Just saw this, loved it, sharing it

A great quote:

Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested. -Francis Bacon, essayist, philosopher, and statesman (1561-1626) 

Right??

Currently Reading:

HP Lovecraft and Others: Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos

So remember my, heh heh, plan to read all the books in the house that we moved here from Athens? Ah, how young and innocent that seems now. What a dreamer!

You see, two weeks ago I got my Massachusetts drivers license. Which meant I could get my Salem Public Library Card.

Did I mention that the Salem Public Library is beautiful, decently stocked, and a ten minute walk from the house?

So consider my plan to read all the books we humped up here from Georgia derailed. Temporarily, at least. What can I say? I've been to the library almost every day since I got my card. I picked up a few How To books to help me with my job search, caught up on a few comic book characters with some wonderful graphic novels, and took out a good night time reads to help make October extra spooky.

My only complaint about the Salem Public Library that it is uncharacteristically loud - you actually have to go and sit on the floor in the stacks to find a quiet spot to read. But other than that its great, and a huge comfort to me right now while I'm dealing with some very sad issues in my little family.

So I am currently doing Tales of the Cthulhu Mythos. This is a collection of short stories that all connect (at least tangentially, or thematically in some cases) with HP Lovecraft's famous horror mythos, centered on Yog-Sothoth and his wonderfully awful cosmic compadres. A gent I met recomended a story to me, The Return of the Lloigor by Colin Wilson. I have had a lot of bad luck with writers wandering into HPL's territory in the past, but this particular story is fantastic.

The key feature of the story is a scholar who develops an obsession with the Voynich manuscript, which leads him on a dark adventure and a terrifying discovery about the nature of man. Great stuff. And, as it turns out, the Voynich manuscript is a real thing. So when Wilson has his scholar adventurer discover the connection between the author H.P. Lovecraft's 'fictional' Necronomicon, and this real world mystery, it gives the narrative a sublime meta-textual layer. Its right out of the Lovecraft playbook and I love this story for it. 

And what a great read for the Halloween season here in Salem!

And that is all for me today on this sad Wednesday.

Happy Halloween all!