In the last few weeks I have read Lewis Hyde's The Gift: How the Creative Spirit Transforms the World, which was quite beautiful and profound, and made me realise some truths like I'm not at all unusual for the type of person I am, and that I'll never be rich unless my writing takes off as I'll always put a lid on my professional activity to leave room for my creative endeavours. A really great book if you're into that kind of thing. I also read Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, a devastating work of schmaltz, and disappointing similar to Everything is Illuminated, which I think is the superior novel. 
Last week there was a glorious re-read of Girl With a Pearl Earring, a quiet classic ever-present in my mind, and also a delve through The End of Men: And the Rise of Women, which made me both sad and excited for the future, but seemed to willfully ignore the fact that not all women in the workplace are Google execs who can demand that their company pay for a business class flight for their nanny so they can commit fully to family and the workplace at the same time, and the some such. There was also too much focus on one socio-economic and racial group, not enough consideration of welfare, single parenthood or the fact that not everyone has all the components of family and economic life lined up like ducks waiting to be utilised, like idle grandmothers and houses near head offices so they can be the CEO, if just their husband would help them with the washing up. It was well-written though, clipped along at an entertaining pace and I did recognise several people in my life within it.
Anyway, should you miss me until my next post there's always my column to read, as well as my short story Poinsettias, which appears in Danse Macabre #66 (if you click through, turn your sound up.)
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