First, a few words about Possession: I hated it. I really wanted to like it, but I just couldn't get past the slooooooow buildup. I find myself a patient reader (usually) and this tested even me. So, a hundred pages in and I put it down and went new-book-hunting. The straw that broke this particular book? All the bad poetry was written by a fake author! It's not even like I'm reading Wordsworth and thinking "God, this is bad; at least it contextualises other works." No! This was just... bad for artistic purposes only! Forget this.
TMKD: lovingly written. I actually cared about the characters and how they would end up. No saccharine sweet endings but no pessimistic wrist-slashing either. Just... life. Heartbreakingly normal; upliftingly mundane. Many books ask "what would you do?" - I like that this asks "what could you have done instead?" and "Now that you've done it, can you mitigate it?" It only took me 7-10 hours to read and it was worth every minute. I'll leave you with the quote that hooked me:
"'She's lovely,' Caroline said. Her hands were trembling. Because she was moved by his love and his sorrow, and because no one had ever loved her with that same passion. Because she was almost thirty years old, and yet if she died the next day there would be no one to mourn her like Rupert Dean still mourned his wife after more than twenty years. Surely she, Caroline Lorraine Gill, must be as unique and deserving of love as the woman in the old man's photo, and yet she had not found any way to reveal this, not through art or love or even through the fine high calling of her work."
I recommend it!
PS: have only recently stumbled upon a French band called "Air" - am in love. I haven't felt this way since first being exposed to Massive Attack. I heard a track on Veronica Mars and have youtubed them to death in the 24 hours since.
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