Bookish thoughts...

On purposely perplexing endings.

Why do some authors feel a need to leave their readers hanging? Do they not know how to bring their story to a satisfying conclusion, or are they morally opposed to tidily wrapped-up endings? (It doesn't have to be happy; it just needs to be definitive.) Maybe these authors are deliberately vague and mysterious because they equate obscurity with 'Literature.' Who knows. Personally, I wish Sarah Lotz had been a little less vague and enigmatic when she wrote the ending to The Three. Overall, it's a great read--I really liked the way she narrated the book using first-person accounts, official reports, interviews, etc. It reminded me a little of World War Z. But her ending left me a little perplexed, a little irritated, and wanting a little more!



On The Odyssey.

Homer's epic poem about the 'much-enduring' Odysseus is 24 books long. (Although Odysseus doesn't come on the scene until Book 5.) I finally read them all-every line of the whole (very long) poem. And I have to say, I'm still not a fan. Odysseus may be a favorite of the Greek gods (and goddesses), but he's not a favorite of mine. I think he's headstrong, brooding, incautious, and arrogant. Like one of his crew, Eurylochus, said, "Our friends went into (the Cyclops') cave because of Odysseus, and it was because of his recklessness that they died." (For which Odysseus almost cut off his head.) And while his wife was faithful to him, he was not faithful to her. What a guy. I'm just glad I don't have to take a test on it this time around. I liked the Greek gods much better when I was younger; now I find their haughty sense of entitlement annoying and their interference with mortal men and women petty and mean. But yay! I read my Seventh Classic of 2014 for real this time. Now it's on to George Gissing's The Odd Women.