jaysaint Getting it all down on paper…

I’ve been terribly distracted lately, but did manage to finish a book before the end of the month. Band of Brothers was sometimes a little hard for me to follow. I don’t know much about the military. For example, if I can’t correlate a rank to a character on M*A*S*H then I won’t know who is the boss of whom. A major is higher than a captain, because Frank Burns somehow outranked Hawkeye. The colonel (Potter) is in charge. A corporal (Klinger) is higher than a private (Radar). That’s all I’ve got. I also can’t identify weapons or vehicles. It turned out to be very helpful that I’d seen the miniseries. Having Damon handy would have been even more helpful. His dad was in the Navy and he knows a lot more about military matters than I do. (I do know that the book is not about the Navy.) But most of my reading happened on the subway so I was on my own.

All that said, it’s a moving book. My Grandpa fought in WWII and was awarded a Purple Heart when he got shot running out from cover to save a wounded fellow soldier. He wasn’t a paratrooper, but his story (which he only told once as far as I know) gave me a more visceral touchstone for books like this.

I finished reading Waiting for Daisy, which is Peggy Orenstein’s new book about her 5+ year fight to become a mother. It’s definitely to my liking, in that it’s very honest about her ambivalence about becoming a mother (which I relate to well) and the way fertility treatments put her marriage through the shredder. I’m more moved by reality than I am by sunshiney versions of events. Still, I wish I had read it a year from now. While Damon and I have stayed blessedly relatively tension-free in the past year and a half, some of the anxiety and worry hit a little too close too soon.

A few days ago I finished to put the other basement-book-trade Stephen King find Cell.
It was fine.

I’m delighted to say I just finished reading my friend Brian’s book, Summer People. I had the special fun of recognizing lots of people and situations I know, and even saw one of my own anecdotes immortalized. But even without that little zing, it’s an engaging book. At one point I was reading in an elevator and a nice man had to tell me that we’d reached the lobby and wouldn’t be going any lower so I might want to go ahead and get out.

I can’t resist a fat Stephen King novel. I found Bag of Bones in our laundry room and dropped everything else in its favor. It wasn’t one of my favorites, but I have no complaints. I tore through all 700+ pages as I usually do with his books.

I also found Cell and I’m sure I’ll get to that soon. But first, a book I’ve been waiting to read for five years. Yesterday I got a galley copy of my friend Brian’s first book — Summer People. Brian’s smart with an intensity I’ve rarely seen and he’s worked harder on this book than I’ve ever seen anyone work on anything. Which is not to say that I anticipate it being a very serious book. Once I’m finished reading it I’ll post about the story, the true story it’s based on, and my experiences with the same.