Published : 2021 || Format : print || Location : Colombia ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆ What was it about the country that kept everyone hostage to its fantasy? The previous month, on its own soil, an American man went to his job at a plant and gunned down fourteen coworkers, and last spring alone there were four different school shootings. A nation at war with itself, yet people still spoke of it as some kind of paradise.. Thoughts : Infinite Country follows two characters - young Talia, who at the beginning of this book, escapes a girl’s reform school in North Colombia so that she can make her previously booked flight to the US. Before she can do that, she needs to travel many miles to reach her father and get her ticket to the rest of her family. As we follow Talia’s treacherous journey south, we learn about how she ended up in the reform school in the first place and why half her family resides in the US. Infinite Country tells the story of her family through the other protagonist, El
Hello again from Toronto! We have been here for about a week now and will leave the city in a couple of days to head to Quebec City, a trip I am schoolgirl-excitedly looking forward to. We will be in Canada another week or so before heading back home to routine, work, and hopefully warm weather.
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To me, Toronto downtown is certainly a much easier place to drive in than most other big city downtowns I've been to, which isn't many. I guess it helped having one of those tourist maps, the kind that boast about the many must-see places in downtown, complete with major road markings and parking spot indicators. So on Tuesday, when the husband and I were driving to meet a friend in downtown near his workplace, I immediately picked my map to see which bookstore was in the vicinity. As we walked into the Eliot's Bookshop, the owner immediately warned us that they were closing. I was a little bummed out - who wouldn't be when a book-shopping plan gets derailed? But he asked us if we were looking for something specific, to which we replied that we just wanted to browse. For whatever reason, he amiably let us in for "a few seconds". And then he divulged that there were three stories of books. Huh, excuse me? How was I going to get through three stories of books in "a few seconds"? I decided not to book-browse while the clock was ticking in my head and come back later, but the friend who was meeting us took us to another nearby bookstore, from where I snagged four great steals, including a Walking Dead volume.
I had a similar experience yesterday when I went to She Said Boom!, where I found a gorgeous copy of Ismail Kadare's The Accident, which had been on my wishlist for a while but wasn't easily available anywhere. It is experiences like these that make me so thankful for used bookstores. Sure, I will probably find both these books in less than a minute on Amazon or Barnes and Noble online, but there is something to be said about coming across a much-awaited gem of a book where you least expect it. It almost feels like getting an early Christmas present.
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The backseat of our car is now stuffed with all my book purchases. I had to fight a strong desire to bring them all up to our hotel room, so that I can surround myself with them, maybe even do a photo shoot with them. But of course, we will have to take them back to the car again for our return so it didn't seem like a sensible thing to do. I will put up a post of all the books once I return back to Virginia.
Comments
And OMG I totally think you should do a photoshoot with all those books. Think about it as a maternity shoot. :)