Stories of the Wind

This afternoon I heard a strong wind in the trees outside, and it made me think of a paper I wrote a few years ago about the role of the wind deities in Navajo and Greek mythologies. I remember how strongly the wind blew that week, whistling through the cracks of the window in my room as I was writing. It was a cold, blustery December wind, fierce and shrill, an uncanny but appropriate backdrop to my scholarly efforts.

The wind I heard this afternoon had a different timbre. It was an autumn wind through and through, like the one Shelley addressed as "O Wild West Wind, thou breath of autumn's being," "sweet though in sadness." It was an expectant wind, unlike the storm winds of winter and summer, which somehow seem just part of the season, striking not a new note but blending into the overall effect. An autumn wind is restless and heralds change.

In many mythologies, wind is the life force of creation, the breath of the divinity. In some cases, it is the speaking of a word by a god (whose divine breath shapes the word) that creates the world and its humans. I was especially charmed by the conception of the wind in Navajo stories, in which the wind is present not only in nature and the gods but in each individual. Wind plays a central role in creation as well as in the ongoing relations between humans and deities. It sometimes takes the form of a helpful god appearing to an individual in times of trouble or need. At these times it takes the guise not of a powerful storm but of a quiet companion, whispering advice and wisdom. Not quite a guardian angel or a conscience, it's more like a sage friend. The Navajo call this wind deity Nilch'i.

Nilch'i plays an important part in the adventures of Reared Within the Mountains, the hero of The Mountain Chant. He appears to the hero at crucial times, issuing guidance, giving warnings, and teaching him how to access and use his own power. Although Nilch'i is a deity, the life force in him is the same force that animates Reared Within the Mountains and all other people. Nilch'i is much like an inner voice, inspiration (from Latin, "to breathe upon or into") that arises when the individual pays attention to its sometimes subtle utterances.

I was struck by the contrast between the role of the wind in the Navajo stories and the Greek myths. Heroes in the Greek myths are often at odds with the winds, which appear as tools of the gods, used to manipulate or punish humans; Odysseus and Agamemnon battle the winds on several occasions, usually coming out the worse for wear. Once, the god Aeolus tries to make Odysseus a present of the winds by tying them up in a bag, but Odysseus's men set them free, whereupon they blow the ship wildly off course, displaying the tricksterish nature that is often their hallmark.

The portrayal of the winds in both traditions is complex, but I see a fundamental difference between them centered on the issue of power and control. In Greek mythology, humans often seem to be at war, either with nature or each other. They are guided by the principle of Arete, "excellence," often in military and athletic pursuits that involve competition or strife. In Navajo mythology, the key concept is Hozhooji, living in harmony and beauty. Strife and discord are a part of the scene, but an individual seeking Hozhooji learns to live in balance with contending forces. Anyone can do this; you are not dependent on the whims of the gods or the impersonal workings of Fate but rather on your own ability and desire to live in tune with nature and other people.

In the Navajo stories, even a wild or destructive wind has its place and purpose in the overall scheme. It may cleanse the world and prepare it for a new season, like the wind blowing leaves around my apartment building this afternoon. It may come as a whirlwind, drilling a hole in which the hero shelters from his enemies. Or it may simply bring needed rains.

To me it seems that the wisdom in this Native American tradition has been trumped too many times by forces thriving on antagonism, but it's always possible to change course. I love the Greek myths but have always thought it would be tough to actually inhabit the world they portray (though in a way, we do inhabit the world they portray). I can better imagine living within the boundaries of the Navajo universe. Life is still difficult there, and certainly the winds still blow. But how different it would be to be measured not by the length of your sword or the size of your ship but by how well you listen.

Household Gods

The other day I read an essay by someone who was critical of people who identify themselves as "spiritual but not religious." His general point seemed to be that people who think of themselves this way are dabblers, holding only a shallow acquaintance with the beliefs and texts that inform the world's religions. He seemed to believe that these dilettantes are invariably fence-sitters, guilty of cherry-picking only the spiritual bits that appeal to them and blithely avoiding the hard truths that are always part and parcel of a religious worldview.

I wonder what he'd think if he ever visited me. I won't even get into my book collection. After three years in a myth studies program, I have books on Buddhism stacked on top of books about the Hebrew Bible, West African religions, and Celtic folklore. Texts on Hinduism share shelf space with volumes on Native American traditions, Christianity, Islam, and ancient Egyptian gods.

