You're going to laugh. Today I went to the library to return "Twelve Sharp" and check out the next book in the Stephanie Plum series, "Lean Mean Thirteen." I knew they had it; I saw it on the shelf my last visit. Zut alors! It wasn't there. I pulled every Janet Evanovich book from the shelf. I checked both before and after her section, thinking maybe someone had stuck it back in the wrong place. Nothing, zero, zilch... no #13! How unlucky is that? I walked away incapable of choosing "Fearless Fourteen" which was there. Muttering "I just can't read them out of order," I continued to browse. After wandering up and down the aisles and talking hard to myself, I returned and plucked "Fearless Fourteen" from its place. "Each book stands alone," I reasoned with myself. "You can read #13 next time around." With a sigh, my defeated, neurotic read-'em-in-order self checked out. As I walked thru the hallway to the library's exit, I glanced at the books for sale. If the library finds itself with duplicates of books (they receive donated books all the time), they put them on sale, cheap, to raise money for the library. Right there, front and center, was #13, a bargain at a buck for the hardcover copy. I stopped; I pondered. Should I just buy it? NO! that's absolutely neurotic. So, Lucie and I continued our town chores...getting gas for the mower, picking up a dozen farm-fresh eggs at the feed store, and mailing bills at the post office. All the while, #13 was calling my name. Finally unable to resist, I drove back to the library and bought the sucker! As I paid the librarian, I confessed my neuroses. "I just can't seem to read them out of order," I moaned. She commiserated with me..."Me neither," she laughed, "number thirteen must be checked out."

"And by the way," she added as I opened the door to leave, "we have her latest, #16 on the 'new books' shelf"

"No way," I shot back,"you can't tempt me. I've got three more to read before I'm there!"

Yes, I am neurotic!

Click here to purchase #13 or any of Stephanie Plum's adventures.

Yummy!

I love to read cookbooks almost as much as I love to cook. So, when I heard this cookbook reviewed on NPR, I knew I had to have it. Judith Jones is a senior editor at Knopf and has written several books on her own, but my interest in her stems from the fact that she was Julia Child's cookbook editor. Anyone who can edit Julia Child has to be able to cook...and to tell a good story. And since I'm a single person, I thought this book about cooking for one would be useful as well. It's become one of my favorite sources for recipes. My dinner yesterday was this gratin of beef, mushrooms and breadcrumbs. Yummy! and just right for one person. (I actually made two, so I can have dinner ready another night this week.) I've tried recipes for all the meat dishes except those using veal; I draw the line at eating baby anything. There are also recipes for veggies, salads, and desserts...all portioned for a single diner with recipes for using left-overs if there happen to be any.  I won't tell you the ingredients for the gratin in the photograph as I use a recipe simply for suggestions...I always substitute according to my taste and to what's in the 'fridge. All I can say is it was yummy good!

Sepulchre

I recorded this panoramic sweep of the mountains of southwest France from atop Montsegur. The view was breath-taking; I felt as if I could see forever! I was surprised at how rugged and rural so much of France actually is. I thought of this view last week as I was reading a second Kate Mosse novel, "Sepulchre." Like "Labyrinth" this novel is also set in southwest France, in these very mountains. And like "Labyrinth, the stories in "Sepulchre" slip between two different time periods: France in 1891 and 2007. It's a melange of tarot, magic, and music, good and evil, and the universal search for family and love. While the novel can certainly be read on its own without reading 'Labyrinth," there are some threads that connect it with the other book that add richness to the story. Having seen the wildness of these mountains makes me appreciate how truly terrifying the battle against evil could be in the remote setting of Rennes-les-Bains and the fictional country estate of Domaine de la Cade. Perhaps the sleepy mountain town had stone buildings just like this one I photographed in the mountains outside of Collioure?

Digging Deeper

It's easy to be charmed by the villages of rural France. If you visit, it's usually because you read about a wonderful market or an historic site there in an illustrated guidebook designed to attract tourists...and tourist dollars! Or perhaps you fell in love, sight unseen, after reading one of Peter Mayles' entertaining books about the characters and adventures of his beloved Provence. In either case, the village usually does not disappoint. All spiffed up for tourists, it provides you with an ATM, WC, and car park along with interesting shops full of local arts and crafts and lovely cafes where you can sample local cuisine while sitting on the outdoor terrace watching the world stroll by. Life is idyllic and sweet. You may begin to question, however, if life was always like this. What was your favorite village like before it was discovered by tourists? How did people make a living before and after WWII? Was this village occupied by German forces? Were its people always prosperous? Finding the answers to these questions requires digging deeper. If you lucky enough to be fluent in written French, there are sources for your research. If you're not (like me!), you have the search even harder. There are books out there, tho. This book, "Little Saint" written by Hannah Green weaves village life and history into Ms. Green's research of Sainte Foy, the venerated saint of the Abbey Church of Conques. I read it first at Laury's in September, and then bought my own copy to re-read once I got home. After spending so much time in Conques, the book took on a whole new meaning on my second read. It's beautifully written and full of the lives and loves of the Conquois. Here are a few more good reads if you're looking for the stories behind the guidebook hype....

