6.04.2010

Mini-Break

I'm off to Blacksburg, Virginia this weekend! I've never been there before - I'm expecting a quiet town, quaint shops, and farmers' markets. Am I destined for disappointment? Maybe it's too close to the end of the school year and I'm going to get a college town with rivers of jungle juice flowing?

I'll be visiting the Soul Twin. You remember our trip to Florida, right?


But I'm a working girl so, naturally, I'm bringing a half-ton of books with me. Here's the stack:


The Bright Young Things you see is a sampler of Anna Godbersen's new series* (my love of The Luxe is well-documented here, here, and here). Naturally, this isn't for me (I read it already) - I'm bringing this one for the Soul Twin. I got her hooked on Anna Godbersen's stuff ages ago and now I'm her pusher.

All the other kids' books? That's my reading for work. When you all stop by our booth at ALA Annual and ask me what's good I need to have read the books, right? So this is all for you.

I bought A Time for Gifts after reading "Frugal Europe, on Foot" in the New York Times. I'm about halfway through and I just adore it. The writing is lyrical but not overwrought - he doesn't try too hard. It also has that wonderful aspect where Fermor clearly wrote the book post-trip, bringing all those memories back to the surface, so that the characters and details are a little fuzzy. He may not remember their names or faces but, ah, he remembers how he felt when he was with them.

Naturally, it has lots of food in it. And there's a huge focus on the idea of food as community - it brings Fermor and strangers together as only communal dining can. I loved this:
Beer, carraway seed, beeswax, coffee, pine-logs and melting snow combined with the smoke of thick, short cigars in a benign aroma across which ever so often the ghost of sauerkraut would float.
I know, I know. You're probably thinking, "'The ghost of sauerkraut'? What the hell?" But just stop and think about it...isn't that a gorgeous way to describe the acidic tang that interrupts all those warm, smoky scents? I just thought it was a beautiful passage.

Off I go! See you next week!

Eat, drink, and savor great writing.


* Read The Compulsive Reader's discussion on the cover.

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