Like everybody in my program, I studied all of these belief systems and more, seriously and open-mindedly, though I wouldn't call myself an adept in any one of them. Our goal was not to choose among them but to try to understand their core beliefs, their origins and development, and above all the stories they tell us. I thought of myself as "spiritual but not religious" a long time before I started graduate school, and the program pretty well convinced me I was on the right track with that approach. I've always been cross-disciplinary in my thinking and have found that being eclectic is not only very enriching but also makes greater sense of things than trying to find all the answers in one place.

I was raised as a Christian and came to have doubts about some of the dogma of the Church, though I was not sorry about the structure and moral fiber I ingested with my upbringing. Myth studies not only introduced me to beliefs different from the ones I learned in Catholic school, it also gave me a new respect for the texts and traditions of my own past. I read parts of the Old Testament in graduate school that I only heard about in catechism class and had never actually read for myself.

One of the professors at school liked to say it's helpful in any given situation to stop, look around, and ask yourself: Who is present? I'm asking myself that now. Over to my right, on a shelf behind my writing desk, is a statue of Ganesha, Hindu remover of obstacles and friend to students. Every time I happen to see him, I get a sense of well-being; he just looks so calm and immovable. On the bookshelf across the room is a statue of Kwan Yin, Buddhist goddess of compassion, sitting serenely atop a crescent moon. In the hall outside the living room is Bastet, the watchful Egyptian cat goddess who sees everyone who crosses my door.

In the kitchen I have refrigerator magnets in the form of an angel with a quill and a manuscript, a pretty little Virgin of Guadalupe, and a tiny metallic goddess engraved with the words, "How do I set a laser printer to stun?" I used to have a Shaker Tree of Life on the wall in there. (It's still around here somewhere. I'll have to find a new place for it.)

In the bathroom, Aphrodite (with one eye on her own reflection) and Hecate, triple goddess of magic, preside together over the sink, lotions, and potions. In my bedroom, a dancing Shiva, another Virgin of Guadalupe, a golden Buddha, my Japanese lucky cat, another Kwan Yin, and an exultant spring goddess coexist on the bookcase. There are also two dreamcatchers, a small angel, and two rather chipped and bemused looking gargoyles (they've been knocked over a few times) who act as bookends on the dresser.

What the gentleman who wrote the essay might interpret as sampling I prefer to think of as "taking all the help I can get." I'm so used to living with the images of all these different entities that I admit I often forget they're even there. But that doesn't mean they've forgotten me, and who knows what good they've done for me without my knowing it, simply because I've made room for them.

By the way, I've yet to hear complaints from any of them about having to share quarters, though they probably wish I would dust more often.

An Off-Cannes Film Festival: It's Archetypal!

I used to enjoy reading mini-reviews of movies that appeared regularly in a local publication. And when I say mini, I'm serious: the reviews were only a short sentence or two. They were pithy, often witty, sometimes mean-spirited, and not to be trusted as a guide to what you should actually see. They were interesting to read merely because it was fun to see the writer sketch an entire film in a few words while turning a catchy phrase.

I thought I'd try to do the same with the movies I've watched over the last couple of weeks at home. None of these films are recent, some of them are quite old, and this is not necessarily a guide to what you should actually see. Also, I think there's plenty of meanness in the world, so I'll leave that element out. Witty is probably aiming too high, but pithy I should be able to handle, having both headline-composing and haiku-writing within my realm of experience.

I always thought it would be fun to be a film critic, and now, through the magic of blogging, I can be, even though the pay isn't much. I'm calling this "The Eclectic Minimalist's Archetypal Film Roundup." If you read anything into my choice of films, it's your own fault, because there's no premeditation involved. I just know what I like (or think I like. I'm not always right). Here's the roundup:

Garden State
Boy living in L.A. heavily medicated goes home to Jersey, meets girl, does primal scream therapy on truck in a rainstorm, self-heals in a bathtub. Reading: Persephone charms Hades clean out of the Underworld.

Man on the Train
A bank robber and retired teacher forge a friendship, sample how the other half lives, exchange notes on slippers and target-shooting.
Reading: Hermes and Hestia have tea and shoot at cans.

The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged)
Three smart-aleck comedians zoom through the canon with a heavy emphasis on the tragedies (because "they're funnier"). They're right.
Reading: Hermes, Dionysus, and Apollo start their own circus.

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Man-about-town journalist suffers catastrophic stroke, is forced to live imaginatively within severe limits, aided by heroic women.
Reading: Wounded Dionysus, attended by Mnemosyne and Muses.

An American in Paris
Gene Kelly paints, sings, and dances his way into hearts of two women, loves one, takes the other to a party, fantasizes choreography to a Gershwin melody.
Reading: Hmmm . . . the Apple of Discord maybe, but there are only two goddesses, and this is Paris, so there's singing, dancing, kissing, and starving artists, but no Trojan War.

