I’m a little behind on my reading recaps, {can 6 months be considered a little behind?} so I’m going to try to catch up.
This past summer, Husband and I decided we want to read more of “the classics”. I’m tired of scrambling in embarrassment to come up with excuses for why I have to answer ‘no’ when someone asks if I’ve read 1984 or The Grapes of Wrath or The Catcher In The Rye. I decided that since the best way to eat an elephant is one bite at a time I should probably just jump in. I started with Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain, and many exhausting hours later I wished I had not just jumped in.
Not that I mean to say I wished I hadn’t read it. It was well written. I don’t think Mark Twain’s fame and praise would have withstood the years as it has if he didn’t write well. It was intriguing and exciting; it’s about adventures, after all. The problem {maybe I should say my problem} is the plural part. Adventures were certainly had by Huckleberry Finn, and each time I would read of one of them I would think something like, “Huh! What a great adventure! …and there are still 947 pages left.”
Each adventure was thrilling but exhausting, and my attention span can only hold out for so many exhausting adventures. I think I would have liked it much better if it were written as a book series instead. Then again, I’m not Mark Twain, nor am I a publisher, or an editor, or an author for that matter…
Conclusion: It was exciting, well written, and when I finished it I patted myself on the back and then took a very long nap.
