I finished To the Lighthouse last week in time for class. It was delightful! I’m feeling sort of obsessed now. I’m going to read Mrs. Dalloway next and possibly tackle Hermione Lee’s biography of Woolf. She seems like such a fascinating woman.

As for George Eliot’s Middlemarch, I had stated that I think it’s one of the best books I have ever read and someone in the comments asked me to explain. I’ll have to think about that. It definitely took me the first 100 pages to get into the book, but I think Eliot does such a wonderful job fleshing out her characters. They all seem so human. Virginia Woolf described this book as “one of the few English novels written for grown-up people”. It was a marked change from the writings of Jane Austen.

On a side note, you can read the entire book online here. And a note in Wikipedia said that Sam Mendes, who directed American Beauty, will be directing a version of Middlemarch. Also he’s directing a film adaptation of Richard Yates’s Revolutionary Road, starring Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio. Interesting, not sure what to think about that.

Have you ever read a book that while not the greatest book in the world filled the need for the moment? I suppose in essence I’m talking about escapist reading. Usually about this time of year, I begin longing to run away and travel somewhere. Sometimes I’ll read travel writing to sate this need. Or I’ll turn to some historical fiction. That’s why I read Kate Turnivall’s upcoming book The Russian Concubine—sounds torrid doesn’t? It’s set in China, 1928 in the International Settlement. 16 year old Lydia Ivanova, daughter of White Russian Valentina Ivanova, supports herself and her mother picking pockets while also attending school. She meets Chang An Lo, a handsome Communist (also skilled in Kung Fu of course) who is constantly on the run from Chiang Kai Shek’s troops. There are a few more story lines involving Lydia’s teacher and mistress, whose father happens to head the Triad gang the Black Cobras; Lydia’s mother and a newspaper man, whose pockets Lydia pick; Mr. Mason, whose daughter Polly also is Lydia’s best friend. All the stories intertwine, some of the well, some of them forced.

I might not sound like I enjoyed reading this book, but I really did. It’s like a chocolate craving, you need it that moment and only chocolate will fufill that need. I needed something that I could easily read in a day or two but also immerse myself into a different world. I use sci-fi for this too. While this book fulfilled that need, I’ve have more satisfying books in the past. For one thing, everything wrapped up a little too neatly for my taste. And some of the more serendipitous conclusions were unbelievable. Overall, I enjoyed losing myself in this book for two days even if I have reservations about it. But that’s the point of this type of reading for me, losing myself for a few days in a book.

I might have spent the better part of last weekend watching the Red Sox sweep the Yankees, but I also did some reading. I read Elizabeth Hand’s amazing new mystery Generation Loss and immediately wrote a staff recommendation for the store. Here’s what I wrote:

Do you want to read a smart, dark, literary thriller that will keep you reading late into the night? Do you want to read about a self-destructive photographer who hasn’t done anything since the 70’s, who has spent the years since drinking, doing drugs, and alienating everyone around her, who goes to Maine to interview legendary photographer Aphrodite, but then gets caught up in a case of a missing girl and also discovers a photographic genius who might also be crazy? Do you want to read about how dark a person can go before get to that invisible line and what might tempt you to cross it? Well, here’s your book: Generation Loss by Elizabeth Hand.