Le livre des fuites

Le trolleybus numéro 9 avançait, portant dans son ventre les grappes de visages aux yeux tous pareils. Sur son dos, les deux antennes dressées couraient le long des fils électriques, s'inclinant, vibrant, crissant. De temps à autre, une boule d'étincelles jaillissait en claquant du bout des antennes, et on sentait dans l'air une drôle d'odeur de soufre. Le trolleybus numéro 9 s'arrêtait devant un pylône sur lequel était écrit « ROSA BONHEUR ». Les freins sifflaient, les portes se repliaient, et il y avait des gens qui descendaient à l'avant pendant que d'autres montaient à l'arrière. C'était ainsi. Puis le trolleybus numéro 9 repartait le long du trottoir portant dans son ventre la grappe d'oeufs blanchâtres, en route vers le but inconnu. En route vers le terminus toujours recommencé, l'espèce de place déserte avec un jardin poussiéreux, où il virait lentement sur lui-même avant de repartir en sens inverse.

Autobiography of Mark Twain

“It’s totally the Dad book of the year,” said Rebecca Fitting, an owner of the Greenlight Bookstore in Fort Greene, Brooklyn. “It’s that autobiography, biography, history category, a certain kind of guy gift book.” Many booksellers said the memoir has a perfect holiday-gift quality: a widely adored author, a weighty feel, and a unique story behind its publication. (Twain ordered that the book be published a century after his death.) Most of the content was dictated to Twain’s stenographer in the four years before he died, at 74 in 1910. It is more political than his previous works, by turns frank, funny, angry and full of recollections from his childhood, which deeply influenced books like “Huckleberry Finn.” A younger generation of readers is discovering Twain for his political writings, Ms. Fitting said.

Holiday Stress

December is one of the most stressful times of the year. And, this particular month is more chaotic, maddening, and depressingly stressful than most years in recent memory. But, in celebration of Jane Austen's birthday, Laurie Viera Rigler wrote: "It is a truth little-known that Jane Austen novels and works inspired by the great author are an effective cure for holiday stress." Do you allow books to offer solace at stressful times in your life? Books always offer an escape--a brief moment of reprieve to forget the worries or troubles of the day. But, books are also old, familiar friends. Cradled in your arms, a book can take you back to bygone days, be the voice of reason, and offer sage wisdom or life-changing experience. So, what do books mean to you in stressful times? Does reading help you deal with stress? Whatever the reason for your reading, take a look at Rigler's novel: Confessions of a Jane Austen Addict (website).