So far this summer, self has read 13 books.
Six of those were Dr. Ruth Galloway mysteries (Thank you, Elly Griffiths!)
Two were Gone novels.
One was Becky Chambers’s latest, a continuation of her Wayfarers series.
One was biography (self’s current read, Steve Jobs)
She read Where the Crawdads Sing because of the movie (which she still hasn’t seen)
Self is tempted to skip some parts of this novel (the torture scenes) but no, she just couldn’t.
Luckily, this morning, we’re still in the fairy tale parts:
My bowl of porridge was full, but it felt empty. The fire blazed in the huge hearth, but the room was cold, as if the snow had not melted after all, had not filled the woodland pool to overflowing and opened the roads for travel. Wee Thomas was forlorn also, his appetite less than I had seen in his illness.
“Ach, fit are the two of you like?” remarked Bessie, taking in our moping faces. “He’ll soon be back and then it’ll be Christmas. What a time we’ll have then. You think your party was fun wi’ the snow, but you’ve seen nothing like Christmas.”
— The Mermaid and the Bear, p. 73
Self picked up a copy of The Mermaid and the Bear when she was in Oxford (UK). She started reading it while visiting friends in Buck’s County, Pennsylvania.
Her progress is rather slow, because — well, because the prose demands close reading. The writing is very evocative.
She knew it was a historical novel so, a few minutes ago, she decided to peruse the Historical Notes at the back of the book. Omg. Gut-wrenching.
If you know nothing about the 16th century witch trials, this is a SPOILER ALERT!
To tell you the truth, her favorite character is the motherly cook, Bessie Thom. Self did hope she would meet a better end than the others.
Today I had promised him bacon and eggs, a mixture that had intrigued both Bessie and Duncan when I told them of it. The thinly sliced ham was ready to go on a skillet and I hung it over the flames to cook. There was a pot of porridge ready to eat, so I dished up a small helping for Wee Thomas while he waited, enriching the bowl with raisins and hazelnuts and a fresh plum which he ate with gratifying gusto.
— The Mermaid and the Bear, p. 49
The glow of happiness from the circle spread out like a raindrop fallen in the pool, and pleasant events kept happening for the rest of the day.
And, doesn’t this just take the cake? The lone miner who doesn’t take to drink after the mine closes, but who continues to work industriously at any part-time job he can find, then secrets his wages in a kitty under his bed, is the object of the worst contempt. He has no family, he doesn’t drink, so what is he saving all that money for?
Life is like this, and not just in Glasgow.
SPOILER ALERT but since it seems quite a lot of you have read Shuggie Bain then just a re-cap of the one precious call Leek makes to his sister Catherine, who moved with her husband to South Africa.
(Self almost wished he was calling the Art Academy to say, Sorry it’s taken me two years, but I accept your acceptance!)
“Catherine, it’s me, it’s Leek . . . I’m sorry. It’s Mammy’s phone. Yes. She’s here actually, she’s standing right next to me.” He looked Agnes up and down suspiciously. There was a pause. Agnes could hear Catherine raise her voice in agitation. “Don’t worry, I never. I promised you I wouldn’t. Do you like South Africa?” There was a pause. “Oh, he’s fine. Nearly died up the Pit but he’s fine. Still a bit funny. You know, funny funny.” There was laughter on the other end . . . “Right, anyway, Catherine, is Donald there? No, I wasn’t checking. It’s just, I’ve got some bad news. It’s just, well, Granny is dead.”
Leek reminds self of another stoic kid, Niall in du Maurier’s The Parasites. And that novel almost destroyed self.
Stay safe, dear blog readers. Stay safe.
Wullie Campbell (Agnes’s dad) returns from the war to find a strange baby in his house, and a high-end pram.
Ah!
His wife:
Wullie takes the strange baby out in the pram. Neighbors hear him whistling all the way down the street!
Self rushed all her errands today (even forgave that young Asian woman in the bright blue compact who cut into her lane and gave her the most WICKED side eye — you can bet self leaned on the horn, the loudest bleeaaaeat she could manage. It’s amazing how rude some people can be) just so she could grab her book and read further about Wullie Campbell and the strange baby and the high-end pram and Mr. Kilfeather.
Stay safe, dear blog readers. Stay safe.
A boy goes scavenging for copper in the depths of an abandoned mine. He brings his younger brother along as “grass.” When he’s finally gotten as much as he can carry, he steps “back into the daylight, but it was too quiet. The grass was gone.”
Stuart’s writing is absolutely amazing.
Where has the grass gone? Where is it?
SHAVED HEAD
from Scunnered: Slices of Scottish Life in Seventeen Syllables (Luath Press, Edinburgh, 2011)
You don’t understand
because you are fuckin thick.
That’s the art we like.
Galloway writer Des Dillon is an internationally acclaimed award-winning writer and stand-up comic. His novel Me and Ma Gal was shortlisted for the Saltire Society First Book of the Year Award and won the World Book Day ‘We Are What We Read’ poll for the novel that best describes Scotland today.
Kanlaon 