First Wednesday Book of 2010

I just returned from an Epiphany bonfire. For those of you who know Holden, it was up on the second level almost directly across the river from Koinonia. So it was quite a trudge up across the footbridge then on a newly tracked road along the top of the tailings to the fire. Nice exercise on a winter night! It was lots of fun. We welcomed two J-term groups from Luther College in Decorah, Iowa and Augustana College in Rock Island, Illinois. The Luther group is doing a course on Environmental Ethics. The Augustana group is doing two literature classes. Each student also is assigned to work 5 hours plus dish team, garbo, and stoking the furnaces. They're a very pleasant group of students. It will be fun to have them here.

Now to the books. I just finished the other book Marilyn Anderson gave me in August at the Women's Book Group farewell bash. It's called The Man Who Invented Christmas by Les Standiford. It's about Charles Dickens' writing A Christmas Carol. It certainly isn't in a league with Evening in the Palace of Reason as it's not very well written, I don't think. It's a kind of cut-and-paste book with lots of bits and pieces from here and there. I also don't think he made his case very well about Dickens "inventing" Christmas. It would seem more that Dickens had the right idea at the right time just when the Victorians were really upping the Christmas celebration ante. Some of the most interesting parts of the book were the descriptions of the copyright law discussions on both sides of the Atlantic. I enjoyed those parts very much. Anyway, it was interesting. Thanks, Marilyn.

Now I've started another book to add to my list of novels about clergy. Phil Rickman - who writes sort of other-worldly ghosty kinds of books - has a series about a C of E clergywoman named Merrily Watkins. I've started the first one - Wine of Angels - as it's been recommended by some reliable sources, it was available in the Holden library, and it's a nice, long read - 550+ pages! It seems like the perfect book to start and take with me when we get on the train next Monday evening to go to St. Paul for this award thing at Luther Seminary. I've been putting off, with great difficulty, reading Wolf Hall, Hilary Mantel's Booker winning novel. Bev Christensen just sent a note saying she's reading it and enjoying it, and Paul Hinderlie devoured it. I'll save it for my return from St. Paul.

Going to the bonfire was worth it for the walk back. It's quite beautiful at night to walk into our snow-covered Village in the middle of nowhere.