A lesson

Since commencing blogging I haven’t read a single book. But that’s about to change after yesterday attending a talk and book signing by Ashfield girl made good, Geraldine Brooks. (listen; watch)

Actually, to win a Pulitzer Prize for literature is more than ‘made good’, it is simply sensational and the reason I attended the event. Yet care must be taken on when I endeavour to read her latest tome, People of the Book.

The only other time I’ve received a personally inscribed book from a Pulitzer winner, who, like Brooks, also resides in Massachusetts, was John Updike’s, Couples. Unfortunately, however, it was a gift doomed from the start as the old scribbler had mistakenly written, ‘To Adrian Keylan...’.

At the time I was working in Far North Queensland and on my first free day attempted to start on Couples. This is a story set in sixties America and addresses the rapidly changing social mores of middle class relationships of the time. Thus, it was always going to be a tough read.

Sure, Updike can undoubtedly put two words together but when read on a deserted beach on tropical Dunk Island, well, it was never going to resonate. Subsequently the book remained unread and eventually wandered out of my life, neglected and unloved.

Today I’m finally heading off for some relaxation time on a mid-North Coast beach. And needless to say Brook’s book, centred in war-torn Sarajevo and dealing with the search for an ancient Hebrew text, will not be accompanying me. I've learnt my lesson.