I'm blaming the holidays!

I haven't written in awhile and I have plenty of excuses, some of them are even pretty good, but I will spare you the drama. But I think it is covered thoroughly below. Since November I've been trying to get through "All the King's Men," but am literally still on page 82. I feel like I'm still waiting for the story to get started. Everything I have read (which is not a lot) has been build up, OK not really build up because that sounds like it would be interesting and suspenseful, let's say back story, Yes, back story for something. I don't know what that something is yet...

Since the book is slow I've used every excuse to put off reading it. Family's in town for the holidays. CHECK. A friend loaned me a book, I should read that first so I can give it back promptly. CHECK. This book is on sale on Amazon and looks really good. CHECK. I read a paragraph in "All the King's Men" and I fell asleep. CHECK. CHECK. Needless to say I was going nowhere. Then my friend, Laura, swoops in and and invites me to join a book club that is using the Time's 100 list as its book list. Wahoo, Perfect! They are starting with "To Kill a Mockingbird," by Harper Lee, since most of the group has already read it and can do a comparison from what they thought when they read it in high school to how it is as an adult.

So I ran over to The Book Stop to find a copy and Ginny informs me that "To Kill a Mockingbird" is one of the hardest books to find secondhand. I couldn't believe it. You would think with all the copies out there it would fill the shelves. She said it is common practice these days for teachers to tell their students to take notes in the book so it is almost impossible to find a clean copy. Who'd a thunk it? She hasn't had a copy in her store for the past 6 months. I got it at the Vinings Library (All of Smyrna Library's copies are overdue or lost), but I fully intend on finding a used local copy at some point for the collection!

I have to say this book is really good and the more I read the more I know I have never read this book before. Can you believe it? I know I saw the movie ages ago and I thought I had read it, but no. Growing up in North Dakota may have something to do with it? Teachers were more apt to pick titles about the prairie, fur-trapping, or extreme survival because that related to us more, maybe? Maybe my "too cool for school" attitude had something to do with it? I'm sure it was on many a reading list I received at one time or another, but my thought would have been "Everyone reads this book, I going to pick the most obscure, least known book on this list just to be different." Yep, I was that kid. Annoying sometimes...

Right now I'm cruising through "To Kill a Mockingbird" and am really enjoying it. More on it and the book club later. Thank you for getting me out of the funk, Laura!