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Interesting look into the life of a Vermont high school boy. I liked the variety of characters Cadow manages to squeeze in among the trees and brooks. Made me think of The Bones on Black Spruce Mountain by David Budbill.

Interesting that after 120 years a book so grounded in social mores in rural Japan is still fun to read. I think part of its appeal is that Botchan maintains the sense of right and wrong that high school students are in the midst of establishing (one of the reasons that you should not read Thoreau's Walden when you turn 40 - you will wince at the number of accommodations you have made with the world) and he reminds us of our youthful selves.

I started trying to read this novel in December (23) but it defeats me. Perhaps it is declining RAM in my brain, but it seems to me that pointillism was fine for Seurat but as a writing technique it requires keeping too many balls in the air. I fell off the horse when Strout invented a new tree species.

Much like Margaret Atwood’s Penelopiad, without Atwood’s bite and humor, Spin is a modern recasting of the myth of Arachne. I applaud Caprara’s bringing women and girls out of their demeaning status in traditional telling of the Greek myths and into the strong landscape of their own.