Still working on Wicked!

So I just thought I would stop by and let everyone know I am still struggling to get through Wicked! I find that when I sit down to read it, it goes by pretty fast but I have to force myself to pick it up in the first place! There is not even really anything interesting happening at this exact moment in the book to report! But I will keep everyone posted and hopefully stick with it and finish it soon enough!
I have also just picked up "If I Did It," the book where OJ Simpson tells how he WOULD commit the murders of Nicole and Ron Goldman if he had actually done it. Mostly I am checking this book out because when I worked at Borders Bookstore EVERYONE was interested and so I want to see what the big deal is!
Hope everyone is doing well and finding some good books to read!

A Trip to Andalucia

Just stopping by to say "hello" from Spain. Well, it FEELS like I am there with Frances Mayes and her husband Ed. Am just getting started and love "A Year in the World"...thank you for picking this book, Annelle.

It's Tuesday...Where Are You?

I'm always in the middle of several books, so I decided to "go" to Montenegro this Tuesday. The time is early 1900's, before WWI, the place is in what was the wild borderlands between Turkey and Montenegro. The book, "Land Without Justice" by Milovan Djilas is a beautifully written autobiography. He describes how his father moved to this area of Montenegro when he was released from jail. He had run afoul of a local Prince and was allowed out of jail if he would renounce revenge. At that time, blood feuds were still a powerful force in the culture.

"The land had to be cleared, and a house had to be built. Father at first erected a sod house, just a place to lay his head. For years, frugal as he was, Father saved, and, when he had something, built a solid house of stone, two stories, like the houses in his old home. That house stood, and stands, in the middle of the Podovo bluff, a very windy place, but with a commanding view.

Father's main concern was that his chimney be seen from everywhere around, from all the roads and hills. But Mother, who worked around the sheep and the house, had trouble with the wind and cared little enough for the view. She always cursed Father for building the house on just that spot. Though she was right, we children were truly glad to be able to see the house from afar, on a hilltop, no matter where we were coming from. Sturdy and gray in the middle of the bluff, it greeted us from a distance. There it lay on the green meadow between the Tara and Stitara Rivers, among the crags and hills, waiting to give shelter to tired and frozen travelers.

It seems impossible in life to have something both useful and beautiful. So men are divided. Some are for the useful, some for the beautiful. I placed myself on the side of beauty."