Random Thoughts

The pool complex where I swim most summer mornings usually plays 70s dance hits, most likely to entertain the teens who serve as life guards. The songs that wash over the pool include Gloria Gaynor's "I Will Survive" and Wild Cherry's "Play That Funky Music". Trust me, it's a real blast from the past.

This morning was no different, except that one of the songs was the Bee Gees "Night Fever". Immediately I was taken back to one particular day I spent floating down the Amazon River. I hope you click on the link and read the blog entry that I wrote at the time.

A few days ago, I started reading a new book entitled Shadow Country. I picked it up at thrift store for $2.00 and thought I would give it a go before the semester begins. Come to find out, the novel is considered an "epic of American rise and descent" which "traverses strange landscapes and frontier hinterlands". Peter Matthiessen, the book's author, has, according to the National Book Foundation, "coaxed a masterpiece, a wrenching story of familial, racial and environmental degradation" out of an earlier trilogy based on the true story of E. J. Watson.

So far, I find the characters to be interesting and well developed, even though the dialect in which they speak is challenging. The story is complicated and Matthiessen requires the reader to keep track of well over a dozen personalities. I have not gotten into the heart of the story yet, but I do know that E. J. Watson is murdered by many of the people who have already been introduced.

Mathiessen won the 2008 National Book Award in fiction for this novel. A helpful interview with Mathiessen can be found at http://www.nationalbook.org/nba2008_f_matthiessen_interv.html .