March was a slow month for reading. I was busy at work and I also got caught up again in doing genealogy. Not to mention I picked some long-ass books to read. As such, the list is short:

27. American Gods - Neil Gaiman

28. The Ghost Writer - John Harwood

29. The Velvet Promise - Jude Deveraux

30. Kings & Queens of England - David Williamson

31. The Historian - Elizabeth Kostova

The book of the month went to The Historian. It's Elizabeth Kostova's* debut novel and I had to read it in a week because it was a "Rapid Read" from the library. It was incredibly long and took me 4 days to read it. That's a really long time for me! It was soooo good, though - it dealt with Vlad the Impaler from a historian's view which completely intrigued me. There's a scene towards the end (spoiler alert for anyone wanting to read this book!!) where Vlad takes his prisoner, the professor, into his underground library. He has everything ever written about himself in there and wants the professor to organize it all into something easy to navigate through. Of course the professor is appalled at being Vlad's prisoner and knows he's already on his way to being a vampire and does everything he can to get out and kill his captor. Pshaw!! If that were me, I would be like, "Oh, well. So it's Dracula...so I'm doomed to an eternity in a deep dark underground cavern with an eternal thirst for human blood...where do I start???" Seriously, getting the chance to go through historical documents like that and the only price paid is being a vampire?? I wouldn't fight it!!!

On a spookier note - - I was reading a collection of ghost stories Sunday night at work and one of them, entitled The Trial For Murder by Charles Dickens, was actually kind of creeping me out. I was sitting at the table, handtesting & reading, when suddenly I was pushed backwards in my chair by a hard puff of air on my chest, just below my throat. It didn't hurt but the pressure was such that it actually jerked me backwards. There was no one else around and nothing that would have justified such a large "poof" of air, at least not one so powerful. I figured it was my resident work ghost playing a trick on me since I was reading a spooky story. I told him it wasn't funny and was left alone after that.

* = After reading The Historian, I was curious about the author and looked her up online. There was an interview with her where she said she had been at a book signing and a lady brought her a homemade pound cake. The lady said she had seen her that morning on a television talk show and thought, "This poor girl is so busy, she probably doesn't have time to eat." And she whipped her up a pound cake. Kostova said she was very moved by the woman's thoughtfulness and I thought that was a great story.

Labels: Books

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