My own personal marathon challenge

What started as a joke has now become a serious challenge. When a friend of mine wrote on Facebook that she had finished a Rubik's Cube and now needed another challenge, little did I know she would take me up on the offer when I suggested she should read Tolstoy's War and Peace. Neither did I think that she'd rope me into joining her!

I was given War and Peace by my boyfriend (now husband) one Christmas several years ago. I had told him that this book was on my all-time "Gotta read that before I die" list so he thoughtfully gave it to me so I could get started. I never did. The 1444 pages seemed insurmountable so I kept deferring it. One day, I kept saying, one day......

Now it seems that 'one day' has now arrived and what better way could you hope to take on such a literary marathon but with someone else. A training buddy, someone to motivate you and spur you along when the pages seem too many and the words blur in front of your eyes. Suddenly, War and Peace seems less like a marathon and more like what it really is: a book I always wanted to read. Yes, it's nearly three inches thick and that's the small print version, but now it seems possible. Starting today, I'm commencing my War and Peace marathon.

I'll let you know how I go.

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She does it again... in 2010!

Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert was, without a doubt, one of my favourite books of 2009 (and there's still 4 months of reading left to go!) In fact, I would say it's a firm contender for my Top Ten reads of all time. It really was that good and with 57 weeks in the number one spot on the New York Times non-fiction list, I think it's a safe bet to assume I'm not the only one who thinks this way.

This book looks at her journey towards a second try at marriage with Jose (Felipe from EPL) - something she never anticipated after the devastating unravelling of her first marriage which sparked off the epic journey that was EPL. Given the things that life and God threw at her in EPL, Gilbert might have known better than to say out loud that she would never marry again, but she did and yet again life and God trumped her with circumstance at border control. The only way for Jose/Felipe to ever enter the USA again was for them to marry... and this book was the result.

Off the back of her MASSIVE success with EPL, I suspect many people will be watching her closely to see if it was all just a fluke. Personally, I think this kind of scrutiny is just, if you will excuse the phraseology, bollicks. This woman can write, as she has amply proven, not only with EPL but with three other published books not to mention a slew of journalistic and other writings. To treat her as an overnight success that might not be able to replicate her previous success is just insulting. And mean. I am firmly in her corner and I am sure this next book will be equally as fantastic as EPL in its own wonderful way.

So, with the follow-up book to EPL coming out in 2010 and the the movie version coming out in 2011, Elizabeth Gilbert fans like myself have a lot to look forward to! It's going to be a great couple of years.

And so my obsession with this author will continue... ;)