As usual, I am working on several books at once.
I'm still laughing at Jasper Fforde's The Woman Who Died a Lot. There's the work on an anti-smiting device to hold off the attacks of an angry deity. There's a meteor heading to earth. Thursday Next, who used to work in Book World, is now a librarian.
"Do I have to talk to insane people?"
"You're a librarian now. I'm afraid it's mandatory."
There are multiple Thursdays because in her world there are Day Players, or clones, but like Barbie, they have no sexual or alimentary systems. Every so often, a Thursday is killed off. It is a satire and a fantasy. I am one of Fforde's biggest fans.
Elizabeth Strout is the editor of The Best Short Stories of 2013. I didn't care much for the stories of 2012, and wondered if this editor would be more in tune with my thoughts. I am thinking of sending her stories from Black Coffee Fiction. I picked up Olive Kitteridge, her Pulitzer Prize winning novel. At first glance, it looks like a book I am going to enjoy.
On my Nook, I have The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot. Henrietta Lacks was an poor African American woman who went to John Hopkins Medical Center in 1951 with a cancer tumor. Without her permission, her cancer sells were taken by researchers who were trying to force cells to duplicate themselves. Henrietta's cells multiplied to the point that they are all over the medical world now, in every university, every research hospital, in every country. They are worth millions of dollars.
Yet the Lacks family never received anything from this.
Gary worked with cells during his graduate days. I asked him if he ever heard of Henrietta Lacks and he hadn't. Then I asked him about HeLa cells and of course he had without realizing "HeLa" were named for Henrietta Lacks.
I am still working through Eudora Welty's short stories and The Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin.
There are books in every room in the house, ready to be picked up whenever I need them.
I'm still laughing at Jasper Fforde's The Woman Who Died a Lot. There's the work on an anti-smiting device to hold off the attacks of an angry deity. There's a meteor heading to earth. Thursday Next, who used to work in Book World, is now a librarian.
"Do I have to talk to insane people?"
"You're a librarian now. I'm afraid it's mandatory."
There are multiple Thursdays because in her world there are Day Players, or clones, but like Barbie, they have no sexual or alimentary systems. Every so often, a Thursday is killed off. It is a satire and a fantasy. I am one of Fforde's biggest fans.
Elizabeth Strout is the editor of The Best Short Stories of 2013. I didn't care much for the stories of 2012, and wondered if this editor would be more in tune with my thoughts. I am thinking of sending her stories from Black Coffee Fiction. I picked up Olive Kitteridge, her Pulitzer Prize winning novel. At first glance, it looks like a book I am going to enjoy.
On my Nook, I have The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot. Henrietta Lacks was an poor African American woman who went to John Hopkins Medical Center in 1951 with a cancer tumor. Without her permission, her cancer sells were taken by researchers who were trying to force cells to duplicate themselves. Henrietta's cells multiplied to the point that they are all over the medical world now, in every university, every research hospital, in every country. They are worth millions of dollars.
Yet the Lacks family never received anything from this.
Gary worked with cells during his graduate days. I asked him if he ever heard of Henrietta Lacks and he hadn't. Then I asked him about HeLa cells and of course he had without realizing "HeLa" were named for Henrietta Lacks.
I am still working through Eudora Welty's short stories and The Team of Rivals by Doris Kearns Goodwin.
There are books in every room in the house, ready to be picked up whenever I need them.
I need to get back to the Thursday Next series. I left off with "The First Among Sequels," so I think I'm two behind.
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