Adam's Rib
Married lawyers mix careers and love in a hectic battle of the sexes in which the winner is -- it's a draw!
Reading: Zeus is bested but turns the tables on Hera, then they go to Connecticut.

Clerks
Generation X minimum-wagers get profane, play hockey on the roof, wax philosophical, attend a funeral on work time, weather bathroom death. First annoying, then wise.
Reading: Satyrs at the convenience store who sometimes channel Saturn.

The Umbrellas of Cherbourg
Young lovers dream, meet secretly, get pregnant, and are parted in a candy-box setting where everybody (even the mailman) sings. You can't get that song out of your head for days.
Reading: Aphrodite gets walloped by Hestia, which may or may not be a good thing. You decide.

Inherit the Wind
Teacher is arrested for teaching evolution; lawyers, politicians, townspeople, demagogues jump into the fray. Sharp and surprisingly modern.
Reading: Apollo loses, but the battle lines get blurred in the melee.

Coco Before Chanel
Early life of Coco Chanel, who dreamed of success on stage, struggled in a man's world, crashed some parties, made her own clothes, and then other people's.
Reading: Artemis becomes Aphrodite. Or, Ariadne picks up her own thread, grabs needle.

Cool Hand Luke
Couldn't get disc to play.
Reading: Mercury in retrograde. A failure to communicate.

First Day of Autumn

Last night I went to the Oktoberfest at a local church, a festival that's made a name for itself by bringing in exceptional musical performers. The last time I went was years ago, and I went there on an artist's date (I was doing the Artist's Way at the time). It was a sunny afternoon, and other than it being a pleasant day with a big crowd, booths, and bratwurst, I don't remember anything about it. This was in the days before Oktoberfest became hip by inviting big-name musicians to play in front of a crowd of beer-drinkers, kids, parishioners, college kids on dates, and hipsters.

My first impression last night was that, besides having better music, the fair has gotten more elaborate. I walked past innumerable games, bouncy houses, Cinderella castles, and other attractions for kids. Out in the open area, between the Bingo tent, the stage, and the food vendors, there was a sea of people, but no one I recognized. My dilemma beforehand had been what to wear, since the afternoon was warm but the night was going to cool off, and in the crowd you could see every possible answer to that problem as devised by other people: I saw women in sandals and women in boots, guys wearing shorts and T-shirts, denim jackets, sweaters, and blazers.

What I didn't see was anyone who looked like me, that is to say, unattached. It was definitely a family-oriented occasion. There are times you can go someplace by yourself and feel perfectly OK about it, but Christ the King's Oktoberfest isn't one of them. After a brief reconnoiter, I determined there was nothing to do except eat, drink, stand in line to eat or drink, play Bingo, or wait for the music to start.

I felt very conspicuous, just standing around (I didn't have flashbacks to the time I went to godparent training alone and received the icy stares of seven or eight married couples, all of whom were going to be parents, though it may have been in the back of my Catholic mind somewhere). I was almost on the verge of sneaking into the church to sit and look at the stained-glass windows (something I used to do in my college days) when I noticed a sign for a silent auction taking place in the church hall. I figured it would be something to do until the music started, so I went in and made the rounds of Wildcat athletics paraphernalia, game baskets, gadgets, and, on a special table in back, a slew of cakes, bundt, caramel, lemon, and iced, which diverted me for ten minutes or so.

Back outside, the musicians, Chris Hillman (of The Byrds) and Herb Pedersen (of The Desert Rose Band) were getting ready, and I was dithering about whether I even wanted to stay. Deciding it was useless to leave without sampling any of what made Oktoberfest famous, I rather indecisively took up a post at a back corner of the seated crowd. I wasn't about to sit. By that time, with the sun going down, it was getting chilly, and I decided that staying on my feet would help me stay warm and also enable a quick getaway.

The music was very good, though something a little less mellow and more rocking would have been a good excuse to move around more. As it was, I managed to bounce up and down on my heels. I never got over feeling out of place in the crowd, but a certain stubbornness prevented me from bolting, and I made it through the first set. While the sounds of mandolin and guitar drifted through the darkening air, and the odor of mustard and sausage wafted around on a stiff breeze, I reminded myself that I'm a mythologist, and that I could look at the scene with a mythologist's eye. I tried, but I have to admit drawing a bit of a blank. I knew I was at a harvest festival, but this suburban church parking lot, with its barbecue, hot dogs, bouncy castles, and soft drinks, didn't seem to have much in common with bringing in the grain. Then again, it's probably one of those things that makes more sense if you come with a crowd.

