Hunger: A Gone Novel, p. 54

Self finished the Ruth Galloway novel, The Dark Angel, yesterday. She enjoyed it. The setting — a small Italian hill town, only an hour from Rome — was so beguiling. If she were ever to re-visit Italy, she’d want to go to a small village in the Liri Valley, to Arpino and Monte Cassino, just like Ruth.

Now she is reading Book # 2 of Michael Grant’s Gone series, Hunger.

She started this series with Book # 4, Plague, which was pretty good. She decided not to read in order — cliffies make her anxious, so it is better to begin reading a new series with a book in the middle, then move backwards. Another advantage to having read Book # 4 before Book # 2 is that she knows which characters don’t make it into Book # 4 and can keep herself from becoming too attached.

All the adults have disappeared from Perdido Beach, CA. As have all the kids over the age of 15. The remaining kids instantly form cliques. Some kids have developed super powers. Jack is one of the mains.

Jack pulled out his handheld. He punched in the numbers. “The slowest bullet goes 330 meters per second. Say 1,100 feet per second in round numbers. I found a book full of useless statistics like that. Man, I miss Google.” He seemed to actually choke up with emotion. The word Google caught in his throat.

p. 55:

He didn’t look strong. He looked like a dweeb. He had messy blonde hair and crooked glasses. And it always seemed like he wasn’t really looking through those glasses but was seeing his own reflection in the lenses.

Jack does have superpowers.

Self loves the way Michael Grant writes about pre-pubescents and teenagers.

The Italian Idyll

While Nelson’s wife is having playtime with her boy toy back in England, Ruth and Nelson go sightseeing. And then he goes home. It’s so simple, and so poignant really, the relationship between the two.

These Italian scenes are tinged with melancholy. Self really loves the writing; very understated, but so evocative!

Here is Ruth watching her daughter draw:

Shona goes off in high spirits, wearing white jeans and rope-soled sandals that don’t look ideal for rough terrain. Kate immediately settles down happily with her felt tips and draws a succession of pictures of Italy. “It’s a fresco,” she says. “Cathbad told me about them.” Ruth watches her daughter, lying on the floor in the circle of sunshine (the way Flint does at home), absorbed in her work. She loves reading and drawing and hasn’t had enough time to do either this holiday; Louis is always interrupting or breaking something. Still, the two have got on very well, considering.

— The Dark Angel, p. 228

Gotta Love DCI Harry Nelson

DCI Harry Nelson comes barging into Dr. Ruth Galloway’s little Italian idyll. In true Nelson fashion, he gets upset at Ruth, and boards a plane.

Ruth and Shona are at a sidewalk café in some picturesque Italian town when “a grey Fiat comes through the archway, going far too fast. For a moment it looks as if it’s going to plough through the tables outside the café, but then it comes to an abrupt halt by the church. Two men get out of the car . . . ‘Dad! shouts Kate.”

To add to the frisson of the moment, Nelson’s brought Cathbad along, and Cathbad is in full Druid mode, “wearing a purple cloak that gleams in the sunlight.”

YEEEEESSS! If you’re going to chase after your Baby Mama in Italy (leaving your pregnant wife at home while a deranged killer is on the loose), go whole hog and bring along a Druid.

Do not be feeling too bad for Michelle, Nelson’s wife, because no sooner has Nelson left for the airport than she gives her ten-years-younger lover a call and he drops everything and drives 100 miles, from Essex to King’s Lynn, and they have fun times in Nelson’s bed (Michelle is pregnant, but that apparently doesn’t get in the way at all), and afterwards she even lets Tim take a shower in Nelson’s bathroom.

Wonder what the neighbors think? Who cares what the neighbors think, it’s what self thinks that counts, and what she thinks is that Tim (who Nelson hired and invited to his house, which is how Tim met Michelle in the first place) is an absolute P.I.G.

But anyhoo. Back to Italy. Nelson offers to drive Ruth to Monte Cassino (which self thinks she will add to her bucket list).

“St. Benedict founded a hospital here,” says Ruth. “The oldest hospital in Europe. The oldest medical school in the world was nearby, in Salerno.”

Nelson does not seem interested in the Benedictine rule.

— The Dark Angel, p. 205

Fun times!

Stay tuned.

A Rendition of “Old MacDonald Had a Farm”

On the way to an archaeological dig in Arce, Italian archaeologist Angelo takes Ruth, Shona, and the two kids on a route that includes “descending hairpin bends . . . and unmade roads,” and the children complain of feeling sick.

“Stop the car!” Dr. Ruth Galloway orders. She’s worried the kids might throw up in Angelo’s car.

“Nearly there,” Angelo says. “You know, kids, you can’t be sick if you sing . . . ” and he launches into a rendition of OLD MACDONALD HAD A FARM. Self can’t even. The archaeologist is encouraging two British kids to sing “Old MacDonald Had a Farm,” in a British novel.

This is almost as hilarious as the moment in the movie Spenser when Princess Di, wanting to expose her boys to the wider world, plays BARRY MANILOW at full blast on her car radio and encourages William and Harry to sing along. Then Princess Di takes them to a KFC, somewhere near the Elizabeth Tower. That’s culcha for you!

The children oblige Angelo with “a few minutes of animal noises.” Oh my goodness! Self, who hasn’t heard this song in aaaaages, is suddenly singing along with Angelo: “And an oink oink here and an oink oink there.” This is what you call “deep memory work.”

Stay tuned.

Italian Man (Angelo) Attempting Convo with Two English Children (Kate and Louie)

This book is hilarious! It’s just glowing with scintillating moments.

