Marydanielle > Recent Status Updates

"How well Isaac knew these scents of autumn and the butterfly touch of falling leaves upon his face, sad or happy as his mood might be. Winter, spring and summer did not accommodate themselves to one's moods as autumn did. They lacked its gentleness."

This is my second time reading Jerusalem — it’s kind of a sacred experience not something one speaks of in public.

I finished it again...this time around it felt like I was reliving my actual lived life, rather than re-reading a book; it was an uncanny sensation not at all comfortable as you might feel in revisiting a favorite book, not at all cozy, not for a moment cuddly.

This is my second time reading Jerusalem — it’s kind of a sacred experience not something one speaks of in public.

I love the Shardlake books and this is the best one. I could not quite read the most tragic chapters all the way through but that’s evidence of how skillful Sansom is at recreating the 16th century and peopling it with characters one cares about. I think the book changed how I see the world in some ways, as I feel more compassion for the dispossessed in our own time after reading about the commons of 1549.

I’m a villain. Without the fortitude to go through the revolution with the Ketts and all the lovely folk on a Mousehold Heath I skipped ahead to the historical essay at the end of the book and then worked my way back through the chapters to save myself from the tragedy as it unfolded. Now I have read back through the chapters to chapter 80. Sansom makes it so vivid I cannot read the ... scary bits.

I loved the sense of disruption and ruin. Allegories of historical, religious, and personal lacunae woven into a rough landscape just this side of western canonical paradise. Very sad.

I like the stuff about miracles being a matter of paying attention.

Food security is no longer the sole concern of the paranoid schizophrenic.