Characters: Fictional and Real

In ten days I read 4 books. Though it would seem antisocial to read this much, ironically it was through this action that I was able to meet all of my neighbors. Yes, all of them. But first, the books. They are easily four of the best books that I have read in a long time; and to read them back to back is something that may never happen again. I should say here that at this moment, though I have purchased a couch, there is absolutely no furniture in my home; aside from my bed of course. There are chairs outside of my apartment, so that is where I generally reside with a great book. There have been many characters that have accompanied me on the porch. There was Alais and Alice; who lived 800 years apart; but their drive to protect the Holy Grail was quite an achievement. I met them in Labyrinth, by Kate Mosse. Phenomenal. Upon putting that book down I literally picked up the other one and nestled back into the arms of a world so different from my own. The book Dogs of Babel plucked me from my life and put me into a place where a man is desperately trying to teach his dog to talk. Though this sounds like the beginning of fantasy babble, it is in an effort to find out what happened the day his wife died. Their dog was the only witness. It explores a journey post-death and pre-death and a man's search for any clues that his dead wife left behind. Beautiful, just beautiful literary work and also a storyline that is so abundantly full of life while death hovers over the whole story.

After Babel, I changed gears a bit and picked up Running With Scissors; a bizarre account of one man's childhood. A memoir that in itself seems born of fiction. I have read many memoirs and it seems as if their goal is to break your heart. That is not the case in this one. I reveled in the hilarity and the odd happenings in this youth's life. After finishing this book it was incredible to look back and see what this young man had actually endured; and the environment he in turn thrived in. Augusten Burroughs has written several works in the memoir genre, this was the first I read. It will certainly not be the last. After putting Augusten's trials aside I moved then to a book called Case Histories. It pulled me in like the comfort of a mother's arms enveloping you in love and safety. Yet with the warmth that it tucked inside of its reader the plot was about a private detective and the cases he was working; families came to him in search of something lost or found, desiring answers that the graves would not tell.

I met these characters while I was meeting my own characters intermittently. Porches and patios, the basic building blocks of a neighborhood forced me to experience what it means to be a neighbor and above all what it means to make friends. I visited many people in these books and in between the spaces I met my new neighbors. It has been a great couple of weeks learning about people that never existed and then hearing stories of truth and life from those that really do exist. I am making great friends.