I lasted through the first performance before heading to my car. That's when a tiny burst of magic set in. I walked down the wrong street, which was OK; I felt like walking and getting some fresh air, so I took the long way around. On either side of the quiet street, warm light spilled out of houses; a half moon glowed between two rows of trees. I had a sudden, vivid memory of being out on a long-ago Halloween, roaming from house to house in the dark with a bag of candy and an even more delicious sense of license, magic, and mystery.

By the time I got home last night, it felt good to walk into the warmth of the hallway, and my apartment, which had seemed a little oppressive earlier in the day, now seemed cozy and clean and blessedly free of the odor of mustard. I celebrated surviving the Oktoberfest with hot chocolate and toast.

If there is any moral to this story, I guess it might be don't go to the Oktoberfest if what you're really in the mood for is something more mysterious. But if you do go, take a friend.

American Graffiti Meets the Amduat

When I watched American Graffiti Friday night, I tried to remember the last time I saw it. It might have been when I was in high school, and one of our teachers brought it in for a class viewing. I had also seen it at the theater when it first came out. It turns out I remembered hardly any of it. I seem to recall finding it a little slow and wondering why everyone at the time was so crazy about it. I'm not sure people still cruised when I was in high school (I was a bit out of the loop back then), but otherwise the characters seemed a lot like people I knew. They were ordinary and did ordinary teen-age things, none of which seemed all that significant.

But this time, when the credits came up, I felt slightly stunned, the way you feel when you've just seen something great and mysterious. This is not my first time to realize that a movie (or a book) changes as you change, but it was one of the most poignant instances of that experience.

A movie about a right of passage is probably going to look different once you've undergone that passage yourself, it's true, and this movie is about nothing if not the threshold between youth and adulthood. You can't be nostalgic about crossing this threshold when you haven't done it yet, and you especially can't be nostalgic if you hated your teen years to begin with and didn't give a parting glance to your own high school days.

But looking at the characters now, I relate to them in a way I didn't back then. I can understand the reluctance to leave the known for the unknown, the good, carefree times for the uncertainties of a life you have to make for yourself, and trusted comrades for a wider world that in the light of day seems more daunting than exciting. At the time I left high school, I didn't feel I was leaving any of these things, but now, having made my way this far, I understand that for people who did enjoy their youth, graduation means crossing a divide over which you can never return. In some ways, it may be an advantage to have been less than thrilled with your teen years because after that there's nowhere to go but up. If you peak in high school (like Graffiti's hot-rodding John Milner), it's an early fall from grace.

Despite being intensely ordinary, the people in the movie carry archetypes that went over my head on the first viewing. The class president, the head cheerleader, the hot-rod king -- all have experienced glory on their small stage and discover (or are about to) what it means to lose that shining moment, almost like Greek heroes just past their prime. The unbelievably fabulous soundtrack, along with Wolfman Jack's on-the-air commentary, constitutes a Greek chorus for the proceedings: the falling in and out of love, the dangers of the road, the excitement of youth and freedom. The Wolfman, now long since passed away himself, is a kind of oracle in the film, idolized by the young, steeped in mythology, and existing in his own remote cave, a small broadcast center outside of town, where Curt manages to track him down while looking for help with love and life.

Listening to Bill Haley's "Rock Around the Clock," the film's opening number, and realizing that the entire story takes place over the course of a single night, I thought about the Amduat, the Egyptian book of the underworld journey, a comparison that's probably escaped most reviewers (but one that makes Curt's initiation into the Pharaohs seem most fitting). The Amduat recapitulates the nightly journey of the sun god through the underworld, also representing the journey of the individual soul through the world of sleep and dreams and the afterlife. Like the dreamer, the sun god encounters foes, helpers, other gods, and various strange figures in his nightly journey by solar bark. Steve and Laurie, Curt, John, and Toad pass the hours of the night cruising in their cars, encountering friends, rivals, those who would harm them, mentors, and even (in Curt's case) an elusive goddess in a white Thunderbird.

In the Egyptian night journey, the twelfth and final hour holds a special significance and danger. The final moments, just before dawn and the triumphant return of the sun, are the most hazardous, since all the forces of darkness lie in wait for a final chance to throw a wrench in the works. In the movie, everything comes to a head in the climactic pre-dawn showdown on Paradise Road, with John racing to defend his status against a dangerous newcomer, Falfa. A mournful Laurie, trying to assert her independence after breaking up with Steve, is in Falfa's car. As Steve races toward the scene, the two drivers take off down a screaming straight-away at high speed, until Falfa loses control and flips his car. Laurie and Falfa escape before it blows up, but the accident seals Steve and Laurie's fate in a way neither had anticipated.

