Note on:The Laws of Evening. Here is a brief review in the NYTimes(registration but no subscription required).

A Book and Some Haikus: The Laws of Evening

From Linda:

The book is called: The Laws of Evening by Mary Yukari Waters. I ordered it on half.com and will read it before I recommend it. Following is the beginning of the review:

"The Japanese and Japanese American women who populate this remarkable poised story collection from May Yukari Waters have had their lives and families decimated by WWII. And yet they - and Waters - manage to extract almost crippling beauty from the defining tragedy of the 20th century and its ever-lingering aftermath. Each of Waters' stories is as exacting and bittersweet as a Hiroshige landscape, and there's a sense of loss and nostalgia becoming hopelessly blurred.

The war, after all, spelled the end of the courtly old Japan.... (reoccurring theme from last night)
Anyway, that Haiku reads:

Since my house burned down

I now own a better view

of the rising moon.

In preparation for our next book, and its theme of guilt:

A lovely nose ring

Excuse me while I put my head

In the oven.

Is one Nobel prize

So much to ask from a child

After all I've done?

From Marlo about The Leopard

If you are one of those who couldn't/didn't finish THE LEOPARD, try to pick it up toward the end. The "Death of a Prince" is very nicely done (or is it just me?), and the last chapter "Relics" gives you a sense of how deep Catholicism was in Sicily and Italy. I remember being overwhelmed in Rome, seeing Catholic art everywhere, even on the facade of buildings -- and churches in which statues of the reigning pope are many times larger than statues of the saints or Jesus himself. (!) Ah, we should have planned this meeting to be held in Sicily. When, oh when, will be develop into a book and travel group. Think about it. M