January 4, 2006

Relish

Yesterday at lunch time, upon reading the final page of Margaret Drabble’s “The Red Queen”, I completed every work of fiction Margaret Drabble had ever written. It felt like there was a hole in soul, even though The Red Queen satisfied in so many ways. I love her works. I love seeing how they have developed over time, the social issues she has dabbled in, the birth of her international interests, the change in her narrative voices, the shapes of her novels. Her early works were best received but I like the later ones better, where it’s clear the novel is beginning to bore her and she is playing with it. Anyway, I was very happy to find out she has a new book due out in March 2006!

In other monumental book news, I am at a point in one’s reading experience that you just want to roll around in forever. I am in the midst of a good Zadie Smith book. Relish.