Friday, October 1, 2010

Rainy Day Reading

Rainy days conjure up a picture of a cozy armchair with a good reading light, a dog at your feet and a book in hand. Here's a list of books to escape into on this very wet day in New Jersey:
I Captured the Castle by Dodie Smith. I just read this 1949 coming of age memoir which is written in the form of a journal by 17 year old Cassandra who lives in a decaying castle with her eccentric family. It's beautifully written, witty, nostalgic. I spent the first weeks of September starting, and then giving up on, several new books and finally pulled this old paperback off my pile of books-I-intend-to-read-someday. This was an antidote to the bad writing that is so pervasive in books these days. I recommend it for readers who like stories of between-the-wars England.

Jeeves in the Morning by P.G. Wodehouse. Having enjoyed one book from my pile of "to reads", I turned to my pile of "re-readables", and selected my all-time favorite author, P.G. Wodehouse. Wodehouse's iconic gentleman's gentleman, Jeeves, and his bumbling employer, Bertie Wooster, head out to the country town of Steeple Bumpleigh, lair of his dreaded Aunt Agatha, for misadventures and misunderstandings that only Jeeves can fix. Also published as Joy in the Morning, this is one of the Master's funniest books with hilarious wordplay on every page.

For "mini-reviews" of the Jeeves books, take a look at Lenny Ng's page.

Other rainy day titles:
At Bertram's Hotel by Agatha Christie - solve a crime with Miss Marple as she visits London.
All Creatures Great and Small by James Herriot - enjoy life on the Yorkshire Dales with this country vet's memoirs.
The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid by Bill Bryson - the author recalls growing up in the Midwest in the 1950's.

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