Mid-flight on Saturday night I finished the translation of Anna Gavalda's lovely novel Hunting and Gathering through a veil of tears. I'd grown to adore the characters so. As I savored the final chapters, it was almost as if I were about to part forever from my only true love. I've already read Gavalda's first book, a short story collection I raved about a few years ago with a most Miranda July-ish title, I Wish Someone Were Waiting for Me Somewhere. I feel the French author is a kindred spirit especially since some reviewers consider her to be "too sentimental," something I've been accused of more than a few times. This I won't deny in the same breath as I admit that it's not the first time I've cried over a book on a plane filled with strangers.
Earlier in the week I'd read Kate Atkinson's Case Histories and quite liked it, so I bandaged my disappointment at not finding Gavalda's only other novel Someone I Loved at the library (I ordered it online just now) by borrowing Atkinson's Emotionally Weird as well as Alan Hollinghurst's The Line of Beauty, which has been on my wish list for a very long time.
Both I picked up at the library yesterday where I accidentally left a shopping bag filled with lingerie at the information kiosk. (Another thing I've often been accused of is being too distracted.) I had to run back and get it, not even sure exactly where in the library I'd misplaced it--all the while imagining I would stumble over a hunched little eighty-year old man scrutinizing my purchases, holding them up to the harsh light for a closer look. So embarrassing... But the bag was perched right where I'd abandoned it with no one the wiser as to its contents. Disaster averted!
We are having a cosmic week!! Anna Gavalda was just "Upstairs at the Square" on Thursday and the audio/video of the show should be up soon at http://www.bn.com/upstairs. She's really wry and clever and it's easy to see why she's the patron saint of stylish girls everywhere! I think my fave line of the night was when the host, Katherine Lanpher, asked Anna something like, "Is it hard to write a love story?" and she instantly replied, "It's easier than living one!" XX LC
Posted by: Lauren Cerand | May 14, 2007 at 03:17 PM
Oh, wonderful! Love her quote. I can't wait to watch the video. Thanks, Lauren!
Posted by: kim | May 15, 2007 at 10:45 AM