Jury Duty, Day 2
I probably can't say much of anything about the trial yet, except to mention that it's a civil case rather than a criminal case; that we're supposed to be done today, but we could be there through tomorrow; that one of my fellow jurors smells like a urine-soaked brewery; and that if it were possible, the council for the defense would make sweet, sweet love to everyone one of us to ensure a "Not Guilty" verdict for his client.
In the meantime, I finished The Trail of the Serpent and...meh. But better "meh" than Lady Audley's Secret. This one is just as ridiculously filled with improbably circumstances (for one of Jabez-disguised-as-Raymond's fiendish plots to succeed, he needs a mimic. It just so happens, the World's Greatest Mimic happens to be in Paris at the nearby opera house. This mimic also just happens to be the same size and shape as the person Jabez-disguised-as-Raymond wants the mimic to mimic), and there are long stretches of the novel that totally feel like padding to increase the word-count (towards the end there were a couple two-three paragraphs that I skimmed more than read because out of nowhere, what Braddon thought the plot needed was a lot of exposition in the middle of an action sequence) -- but this story is much more engaging while reading it. Lady Audley's Secret, on the other hand, is only interest when the novel's done, and you approach it from a 21st-century perspective.
Up next on the docket is either Shirley or The Heart is a Lonely Hunter. Following my "Alphabetically We Read" plan, Brontë should be next. However, April's book for my Bethesda Book Group is McCullers. I read the first chapter of The Heart is a Lonely Hunter last night and didn't think much of it. (So, I thought, they're mutes. I get it. They're silent, yet their silence means so much. Can we go now?) Since I have until the second week of April to read The Heart..., maybe I'll just put it off and read Shirley -- mostly because the title makes Zach giggle every time he sees it. ">snerk<, Shirley," he'll say. "How improbable."
In the meantime, I finished The Trail of the Serpent and...meh. But better "meh" than Lady Audley's Secret. This one is just as ridiculously filled with improbably circumstances (for one of Jabez-disguised-as-Raymond's fiendish plots to succeed, he needs a mimic. It just so happens, the World's Greatest Mimic happens to be in Paris at the nearby opera house. This mimic also just happens to be the same size and shape as the person Jabez-disguised-as-Raymond wants the mimic to mimic), and there are long stretches of the novel that totally feel like padding to increase the word-count (towards the end there were a couple two-three paragraphs that I skimmed more than read because out of nowhere, what Braddon thought the plot needed was a lot of exposition in the middle of an action sequence) -- but this story is much more engaging while reading it. Lady Audley's Secret, on the other hand, is only interest when the novel's done, and you approach it from a 21st-century perspective.
Up next on the docket is either Shirley or The Heart is a Lonely Hunter. Following my "Alphabetically We Read" plan, Brontë should be next. However, April's book for my Bethesda Book Group is McCullers. I read the first chapter of The Heart is a Lonely Hunter last night and didn't think much of it. (So, I thought, they're mutes. I get it. They're silent, yet their silence means so much. Can we go now?) Since I have until the second week of April to read The Heart..., maybe I'll just put it off and read Shirley -- mostly because the title makes Zach giggle every time he sees it. ">snerk<, Shirley," he'll say. "How improbable."
posted by Mike at 7:00 AM
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