Quote de jour
"A good book should leave you... slightly exhausted at the end.  You live several lives while reading it."

 ~William Styron, interview, Writers at Work, 1958

That is so true. I'm still wading through the last week's delicious Moveable Feast and falling behind my reading pile. Damn, how real life has a way of interfering. What with celebrating the Pagan new year last night, All Soul's Day or Dia de Los Muertos today, confering with shamans, High Priestesses, spirit entity removal experts all week. It's been shall we say, interesting. I wish I could share the magical weirdness of it all, but I can't. You'll just have to wait until the book comes out.

It's over. The shedding of my beloved maple of her golden finery. What a difference a day makes. 24 hours. Anything can happen, any kind of transformation can occur, good or bad in one day. Some transformations happen with intent or by design, some by surrender to higher forces. It this case, there is nothing to do but let go and gives thanks.
Books this week: a mixed bag of three.
I let out a groan when I found the novel Mercury in Retrograde by Paula Froelich. I'd had a idea for a story with that title and hoped no one would grab the title. Oh well, for anyone into astrology and entertaining post-chick lit romps set in New York, this is fast and funny book is for you. This is a debut novel by Ms. Froelich who writes the Page Six column at the New York Post. Great jacket design too.


My old trick of ordering large print versions of current best sellers from the library worked again. Dan Brown's new book The Lost Symbol  had a mile long waiting list but I only waited a week. Will it satisfy this jaded reader? I doubt it. One good thing about selling millions of copies of books is being able to afford the jazziest web design with a nifty interactive game. http://www.thelostsymbol.com


What is it about women and their affinity for cats? I'm a cat lover and I hope The Feline Mystique by Clea Simon offers catnip for the soul. I do wish they'd chosen a less hazy photo for the cover. You can barely notice the cat.


Magazine design are continuing their penchant for red, white and blue, but heading from autumnal shades to more reds as we, dare I say it, approach the holiday season. Too soon, too soon!  My neighbors already installed their Christmas tree display.

I'm still in shock that Gourmet Magazine got the axe. The November issue of this historic magazine will be their last, sigh.
Ya gotta love New York magazine for telling it like it is about our mayor: Micheal Bloomberg Is About to Buy Himself a Third Term. The lure of distant travel to Asia and India entices more than ever. It seems like everyone wants to escape something or someone to go somewhere.  A new poll shows American women are more powerful but unhappier. I suspect the power is question is external and not from within. When there is internal power with its external expression, happiness results. It means living your truth. Power measured by externals: money, good job, status, designer clothes will never satisfy if the power is not from within.