The Poisonwood Bible by Barabara Kingsolver

Four girls and a mother accompany father preacher (a tyrant) into the great unsaved Belgian Congo in 1959. Told in five distinct female voices that you may love and loathe in turn. Favorite quotes:

"Tall and straight I may appear, but I will always be Ada inside. A crooked little person trying to tell the truth. The power is in the balance: we are our injuries, as much as we are our successes."

"Everything you're sure is right can be wrong in another place. Especially here."

"Culture is a slingshot moved by the force of it's past. When the strap lets go, what flies forward will not be family planning, it will be the small, hard head of a child. Overpopulation has deforested three-quarters of Africa, yielding drought, famine, and the probable extinction of all animals most loved by children and zoos. The competition for resources intensifies, and burgeoning tribes try to kill each other. For every life saved by vaccination or food relief, one is lost to starvation or war. Poor Africa. No other nation has endured such an unspeakably bizarre combination of foreign thievery and foreign goodwill."


It's Kind of a Funny Story by Ned Vizzini

A story about a teenage boy who is clinically depressed and checks himself into a psych ward one suicidal evening. I skimmed through much of the first half and curiosity led me onwards. There have always been people in my life with clinical depression. I have known people who have made "a stay," "a visit," who have disappeared for a little while...It was the process of healing and the exploration of friendship and finding anchors in a turbulent life that kept me reading. Immensely satisfying. Tears in your eyes satisfying.

And at the end of the story:

Ned Vizzini spend five days in adult psychiatric in the Methodist Hospital, Park Slope, Brooklyn 11/29/04- 12/3/04. Ned wrote this 12/10/04 - 1/6/05.

Awesome.

Coastal Moments

The patter of rain, wood smoke hanging in the air, the perpetual sound of a whistling neighbour and the resounding chorus of neighbourhood dogs when a bear crashes through the underbrush. Where else can I jog along a dusty road as pick up truck roars past, every kind of colour, a hand shoots out the window and waves? Flowers for sale for five dollars at an unmanned roadside stand. Glorious colours waving in the wind. I leave money in a small wooden box for produce on Reid Road where they have the juiciest tomatoes, the springiest salad mix and the crunchiest zucchini.

Nights at the beach with a campfire made of driftwood. The waves washing the shore and the twinkling lights of the island surprisingly sharp on the horizon. Other folks down the beach drunkenly wander over to inquire about a missing Basset Hound. The police visit our group later on, surprised that our hands conceal only Tim Hortons cups of hot chocolate. I watched a meteor shower that night and roasted wieners and marshmallows.

I hiked in the forest, sat atop bluffs, swam in the ocean, breathed in the scent of horse... I had many glasses of wine with good friends. I am sad that my visit draws to a close but what a wonderful visit it has been.