Sunday Salon

Yesterday was cool, with temps no higher than 70 degrees. It rained in wind-whipped torrents around mid-morning and the dark, low-hanging clouds threatened additional rain for most of the day. Luckily, the weather had cleared by 5:00 for our town's parade, and by the 9:30 fireworks, the sky was almost entirely cloudless. Today, it is a still and peaceful blue.

My Fourth of July was an uneventful one holiday-wise. In terms of reading, it was highly productive. I started and finished "The Part About Fate" as part of the 2666 read-along I'm doing with several other book bloggers. They are as follows:

Claire at Kiss a Cloud (co-host)
Steph at Steph and Tony Investigate! (co-host)
Emily at Evening All Afternoon
Richard at Caravana de Recuerdos
Jackie at Farm Lane Books Blog
Gavin at Page 247
Lu at Regular Rumination

And, of course, here is my most recent post.

"The Part About Fate" is as different from "The Part About Amalfitano" as that section was from "The Part About the Critics." Not surprisingly, the late Roberto Bolaño had intended to publish these each as separate books in a miniseries. I don't know if it's better to have them all together or if the estate should've stuck with Bolaño's wishes. There are good arguments for either side. Some would debate, but I think the parts relate just enough to each other to form a cohesive novel. I'll save my further thoughts on "The Part About Fate" for my post on it, but I will say now that reading American characters written by international authors is always interesting. I can't wait to hear what the others say about this book.

Carlos Ruiz Zafron's The Angel's Game is proceeding nicely. I got a good chunk of it done yesterday, mostly as I waited for the fireworks to begin.

I also started and completed J.M. Dillard's Resistance! Yes, it's a Star Trek novel! I mean, look, let's not wall ourselves up in ivory towers and read nothing but Great Literature. How confining! Unfortunately, I am sad to say that Resistance was rather disappointing, especially given the weighty subject matter of Captain Picard and his past traumatic experiences with the Borg. (if you're familiar with Star Trek, you should know who Locutus and the Borg Queen are. Everyone else: watch The Next Generation episode "The Best of Both Worlds" and the film Star Trek: First Contact. And for bonus points: the Voyager episodes "Dark Frontier" and "Endgame.") Reading Resistance did leave me with some thoughts on tie-in fiction in general, so expect a post on that soon. And next I shall be reading the Destiny trilogy! About the biggest Borg invasion ever! Mwa-ha-ha-ha.

Plus: a list from Newsweek of 50 books "for our times." Just found it, so I haven't analyzed it yet. Looks very interesting though!

And lastly: YOU MUST WATCH THIS.