"Village in the Vaucluse" by Laurence Wylie. Wylie spent a year doing sociologic research in a small, rural village that he called Peyrane. Twenty years later, he revealed that this village was actually Roussillon, a famous tourist village in Provence. His work covers life in the village by age groups: children (infancy, school and adolescence) adult work and recreation, and the aged.

"A Life of Her Own" is an autobiography by Emilie Carles, a French countrywoman born in 1900 in the Vallee de Claree high in the French alps. All her life she kept notebooks and diaries, finally putting them together in a book the year before her death in 1979. Translated into English in 1991, it's a fascinating story of a strong, outspoken, often radical French woman who almost single-handedly saved her beautiful valley from developers' bulldozers.

Michael Sanders went to the tiny village of Les Arques in the Lot to write a book about its restaurant. When he finished "From Here You Can't See Paris," he had actually written a book about the story of the village. Typical of so many tiny villages, Les Arques was on the verge of disappearing...its young people were leaving to find work elsewhere, its old people were dying off, its farmers were having a harder and harder time making a living. When its school closed, the village's fate seemed sealed until someone had the idea to re-open the school as a restaurant. Le Recreation breathed new life into the fading village and Michael Sanders was there to record the story.

"Broken"

I'm off to Reno this afternoon. I'm very excited to see my brother Jim, my nephew John , and my Dad. And I'm excited to start this new book that just arrived in yesterday's mail! Here's the connection (you know, there's always some kind of connection for me!). Lisa Jones, the author of "Broken" is a friend of my dear friend, Edith. They were neighbors for awhile in Boulder. And Edith....in her younger days...spent some time on the Wind River Reservation at Ethete working with Native American kids. She's met Stanford who is the subject of this book. Now is that a cool connection, or what? I'm looking forward to enjoying the book; I'll give it a review when I finish it, but in the meantime, enjoy this YouTube video that features Lisa reading while photos of the Rez entertain you. If you have further interest, Lisa has a website and blog.

Crying Over Cut Onions...and a Book!

My brother, Jim. scored another big hit this holiday season with Kathleen Flinn's "The Sharper Your Knife, The Less You Cry." It was his gift to me for my birthday, and it couldn't be more perfect! See that little Eiffel Tower on the cover? It's a hint that this book is about the author's life-long dream to go to Paris and study cooking with the master chefs at Le Cordon Bleu. At 36 Kathleen Flinn was a successful manager working for an American company based in London; within 2 hours after arriving home from a vacation, however, she was unemployed, laid off, from a job that she really didn't feel a passion for, but that paid the bills. Sound familiar? It did to me. That hit very close to home.What Kathleen did, however, was something I'm not sure I'd ever be brave enough to do...she cashed in her retirement, emptied her savings account and applied to cooking school. She was accepted and her adventure began. (This is the part that made me cry. What a leap of faith!) I'm not certain that putting up with the rigors of the curriculum and the moods of the Cordon Bleu chefs would be my idea of fun, but Kathleen loved it. Each chapter of her book is devoted to a cooking lesson and comes complete with a recipe at the end. I don't intend to spend hours and days making beef stock from scratch, but I've tried the faux minestrone soup recipe, and it's delicious. So is this book!

Black and White

Ansel Adams and Georgie O'Keeffe were both inspired by the churches of northern New Mexico. They fascinate me as well. There's something about their solid, geometric shapes that I find comforting. They look peaceful and ageless. I also love the black and white contrasts of Adams' photography; the play of dark against light is very mysterious to me. The Adams images in "Natural Affinities" illustrate his love of nature as well as his attraction to these adobe structures. After reading the book, I was inspired, too. I won't share my feeble watercolor efforts, but if you're interested in my literary interpretation of the mystery of black and white, you can click here to visit my other blog, Dona Nobis Pacem.