Darnit, this isn't a book review!

Greetings regular readers and assorted strangers and people who have the potential to be regulars and people who stumbled by here looking for something totally unrelated to what is actually here! I have returned from vacation which was relaxing and delightful for the most part. Since the day of my return it has been stunningly beautiful weatherwise here, thus keeping me far from the computer. However, I have been diligently reading books and acquiring books and considering the possiblity of acquiring still other books.

For example, both times I ended up tooling about the Philadelphia airport waiting out my layover (which I really don't mind because I've got a serious airport people watching/airport addiction plus, you may have noticed, I like to read) on my way to and from Florida I seriously contemplated buying Garth Stein's The Art of Racing in the Rain which was looking out at me oh-so-tantalizingly from that airport Borders shelf. Aside from my possibly being one of the last five book bloggers on the earth that haven't read it, um, it looks really good, and if this Raven Stole the Moon is any indication, it's probably excellent, just like everybody says. Facing the prospect of eviction and put off by the thought of carrying yet one more thing about on my journeys, I dutifully resisted. Nonetheless, if had about 750 fewer books and/or countless hours of free time and/or a really really really big house, I would have bought it. What, pray tell, does this have to do with anything? Well, um, not much really - sorry. ;-)

What I'm trying to say is, I think, that I really really liked Raven Stole the Moon, and it made a horrible companion of me on vacation because I kept wandering off to read it and ignoring my hosts. Now here's the part where I was going to stop babbling on and actually write a review, but this post is getting awful long, and I'm not feeling very cerebral, so I think I am, instead, opting for yet more babbling.

Raven Stole the Moon is definitely part of an epic good reading streak for me. Everything I'm reading is totally taking me in and reminding me why I love this reading stuff. Trigger by Susan Vaught started it off. Then I read an excellent middle-grade-y/YA book called Leaving Gee's Bend by Irene Latham (review forthcoming). Precocious first person narrator with heart, a treacherous adventure, some good old fashioned coming of age - recipe for awesomeness. Then the aforementioned Raven Stole the Moon which was not what I was expecting which is actually a good thing, and it had just the right blend of mystery and suspense to go with its deeper themes to make it the ideal vacation read. I was entirely taken in and so oddly just satisified with the entire thing.

Then, at long last, I broke out that copy of Susan Beth Pfeffer's Life As We Knew It which I couldn't resist buying quite some time ago, but never quite got around to it despite (it seems like) everyone's heaping praise. Happily for me, it more than lived up to all the hype. When I got home on Saturday afternoon, I was only about 120 pages in. On Sunday I devoured the rest in a few hours, which is decidedly unlike me. I'm terribly distractable, but this book made me forget all about all the stuff I had to do, that I had to go back to work the next day (notorious ruiner of many a Sunday night!), that there were other people in the house, and pretty much everything else. In fact, I was so into it that the house could have been on fire and I might not have noticed. In fact, it was the perfect example of the "out of touch with reality" quote in my blog header, so much so that when I did manage to lay the book down for a minute or so that the happenings seemed so imminent in my mind that it felt like they might actually be happening which is, admittedly, a bit frightening since it's a book about the moon getting knocked closer to earth and totally decimating the planet and the struggle to survive that follows. Vivid, indeed.

I've just started The Many Deaths of the Firefly Brothers by Thomas Mullen which is notable for being the first time LibraryThing Early Reviewers has actually chosen the book out of the month's batch that I would have chosen for myself if I'd had to pick just one. I've been looking forward to reading it every since it graced my mailbox, so I hope it continues the great reading streak.

I had so hoped that this post would be a book review, but alas it is not to be. Then, I do miss doing this on occasion, this brainless gushing about books. Perhaps, just perhaps, it will clear my mind enough that actual thoughtful reviews might emerge in the near future now that the gushing is all over with.......or is it?

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