Opens At Nightfall, Closes At Dawn

I recently finished reading Erin Morgenstern's novel The Night Circus. It is by far the best book I've read this year, and it is also HP's current book club selection.

The story centers around two illusionists, Celia and Marco, who are pitted against each other in a contest of sorts by their "fathers" when they are just small children. The rules of the contest are vague, but the fathers are determined that there will be a winner, at any cost.

When Celia and Marco are grown, through a series of events the competition becomes centered in the Night Circus where Celia performs and Marco works behind the scenes.

The circus is amazing, travelling from place to place all over the world. It is open only at night and is made up of multiple black and white tents where magical and fantastical things happen - things beyond anyone's imagination. (I can't wait for a movie of this book to be made. It has the potential to be really neat.)

Anyway, the story is too complex to explain more without giving key points away, so I'm going to stop here.

Definitely check this one out. 

Fall Afresh

Today is Pentecost Sunday. Here's one of my favorite worship songs - appropriate for the day.

The Land of Decoration ~ Grace McCleen

I finished reading The Land of Decoration by Grace McCleen about a week ago, and I'm still trying to figure out what it's all about. Is it a book about religion? Is it a book about mental illness? Is it a book about any number of things? I never did come to a strong conclusion about what point the author is trying to make. 

The story starts out strong, but then becomes strange and tedious to read. 

The book centers around a ten-year-old girl named Judith McPherson. She lives with her father (her mother died in childbirth) in a small village somewhere in England.

Judith and her father belong to a very outspoken fundamental religious group that is obsessed with Armageddon and the world as it will be after the Lord returns. They spend their evenings reading the Bible and their Saturdays going door to door warning people about their coming doom.

Judith is constantly bullied and threatened at school. At home, for solace, she builds a model of the town in her room, made of found objects, that she calls The Land of Decoration. Strangely, as Judith begins to manipulate things in her model world, the same things happen in the real world. Judith believes the coinciding events are miracles, but no one will listen to her when she wants to talk about it.

The book is interesting up to this point, but then Judith begins having conversations with "God," and decides that he is using her as his instrument. The spiritual aspect of the book from this point on is just weird. The author's portrayal of God is creepy - at one time Judith even says to him that he reminds her of the devil.

The book also becomes difficult to read because it is chapter after chapter of bullying and harassment of Judith and her father at school, at home, at her father's job - everywhere they go.

Thankfully, there is a resolution of sorts at the end, but I don't recommend reading the book to find out what it is. Skip this one.

Symphony!

I was lucky to get to go and hear the Colorado Symphony last Saturday - thanks again, Aunt Cathy!

The night's headliner, Olga Kern, dazzled us with her playing of Grieg's piano concerto and an encore piece by Moszkowski, but before she played, the orchestra started out with a short work: Glinka's overture from the opera Russlan and Ludmilla. It's such a delightful piece, and it seems to have stuck in my head more than anything else we heard that night. I've willingly added it to my list of favorite orchestral pieces. Here's the overture performed by the Berlin Philharmonic.