So, all the kids are at school this morning and I have the house to myself. I have a ton of stuff to do: lay out a newsletter, make some phone calls, write up a contract, finish a draft website, start work on a flyer. However, it is pouring, pouring rain, and judging by my dog’s frantic panting, there’s thunder in the offing. Therefore I really shouldn’t work on my computer because even though it’s plugged into a surge protector, well, you never know.

Now there’s no danger of electrical surges when you’re on a laptop, right? A laptop with a good battery, that is. Best of all, this ancient iBook is so tiny that it doesn’t even have Word on it, let alone my beloved InDesign and Photoshop, without which I really can’t do any work at all. It’s got Safari, and that’s it. So what else is there to do but blog?

Friends, do not worry. Yesterday’s post was an aberration. I have absolutely no intention of turning this blog into a vegan cooking blog. Unless requested I will not post recipes or blather about tempeh and seitan. I promise!

And now, back to our regularly scheduled mishmash of books, family, and whatever.

The last time I took Joey to martial arts, O horrors, I forgot to bring a book. So I dropped him off and zipped over to the nearest library branch. The nearest library branch happens to be my least favorite, the Malletts Creek branch. Even though it’s nice and new and bright and airy and architecturally interesting, I don’t like it because the (tiny) adult fiction section is disrespectfully placed all the way back in the farthest corner. However, Malletts Creek is better than nothing and I have found interesting things there on other occasions when I forgot to bring my book to martial arts. Just the other day I stood there for half an hour reading a graphic novel version of Paul Auster’s City of Glass. I’d read the original years ago, remembered nothing about it, but wow was it weird and amazing the way it all came back to me. I mean, I was so wrapped up in it that I didn’t even sit down. And graphic novels are not my thing at all.

Anyway, this time at Malletts Creek I was in more of a hurry because Joey had “stripe testing” that day and I wanted to be present for as much of it as possible. True, my presence would be in body only, since I fully intended to have my nose in a book, but I still felt the need to hurry. My first thought was to see if they had a prettier copy of The Brothers Karamazov than the one I own. I had this yearning for The Brothers K because of the Dostoevsky versus Hemingway debate that came up on Lost (season 2 on DVD) that Steve and I had watched the night before. I’m sure you can guess where I weigh in on that debate. Have I ever told you that my grandmother was a Russian princess? Ok, she wasn’t a princess, but she kind of was. Subject for another post, some day.

Well, Malletts Creek had the same exact Signet Classic Brothers K that I have at home, so I didn’t bother. And anyway, another title nearby on the same shelf caught my attention instantly: The Sin Eater by Alice Thomas Ellis. What a great title, eh? I mean, what a repulsive & pathetic idea, that a person would get paid to “eat” and assume the guilt of another person’s sins. Judging by the title, I figured this book would either be fabulous or completely unreadable. Here’s a bit from the dustjacket: “Daughter-in-law Rose is stage-managing the scene [i.e., adult children coming together at father's deathbed] . . . . She relishes this post, and displays her undeniable gift for disarming family members by moving furniture about, making shocking remarks to Angela (her far more conservative sister-in-law), and presenting her mischievously seductive cooking.” Sounds pretty bad, don’t it? But continuing down the dustjacket, I learned that 1) the book takes place in Wales and 2) one of her later novels was short-listed for the Booker. So, well, maybe.

I’m such a sucker for anything to do with Wales. Just sprinkle a few cariads and bachs in the text and I’m all over it. This one’s a little slow going, though. I don’t like any of the characters yet, except perhaps Jack the Liar, but he’s (so far) peripheral. All the characters hate each other, and all their passive-aggressiveness is rendered in minute detail. Example:

“Ah yes,” said Michael nervously. He picked up a pea-stick and beat it against his leg. “I think I’ll just have a look round.”

Angela smiled after him to show Rose how tenderly good wives treated their husbands. “He always does that,” she said, determinedly fond. “Goes to make sure everything’s just the same — like a little boy.”

“Or a dog,” said Rose. “Dogs do that too.”

“You would know more about that than I,” said Angela distinctly, intending to wound. Rose’s father had been the local vet — though no one believed he had actually qualified. He had been Irish and disreputable, and she could never understand why Rose didn’t mind. “I think I’ll go after Michael,” she said.

My patience for this sort of thing is limited. I think I’ll give it another chapter or two, but if a real sin eater doesn’t appear soon, cariad, I’m going to give up.