost Symbol. This was Katherine Howe's The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane. I've been greatly enjoying this book - I can't wait to see exactly how it will end. I guessed pretty quickly that Connie was related to Deliverance Dane somehow - why else would some things apparently hers be in Granna's house. I sometimes felt a bit of kinship with Connie - in some ways I think we are quite alike - but obviously not in every way. When I started this book Wednesday evening, my first thought connected to a book I read a year or so ago, Ian Caldwell and Dustin Thomason's The Rule of Four. Both of these books made me a bit nostalgic for college/paper-writing - again I almost want to assign myself a research paper or a writing project (maybe something similar to my Brit Lit after 1700 research project), but I'm a bit afraid it will have a similar result to the assignment I'd given myself after reading The Rule of Four (great book, btw) - my brain was too fried after trying to understand Gerard Manley Hopkins' poem "The Wreck of the Deutschland" and I was unable to finish anything. Unlike Connie, I can't imagine knowing enough about any topic - especially something as broad and New England history - to be able to spend three or four hours answering any and all questions posed about it - I suppose that means it's a good thing I'm not looking at being a doctoral student. I'm enjoying the little bits of historical story amidst the modern-ish main story. I've always been a bit fascinated by the Salem witch trials - horrified too. One prediction I have for the end of this book is that Connie is going to decide to buy/keep Granna's house instead of putting it for sale on the market. Oh, I'm also still surprised that Connie hasn't realized that her ability to know what her mother is doing at a particular moment - even seeing her sometimes - despite being on opposite coasts of the U.S. is something that is quite unusual for most people. It almost seems as if she thinks everyone can do that.

Friday afternoon/evening I came up with a solution for one slight problem I had. I wanted to be still reading The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane this morning, but I was reading it a bit too fast for that to work well. However, I realized that if I were to read the final book I'd checked out with it first, that would solve my difficulty (although it did end up leading to me staying up much later than I should have Friday night). Friday afternoon/evening/night (I stayed up until about 2am) I read I am the Wallpaper by Mark Peter Hughes. Much of this was also as I expected it to be - although at times it was hard for me to picture Floey as 13 and even harder for me to picture Calvin (I think this is the right character - I've already forgotten some of the names) as 15. I did enjoy the story - as evinced by my late night. As with many books I read - especially the YA ones I find while shelving or shelf reading - I found I was crying at times. Not as much as I did for many books, say especially Mercedes Lackey's Arrows of the Queen, and partially it's sequels, Arrow's Flight, and Arrow's Fall.