A Book that Makes Me Happy - 30 Days of Books, Day 5

Hand me any book by Anne Tyler, and I'm happy. I loved Ladder of Years and was entranced by the thought of a wife and mother who just decides to leave it all behind and move to another city - even though she is only wearing a bikini, a beach coverup, and has a few hundred dollars in her purse. 

As for The Accidental Tourist,  I've read it so many times I'm on my fifth copy. Tyler's descriptions are always spot on, to the point that while I'm reading I have to stop, read again, and say, "Yup, that's totally what I thought too except I never knew it before."

PS - If you were turned off by the movie, press on. The book, as is usually the case is much better. I did enjoy Bill Pullman, though, I must say.

“You ever wonder what a Martian might think if he happened to land near an emergency room? He’d see an ambulance whizzing in and everybody running out to meet it, tearing the doors open, grabbing up the stretcher, scurrying along with it. ‘Why,’ he’d say, ‘what a helpful planet, what kind and helpful creatures.’ He’d never guess we’re not always that way; that we had to, oh, put aside our natural selves to do it. ‘What a helpful race of beings,’ a Martian would say. Don’t you think so?” - The Accidental Tourist

“But his study was so dim and close, and it gave off the salty inky smell of mental fidgeting.” - The Accidental Tourist

As for my Indie book, I'd have to choose The Last Good Knight, by Connie J Jasperson. Yes, it's a saucy, bawdy read, but the characters are as alive as the Wife of Bath in the Canterbury Tales.

The scene where a bullying, violent Lord is unmanned by a female knight is fantastic - and very bawdy. The romance is tender, frustrating, and REAL. Sir Julian is swoon-worthy, as is  Lady Mags herself, the female knight. Reading their stories and long relationship always puts me in a good mood.

" 'I think your horse is sulking, Lackland,' ventured Slippery Jack after they had been on the road a while.

'Do you? I suppose he is. He has delusions of grandeur, you know,' Julian replied. 'His dying ambition is to be put to stud for the rest of his days, the randy old beast.' " - The Last Good Knight