2 our of 3 ain't bad

I just finished the third novel by Stephanie Kallos, entitled Language Arts. I read it's 400+ pages in two days. I read her first novel, from 2004, called Broken for you in a day. It is one of the best first novels I've ever read. Amazing.

Then it took me several days to read her second novel, Sing them Home. It had all the things that make the other two so special: fascinating and needful characters, quirky situations, skipping between decades in the characters' lives: but somehow it was like she tried too hard and stretched it out to over 500 pages. I loved the characters and the stories, but it was just too much.

Language Arts won me back. Very like Kate Atkinson, my current favorite writer, Stephanie Kallos took some bold and dangerous moves in Language Arts. I won't do a spoiler but it has to do with the 'reality' of the narrative and how both of them disrupt reality in major ways.

Bern and I disagreed about Kate Atkinson's latest novel. I was troubled by the disruption. She was not. Kallos, in this book, pulls it off more adroitly.

I admire writers who take that chance--like stepping off a precipice believing you'll find something to step on or else learn how to fly. Kallos even uses that quote to introduce one of her portions of the novel.

I love the main character, because he reads so much.

I sometimes wonder if I read too much--5 books a week on average.

Then I remind myself: "what would be a better use of my life". Then I know. I read just the right amount.