"What the Psychic Told the Pilgrim" by Jane Christmas
This is subtitled "A Midlife Misadventure on Spain's Camino de Santiago de Compostela"
Christmas' style annoyed me initially...she certainly didn't seem like someone I would like to know and I can see why she ended up losing her group and walking most of the way herself on this pilgrimage. However, I did get into it in the end and quite enjoyed reading about these modern pilgrims who walk around 25K a day for a month...or not. Actually, to finish the pilgrimage officially one only needs to walk the last 100K. People, including the author sometimes, took taxis, the bus, etc. It sounded quite unpleasant staying in the hostels although the pilgrims also did stay in hotels too.
What I found most interesting is that people get addicted to doing this. I guess part of it is not having to make any other decisions than just getting up and walking every day.
"Summer" by Edith Wharton
One of my Christmas books that Jim scoured the second hand bookstores for. This Christmas tradition gets me reading things I probably wouldn't read since I am so attracted to contemporary fiction. This was first published in 1917. A rather interesting tale about another unlikable woman. Interesting for the social mores of the time.
"The Assassin's Song" by M.G. Vassanji
Hot off the press but he didn't win a third Giller for it this year even though it was nominated. I quite liked it but probably not as much as the two novels that won the Giller. I think I'm tiring a bit of immigrant, two worlds type stories.
