I suppose I should be apologizing for not having posted in such a long time, but I’m not going to. Ha! I’ve been rediscovering the joy of reading this month with Jean M. Auel‘s Earth’s Children series. It is so fantastic. My Mom (Janet) gave me the first book in the series, Clan of the Cave Bear, which had been given to her by one of her college roommates (Jane). (I find it interesting that the names of these three women all start with J, don’t you?) After devouring the Cave Bear in record time (it is a whopping 468 pages), I absolutely HAD to have the rest of the series. As you can imagine, this created a dilemna. English literature isn’t exactly aboudingly easy to find in Verduno, so I book mooched the entire rest of the series for free online.
Or I thought I had. When I finished the third book (which had a little more sex than was necessary in it) two weeks ago and went to start the fourth I realized that I was missing #4. Woe was me!!! If you’re not a big reader, you cannot understand how it feels to be going strong on a great new series after a ten-year drought of quality reading material and then run out of books!! GHAIGHAIA!! It’s THE worst. (The same thing happened to me when I was twelve and discovered, on a trip to Wellesley to visit my Grandparents, Tamora Pierce‘s The Song of the Lioness series. I unknowingly purchased the third book in the series and loved it. Unfortunately, the rest of the series was not available at WML and I had to wait a whole year before going back to that book store near Nonnie’s house for the rest of the series. (Which, obviously, they didn’t have.) I ended up finding the last book FOUR years after reading the first one. Can you imagine?! That was life before internet!) It seems this missing book in a series is a recurrent theme in my life and a burden I must bear. Needless to say, I am anxiously awaiting the arrival of book #4…
In both of these series’ there’s a strong female protagonist that I am one with. Seriously, this is more of a spiritual bond than I’ve felt with most of my boyfriends. You know you’re in deep when start seeing parts of these fictional characters’ lives in your own life. In Earth’s Children, there’s Ayla, daughter of the earth. I knew I was in deep when I started wishing I had a birch tree near by so I could chew on that instead of brushing my teeth in the morning, and wearing my fake-suede slipper boots and pretending that I hunted the deer and prepared the hide myself. In The Song of the Lioness, there was Alanna, the lady knight who also knew magic – I tried some of her magic spells myself in secret. And in Anne of Green Gables (my other favorite series of all time, though I prefer the movies to the books), there’s Anne – I memorized and can recite from heart all of her favorite poetry. (I find it interesting that all their names start with A, don’t you?)
What will the next series be? Suggestions, anyone?
