Books and other stuff I feel like discussing
By education and experience - Accountant with a specialty in taxation. Formerly a CPA (license has lapsed). Masters degree in law of taxation from University of Denver. Now retired. Part time work during baseball season as receptionist & switchboard operator for the Colorado Rockies. This gig feeds my soul in ways I have trouble articulating. One daughter, and four grandchildren. I share the house with two cats; a big goof of a cat called Grinch (named as a joke for his easy going "whatever" disposition); and Lady, a shelter adoptee with a regal bearing and sweet little soprano voice. I would be very bereft if it ever becomes necessary to keep house without a cat.
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Books Update - Saving the best for last
LIFE AFTER LIFE by Kate Atkinson
I've long enjoyed books by Atkinson. The books in her series featuring sometime investigator Jackson Brodie are a combination of wry observation, intriguing mystery, and insightful character study. That series is hard to describe, but almost all the readers I know who are familiar with her books enjoy them very much and never hesitate to recommend them to others.
In her latest, she steps away from another entry in her series, and instead presents a series of alternate histories, each occurrence featuring the same main character. In the opening pages, a young mother is in labor during a winter night in 1910. Her daughter is stillborn. But in the next chapter, the doctor arrives in time to preside at the delivery and untangle the umbilical cord from the infant's neck.
In this fashion, in scenarios sometimes brief, sometimes extended, Atkinson moves through the twentieth century and imagines alternate life events for her protagonist Ursula Todd. In a radio interview, Atkinson discussed the power she had as the author - to imagine varying fates for Ursula and to revise and reorder how her live (or lives) might unfold. She also uses her power as author to write some very unlikeable characters out of the picture altogether when she returns to a time in Ursula's life and changes things around one more time.
These alternative narratives move from England to Germany and back (at least some of the time). The author presents the horror of the London blitz from several differing viewpoints.
As the book develops, Ursula lives with a sort of deja vu. Certain small points become significant to the reader - a certain main dish at a family supper; a crescent moon in the sky; a specific piece of jewelry; a mound of rubble (or is that just a sand castle on a beach?)
So in a way, all of the events in the book happen to Ursula, or perhaps none of them do. I know this sounds sort of other worldly and perhaps like science fiction, but it's not really. It's one of the most intriguing books I've ever read.
I've long enjoyed books by Atkinson. The books in her series featuring sometime investigator Jackson Brodie are a combination of wry observation, intriguing mystery, and insightful character study. That series is hard to describe, but almost all the readers I know who are familiar with her books enjoy them very much and never hesitate to recommend them to others.
In her latest, she steps away from another entry in her series, and instead presents a series of alternate histories, each occurrence featuring the same main character. In the opening pages, a young mother is in labor during a winter night in 1910. Her daughter is stillborn. But in the next chapter, the doctor arrives in time to preside at the delivery and untangle the umbilical cord from the infant's neck.
In this fashion, in scenarios sometimes brief, sometimes extended, Atkinson moves through the twentieth century and imagines alternate life events for her protagonist Ursula Todd. In a radio interview, Atkinson discussed the power she had as the author - to imagine varying fates for Ursula and to revise and reorder how her live (or lives) might unfold. She also uses her power as author to write some very unlikeable characters out of the picture altogether when she returns to a time in Ursula's life and changes things around one more time.
These alternative narratives move from England to Germany and back (at least some of the time). The author presents the horror of the London blitz from several differing viewpoints.
As the book develops, Ursula lives with a sort of deja vu. Certain small points become significant to the reader - a certain main dish at a family supper; a crescent moon in the sky; a specific piece of jewelry; a mound of rubble (or is that just a sand castle on a beach?)
So in a way, all of the events in the book happen to Ursula, or perhaps none of them do. I know this sounds sort of other worldly and perhaps like science fiction, but it's not really. It's one of the most intriguing books I've ever read.
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