It’s always a 50/50 chance that I will immediately bail on these books in favor of others… Two digital library hold became available yesterday:
This Week I’m Reading:
The Mist by Stephen King
It’s a hot, lazy day, perfect for a cookout, until you see those strange dark clouds. Suddenly a violent storm sweeps across the lake and ends as abruptly and unexpectedly as it had begun. Then comes the mist…creeping slowly, inexorably into town, where it settles and waits, trapping you in the supermarket with dozens of others, cut off from your families and the world. The mist is alive, seething with unearthly sounds and movements. What unleashed this terror? (Goodreads)
Suddenly had the yen last week to reread this.
In the Garden of Beasts: Love, Terror, and an American Family in Hitler’s Berlin by Erik Larson
The time is 1933, the place, Berlin, when William E. Dodd becomes America’s first ambassador to Hitler’s Germany in a year that proved to be a turning point in history.
A mild-mannered professor from Chicago, Dodd brings along his wife, son, and flamboyant daughter, Martha. At first Martha is entranced by the parties and pomp, and the handsome young men of the Third Reich with their infectious enthusiasm for restoring Germany to a position of world prominence. Enamored of the “New Germany,” she has one affair after another, including with the suprisingly honorable first chief of the Gestapo, Rudolf Diels. But as evidence of Jewish persecution mounts, confirmed by chilling first-person testimony, her father telegraphs his concerns to a largely indifferent State Department back home. Dodd watches with alarm as Jews are attacked, the press is censored, and drafts of frightening new laws begin to circulate. As that first year unfolds and the shadows deepen, the Dodds experience days full of excitement, intrigue, romance—and ultimately, horror, when a climactic spasm of violence and murder reveals Hitler’s true character and ruthless ambition. (Goodreads)
It’s been on my TBR list for a long while. I finally noticed it was available through the Greater Phoenix Digital Library and queued it up.
Short Story of the Week:
Read Ray Bradbury’s “The Laurel and Hardy Love Affair.” More on that in my R.I.P. post tomorrow.
The Usual:
A poem & a section of Poetic Edda. I’ve been reading poems from The Chiaroscuro archives.
What I Read Last Week:
Will be covering a short story or two in tomorrow’s Readers Imbibing Peril update. On Wednesday, I’ll have a review of Doctor Who Dave Gibbons Collection, and on Friday, a review of The Enchanted Truth, a little gift book from author Kym Petrie.
Simple Tricks & Nonsense 