Wrong Sized Books

A totally petty but real gripe: 7 inches is too wide for a paperback novel that one reads in bed, and I read novels in bed. Other than that, I found The Valley of Secrets by Charmain Hussey to be an enjoyable, if somewhat preachy, read. Sunflower Spinner had chosen it as a gift for me because it contained a list of scientific names at the back. I'm a sucker for young adult fantasy and books with plant lists, so for me the combination worked. Others less interested in gardening, Amazonian flora and teenagers who manage to do everything on their own, probably won't appreciate it, but Tucson Trekker, Sunflower Spinner and several of the GBK should enjoy it.

In other book news, I've started Dickens' Our Mutual Friend , and, at 907 pages the paperback is just too long for holding open, which has made me wish for the short serials of the original publishing. Thus far, as with early in any Dickens I've encountered, I am entranced by the characters but completley unsure as to whom I should be paying attention.

Fully catching up with the last several months, I re-read most of the Anne series just to have the cathartic experience of sobbing when Anne's first baby died. (I can't imagine that I have many readers who don't know whether they are Anne of Green Gables fans or not, but if you are among them, you should find out.) I thought I might be re-reading A Bear Called Paddington by Michael Bond, but as I read it became clear to me that I had never read this before, not even in third grade. I was surprised to find Paddington was a real bear (I had always envisioned him a teddy bear, like Winnie the Pooh), surprised to read over and over about "darkest Peru", and surprised that the thing that intrigued me the most was figuring out what kind of bear Paddington could be. I didn't read any sequels, although the Mister owns many. I also picked up Marilyn Clay's Bewitching Lord Winterton and couldn't figure out if I were rereading it or reading it for the first time for almost half of the book. Of course, I knew exactly what was going to happen, but knowing the plot of a Zebra Regency Romance doesn't indicate one has read it previously. It wasn't until I knew she was about to hit the good guy with a skillet in the dark that I was certain I had actually read it.