Dr. Ruth Galloway, usually so dour, is getting quite a vacation in Italy! She’s brought along her daughter Kate, her friend Shona, and Shona’s son, Louis. Their host is an archaeologist named Angelo, who knew Dr. Ruth from an archaeology conference twelve years earlier.

In this scene, Angelo meets the children for the first time:

“Do you like the beach?” he asks Kate and Louis, both of whom are staring at him.

“Sometimes,” says Kate judiciously.

“If there’s sand,” says Louis.

“There’s sand at Formia,” says Angelo. “Miles of sand. Not like Brighton beach. I went there once and I thought I was going to die. And the sea was so cold. Like ice.”

“There’s sand in Norfolk,” says Ruth, feeling an obscure loyalty to her adopted county.

“But the sea is always freezing,” says Shona, less loyal.

Kate chooses this moment to fix Angelo with one of her Paddington hard stares. “Are you a policeman?”

Angelo laughs. “No. Why?”

“My dad’s a policeman.”

Angelo shoots a glance at Ruth, who concentrates on her coffee.

— The Dark Angel, pp. 89 – 90

Hugely enjoying — so far — this installment of the Dr. Ruth Galloway mystery series.

Stay tuned.

Dr. Ruth Galloway Goes on Holiday

To escape the unbearable pain of watching her married lover’s wife’s pregnancy progress (that’s quite a mouthful, but that situation has been developing over the span of 10 books), Dr. Ruth Galloway makes an impulsive decision to go to Italy with her friend Shona. Uh-oh. This is not an ideal situation for Ruth, since Shona is beautiful and Ruth is not. In addition, Shona’s son Louis, who is two years younger than Ruth’s daughter Kate, isn’t a nice kid. Not to mention, Ruth had to ditch her classes (who did she get to sub for her on such short notice? Not, surely, the Department Chair, Phil?).

They arrive in Rome:

Kate and Louis, who have, during the flight, moved from being best friends to hating each other, now stand side by side, transfixed. In front of them, two men argue volubly over a taxi and an armed policeman lights a cigarette.

“Why’s it so hot?” says Kate.

“That’s what it’s like in Italy,” says Ruth.

“Where’s Italy?” says Louis.

“Italy is here,” says Kate, crushingly.

Louis starts to cry and Shona picks him up. The sun shines on her red-gold hair and the two arguing men break off to look at her appreciatively. One says something about the Madonna.

— The Dark Angel, p. 42

Self can see where this is going. Ruth should have gone to Italy by herself. That way, she wouldn’t have to constantly be reminded that she isn’t pretty, which means that after Italy her self-esteem will probably be even lower than it was before she left.

Stay tuned.

Story # 6, The Big Book of Classic Fantasy

I arrived in Genoa. I trod the pavement of my ancestral palace. My proud step was no interpreter of my heart, for I deeply felt that, though surrounded by every luxury, I was a beggar . . . We kept nightly orgies in Palazzo Carega. To sleepless, riotous nights, followed listless, supine mornings.

— Transformation, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley (1797 – 1851)

This is one Mary Shelley story self is not familiar with. Interesting that she chose to write it from a man’s point of view (Oh wait, isn’t Frankenstein also written from a man’s point of view? It is! So are all Shelley’s stories written from a man’s point of view? What’s up with that?)

This is an extremely long story. Self has been reading it the whole day, and she’s still not done.

Oh, hello, what have we here? The MC encounters a dwarf squatting on top of a treasure chest, on a wild and lonely stretch of beach. All the dwarf wants is the loan of the MC’s “fit and handsome” form for three days. Then he will grant the MC his dearest wish (which is to abduct his fiancée and murder her father?)

Stay tuned, dear blog readers. Stay tuned.

Siena, Italy

Although it is rather unexpected to find a passage about Siena in a book about fine bourbon in Kentucky, self does have good memories of visiting this part of Italy with her niece, Irene, in 2015. Maybe later, when she has time, she can find a few pictures from that trip and add them to this post.

Wright Thompson travels to Siena so he can watch Siena play Florence. He’s met at a train station by his friend, Fred Marconi.

Rows of trees lined the road, pine and cypress. Castle keeps rose from the hills.

Marconi’s family has lived in Siena for at least five hundred years . . . and he is proud of his history. This wasn’t some old man talking. He was a forty-two-year-old graffiti artist who plays bass in a rock band. He’s got a Ramones tattoo. He baptized his three-year-old son on the 750th anniversary of the battle that took place on the peaceful field he was driving me to see.

“This was one of the biggest battles in the Middle Ages,” he said. “It was September fourth, 1260. Dante talked about this battle in The Divine Comedy and said it was a terrible day. The Sienese turned the Arbia River into a red river of blood.”

— Pappyland: A Story of Family, Fine Bourbon, and the Things That Last, p. 20

Stay safe, dear blog readers. Stay safe.

BREAD AND SALT: STORIES

Excerpt from Story # 1: Il Piccolo Tesoro

I chose this Ligurian village in the sensible way, by spreading a map of Italy across my kitchen table in Toronto, closing my eyes, and sticking a pushpin into destiny.

Stanza in affitto: one of the phrases I know by heart.

At the door of the rambling house, I knock assertively.

“Good morning.”

These stories are mostly about women who travel. Alone.

Self doesn’t pretend to have anything in common with Valerie Miner. Not. In. The. Least!

It’s been ages since she’s been in Italy. Or maybe it just feels that way. 2015. The world was so different then.

Stay safe, dear blog readers. Stay safe.

Arranged Marriage

Still Chapter One, The Charterhouse of Parma:

There now occurred a great event in this family. The Marchese had arranged the marriage of his young sister Gina to an extremely rich personage of the highest birth; but the man powdered his hair: on this account Gina received him with peals of laughter; and soon committed the folly of marrying Count Pietranera.