Other two books finished last week
I ended up staying home for for four days with my son, who had a stubbornly pesky cold. Back to normal now, so let me finish recapping last week's books:
This is a murder mystery set in Yorkshire. As an old Christie-head from many years past, I can't say that I found the story that compelling. Pretty good red herring, one fine character sketch, and well done confession. Otherwise, pretty pedestrian. But I've read worse.
This has been one of my morning meditation books lately. I usually read a daily selection from Emmet Fox, and then read a portion of a book which I consider having meditative qualities. Mary Oliver is a poet, although this book doesn't really feature her poetry. Rather, it is a book of essays and ephemera. Pretty decent variety of selection.
Writes well, if not superlatively well, at least in essay, about nature. Stakes out a "selfish" position on how to be a creative person which resonates. Reminisces about living with Edna St. Vincent Millay's sister in her old house, and about her one Millay's one grand romance. Laments, compellingly, the failure of modern poets to have had any background in classic poetry, and how the sense of self makes the poem less powerful to the reader.
Includes lists of one to two sentence notations out of the notebooks she carries with her, which give a fine sense of how to pick up ideas for later writing. It was this last bit that I found most fascinating.
Worth a try, especially if you're a writer/poet.
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