Have you read any good books lately? I love summer; in particular because that is when I seem to have the most time to read.
This last week or so I finished all three parts of the Shades of Grey trilogy. Now, if you’re a woman, I’m fairly certain you know about these three books. And, if you’re a man, it’s likely that you have also heard the buzz regarding the Shades books.
Let me paint a picture for you about how popular these books are right now.
My husband and I have been camping for the last little bit along with a bunch of friends. When looking around the camp, after chores had been done, it wasn’t unusual to see each and every woman there with a book or a Kindle in hand, and, without a lie, each and every one of those women was reading one of the Shades of Grey books. In fact, it’s safe to say the camp was deadly quiet of the usual women-type noises, so engrossed were we in the sexual (and other!) antics of Anastasia Steele and Christien Grey.
Knowing that this is a family newspaper, I shall refrain from further describing the contents of the books except to say that after a while I became tired of reading about the continuous, (and after the first few chapters quite frankly, boring), Ohs! and Ahs! of the books and started skipping over those to get to the true plot line – which was fabulous, by the way.
That’s not to say that I didn’t enjoy the books. I most certainly did and I can vouch for ever single lady there who read them that they did too. The books were the talk of the campsite for several days running and instead of the usual campfire talk, our evenings around the fire were spent discussing the finer points of the books. *Snicker.*
Now men are curious creatures – just ask any woman. While the women were chirping on and on about the scandalous books, the men at first pretended they weren’t listening to such salacious discussions. We women knew better and, quite frankly, we secretly enjoyed dropping little comments here and there just to tease them and egg them on a bit. It really was quite funny watching the men who were trying not to appear to be listening to us.
Finally, taking pity upon my poor husband I decided to read him a tamer part of the book. He was all ears and took the bait hook, line and sinker. Now that the secret (women-only) contents of the book had been spilled, it was then game for open talk among the men.
I’ll spare you the gory details except to say that as the men were elaborating on the finer details of the book the women were looking at each other with a knowing look in the eyes and smiling inwardly.
Now, THAT is what a good book is supposed to do. It’s supposed to stimulate conversation and Shades certainly did that.
Anyway, enough of the Shades of Grey trilogy. I’ve certainly had enough and since then I have finished The Slocan, by Katherine Gordon, a fascinating and well-researched historical book about the Slocan Valley and am now gearing up to read The Book of Negroes, by Lawrence Hill.
Written by a Canadian author, it is published as Someone Knows My Name, in the U.S., Australia and New Zealand because, evidently, someone took offense to the negative connotation of the word Negro.
I hope you find the time to read a great book this summer. There’s nothing better than the beach and a good book.