How good does it feel to hunker down with a book for a good old read? Excellent. And what a treat!
And that is what I am doing at the moment. Sadly I don’t often put chunks of time aside (I am talking about being a wife, mother, Grandy, cook, laundry person, author, snow shoveler….you get the picture), to put up my feet and dive into a good book. And what has given me this time of abandon and luxury? A novel by Amor Towles called A Gentleman in Moscow.
This book came out in 2016 but seems to be having a moment, maybe it never stopped having one but I only became aware of it when it was warmly recommended by a friend. Something guided me to not get the eBook version (as you know I have been in a bit of a love affair with eBooks as my novel Pardon My Camino is available as a paperback and eVersion) but rather to check in with the library. They were so kind as to put me on the waiting list.
Last week the email came through that the book was available and I had a few days grace to collect it. The joy and challenge of ordering a book from the library is that you are now locked into the book’s schedule that is dictated by the requests of one’s fellow citizen-readers. Too bad if you are committed to hosting a dinner party, have booked a landscape gardener who must be carefully supervised or have a deadline to assemble your retirees’ association newsletter. The book is there to be read and unless you want to go to the very back of the queue, get your act together and read. And to make it the most time-sensitive, I know, that, as there is a waiting list I cannot renew the book. So that gives three weeks.
But I am having a grand old time! I had forgotten the sensual pleasure of reading a hefty hardcover book. This book engages and entertains me. I am steaming along and still have a couple of weeks of lending time.
My weekend newspapers with their Editorial, Arts and Pursuit pages which last me all week, have been cast aside and it is no stretch to let house dust and dirt lie dormant.
This book is quite astounding. It was difficult for me to imagine how the story would all roll out and sustain the tale. Chapter one and our hero in 1922 Soviet Union is condemned to house arrest, except it is hotel arrest as that is where he is living.
What were we going to do with the rest of the novel? Well…even though he is now housed in the garret, it is the Hotel Metropol with its staff and being near Red Square, is at the heart of Moscow civilian life for the privileged and was frequented by the upper echelons of Soviet officialdom.
I am now up to 1946, the war is over, and the Count is still going strong. Yes, our hero is a Count and was saved in 1922 from execution that befell other aristocrats as he had written a revolutionary poem in his youth.
And the writing, oh I could only dream of having that mastery and skill. As a just-published author, on reading Amor Towles’s book, I sigh. I feel I should go back to my ABCs and learn to write all over again. And the content – is layered and scholarly with deep wide research. There is a light touch and the book bounces and swishes along entertaining and charming me. I aspire to such skill and style. Another sigh.