I have many volumes of Trollope, but I have read only seven so far. My plan is to work my way through over time. Over this period, I managed one: The Macdermots of Ballycloran. It’s a dark tale of the downfall of the Macdermots, but manages to be pleasant reading anyway. Women of the period appear to be able to get pregnant without any time truly alone with their no-good rakes, but I’m willing to accept these miraculous conceptions for the sake of plot.

My friend Laila wrote a book. (That’s the disclaimer part, so you can choose whether to believe my account of it or not depending on how nice you think I am to my friends…) It’s called Yellow Crocus and it tells a cracking story about slavery and escape, but also about transformation and the way people realize and assimilate the truth of things. Read it!

I bought a copy of Tristram Shandy for a quarter a long time ago because it was mentioned in some other book I was reading. What an awesome book! It has meta-prose, stream of consciousness, digressions, hilarity, love, and a character who builds model battlegrounds. If I could only recommend one book out of my whole list this time, I think it would be this one because it was so smart and funny.

Nightmare Abbey is a send-up of Byron, Keats, Shelley, etc. It is slight and charming. I expect it is even funnier if a person is deeply steeped in the poets, but even a smattering is enough (she says from experience!).

The Leopard is another book about the end of a family, but an Italian one that has to come to terms with the change of times. They fade rather than explode.

I read a single volume of poetry this time, A.E. Houseman’s A Shropshire Lad. Manly stuff and yet tender. War is stupid. That is all.

Tomorrow I’ll finish up with non-fiction, kids/young adult, sci-fi/fantasy, and graphic novel.