Required Reading

Books make us happy!

"When someone speaks he looks at a mouth, not eyes and their colours, which, it seems to him, will always alter depending on the light of a room, the minute of the day. Mouths reveal insecurity or smugness or any other point on the spectrum of character. For him they are the most intricate aspect of faces. He's never sure what an eye reveals. But he can read mouths darken into callousness, suggest tenderness. One can often misjudge an eye from its reaction to a simple beam of sunlight."

JING SAYS...

For days now, my mind has been flip-flopping from the sands of the Sahara Desert to the ruins of a villa in Italy. I've been buried in the pages of Michael Ondaatje's The English Patient, and it has been such a delicious read. While the movie, with a young Ralph Fiennes with the piercing eyes, will always be one of my all-time favorites, the book is, as is always the case, even better. I remember digging out the volume in one of the bins of Booksale, and feeling somewhat ecstatic. It was quite a find! 

But then, I don't remember when or how, I lost the volume. Someone borrowed it, I think, and never returned it. Oh, well, such is the fate of books.

A few weeks ago, I received a message from my dear friend B. She was looking for new homes for her old books, and among the many titles was, yes, you guessed it, The English Patient! I did a little happy dance in my head, and messaged her immediately, hoping I was the first to call dibs on it. And that's how I found myself getting to know Count Almasy once again, and Katherine and Caravaggio and Hana. It was like meeting old friends.

Oh, and I got more than The English Patient. B gave me a bunch of other books including volumes on writing and travelling. It was quite a treat! Thank you, B!! :)