Sheila's Guests and Reviews

The library's tidy. The books can be found. And the world keeps spinning around. I'm enjoying the delight of a son's bedroom now repurposed as a home for all my books, and the benefits of last year's flood that engendered this repurposing. I'm still regretting the books I lost, and staring anxiously at bottom shelves, four inches above ground level, just hoping that will be enough if the worst comes to worst. But we have water detectors now. As long as we're home when the worst comes to worst, I shall hear a loud noise and come down to rescue my world... ...which keeps spinning around. The books on my review list for today are a very curious mix--the only thing they might have in common is that curiously spinning world... and the fact that they create their own worlds made of words... T he Nut File by John Skoyles presents an almost real world in almost a series (or sequence) of essays, very short stories (sometimes only one sentence) and ponderings, and ...

I've been trying to find a definition of fiction. Someone says it's the art of imagining the unreal then rendering it real enough with words for others to believe in it. I'd try "temporarily believe." I wouldn't want people permanently convinced that my fictional worlds were true. But the intended audience surely has something to do with it. Someone writing a fictional account of a saint's life, with the intent to inspire, will presumably write for an audience that can be inspired by saints. Someone eager to prove that capitalism leads to world domination will write for readers of similar political views. And someone trying to bring history to life presumably looks for readers who believe real history matters. This led to me wondering, what if your intended readership (say Christian women) includes readers of more than one political persuasion (says she as a European Christian, therefore almost by definition somewhat different from an American one)? Shou...