My head feels empty if there's no story percolating in it somewhere so, no matter how much I have to read for school, I can't abide not having something else to read on the side—before bed, during my morning commute, or as a reward in between reading cases. Not that the Rules of Court don’t make for compelling reading (pweh), but there's reading for school and there's just reading. My classmates don’t understand why, on top of my remedial law textbook I’m also carrying a copy of Elizabeth Kostova’s The Historian (the legend of Draculya—fiction, of course ;) How can I manage to read anything else on top of our caseload, they ask. I don’t bother answering. What John Carey says in Pure Pleasure is true: “…the gap between people who read books and people who do not is the greatest of all cultural divisions, cutting across age, class, and gender. Neither side understands the other. To non-readers, readers seem toffee-nosed. To readers, the puzzle is what non-readers fill their minds with.”
So what have I been filling my head with these days? Well, I’m still reading The Historian, as I said, coz I had to put it down to prioritise Steve King’s Cell—naturally—which was a great romp but actually a bit unsatisfying. I was speed-reading through most of it, couldn’t wait to see what would happen and why, only to collide with a solid blank wall of an ending. Then again what zombie story has ever had a satisfying conclusion? As far as zombie stories go, *The End* is a given. What matters is the carnage and the chaos ;P
More on The Historian when I finish it. Malapit na!
Saturday, March 4
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What did I tell ya? Toldja you wouldn't regret buying the book! :)Had the same experience while I was reading The Historian. I was half buried under deadlines, and my copy was the big trade paperback edition, and still I lugged it around. What can I say? Drakulya is a compelling character and that book is one of my favoritest for 2005. Kept me sane, too, through late-night proofreading and the occasional screaming by our creative director. :)
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