Jumping around.

Still holding off on the Catch-22 discussion. Probably just going to make a mega-post when I finish it. The book is mad depressing in these last 100 pages. Not that I'm not still enjoying it between the crying jags.

I've done nothing to moderate my habit of jumping back and forth from book to book. I can't decide if it's a better or worse way to go about reading things. On the one hand, if I get bored with the way one book is going, I can take a break and go to another book, then go back to the aforementioned book when I've got more time. I feel this is the best way to read certain authors--for example, I read one chapter of Catch-22 and ten pages of Cormac McCarthy a night. Any more than that and I tend to get a little bogged down. With Catch-22, I feel like I'm drowning in all the words after a while because Heller's writing style is so frantic and shifts focus so quickly, so I need those breaks to fully comprehend what I've read. With McCarthy there's that similar flood of words, but McCarthy's writing style is the opposite of frantic--I'd say he comes as close as a human being can to emulating with words the desert he focuses on in so much of his work. And if you were sitting in the desert, just staring at it, for ages, you'd get overwhelmed, because there's just so much of it. But if you just take small trips out there, looking for a bit and then leaving, knowing it'll be there when you come back, it's much easier to focus on each beautiful detail, and you appreciate the beauty all the more comparing that unparalleled landscape to whatever sheltered little dwelling you're going back to.

But then on the other hand, I buy Stephen Fry's new book on a whim and of course can't just wait until I'm done with my other books, and then I can't put it down for love of Stephen Fry.

I mean, just look at him.

 
This new book is called The Fry Chronicles, and it's an account of his life mostly college and afterwards (there's a bit in there about his childhood and adolescence, but apparently he's got an entire separate book on that, which I will be acquiring in short order). The book is just a joy to read. Fry writes exactly like you'd expect him to, so he's got a really pleasant, down-to-earth (and often self-deprecating) way with words. Some might argue that I only love the book so much because I have a truly inappropriate amount of affection for Stephen Fry, but I don't think that's the case. The book is really just delightful to read. I mean, I'm only a hundred or so pages in, so I suppose it could take a horrible turn, but I've more faith in Fry than that.

My only issue with the book is that I keep calling it "The Why of Fry" in my head, because that's a much catchier title and also an episode of Futurama.

Don't worry, Other Fry, I love you just as much.