Against the backdrop of the rising sun, Steve, who had been the voice of reason when Curt expressed doubts about heading off to college, now promises a sobbing Laurie that he won't leave her. Toad is jubilant over John's unblemished record, but John, who is a few years older and sadder, tells Toad he was losing until Falfa blew a tire. Awash in hero worship, Toad can't believe it, and his enthusiasm helps John put off his growing realization of mortality until another day.

Curt, meanwhile, finally gets the call from the girl of his dreams after spending the last few hours of the night in his car, only to realize that she will remain a dream because now that it's day, he has decided to go to college after all. At the airport, it's Steve, not Curt, who remains behind.

It's as if the entire lives of the characters have been lived in a single night, as if with the sunrise, without their planning it, a line has been crossed. According to the film's epilogue, Curt goes off to become a writer, Steve becomes an insurance agent in their hometown, John is killed by a drunk driver, and Toad goes off to Vietnam, where he is eventually MIA. Dreams deferred, new beginnings, early death, the passage of time. It's strange how this movie, playful and trifling as it comes across at times, holds so much more than was apparent to me at 15.

Although I thought I had little in common with these people other than age back then, I understand all of them much better now. Curt's indecisiveness, John's awareness of aging, Carol's determination to find out where the action is, Toad's awkwardness -- all seem familiar. It took me several decades to understand this movie, and I'm beginning to see that years from now it will be different still. Besides capturing the flavor of a particular place and time, it reflects you back to yourself, however far you may have traveled on Paradise Road.

Looking With Persephone

A couple of weeks ago, I was taking an evening walk when I noticed how pleasantly cool it was. This was in the midst of a heat wave, which made exercise in the middle of the day unwise at worst and unpleasant at best. It was one of those evenings that gives you a foretaste of fall. A true summer evening, even as it cools down, retains a lazy residue of the warmth and humidity of the day. Those evenings that signal change have a completely different character, even a slight urgency. Hurry up! Time to get the harvest in and the barns filled! You'll be carving pumpkins before you know it!

At the time, I thought, "How nice this feels." Even as inveterate a fan of summer as I am can't help but be a little refreshed by the cooling and hint of change in the air that generally comes around Labor Day. This year, having been baked to a crunch during an unusually searing summer (on the Fourth of July, it seemed the height of foolishness to step outside the door without a sizable water bottle), even I say the cooling is welcome.

There have been times in the past when I didn't want summer to end, but my feelings are conflicted this year. September and October are usually very pleasant here, and the turning of the leaves can be spectacular. You're always aware, though, of November, that moody month with a split personality, out there waiting in the wings. In the best years, it's a continuation of October's glorious red and gold riot, Keats's "close-bosom friend of the maturing sun"; it may even be an Indian summer extravaganza. In the worst of times (which seems to be most of the time), it ushers in an unending series of dark, damp, and gloomy days that last, off and on, until the latter part of March.

Still, there is a certain buzz about the early and middle days of autumn. I have been reading essays lately about the association of fall with new beginnings. A Jungian writer points out that this is when school begins, older kids go off to college, and adults return to their jobs with (we hope) renewed vigor and enthusiasm for new projects that couldn't get off the ground while people were out on vacation. There is a cozy quality about fall and all of that soup-making, squash-baking, leaf-raking hearth and home activity touted by homemaker magazines and advertising campaigns for cardigans and corduroy. It's beguiling, in a way; you can still be active outside, but the inside of your home is more welcoming than it was in July, and you may actually want to be in your kitchen, making chili, pigs-in-blankets, and apple cake.

I think this emphasis on change and new beginnings is real but ironic. In nature, spring is the time of the new. Spring is when Persephone, forced underground in the autumn to spend the six dark months with Hades, comes joyously back to the earth accompanied by new flowerings, the greening of fields and trees, and the warming sun. For many of us, however, although spring is a very welcome sight, it does, in fact, signal an ending -- of the spring semester at school, of the season of serious work and deadlines, of the calendar of normal activities soon to be interrupted by summer vacations. When I was an undergraduate, I sometimes felt at a loss in the spring, viewing summer as an upheaval that required new plans to be made.

I'm different now, having reverted to my childhood mold. I always say that no matter how hot it is, I'll take a summer day over a winter one any time. Exhilarating winter days of sunshine on clean, sparkling snow are an ideal but rarely seen, but a summer day is always a summer day. Spring and fall are more ambiguous, each signaling change in its own way and each (unless we work on the land) at odds with some of our human purposes. Maybe "April is the cruelest month," if your circumstances are unlucky, as mine have sometimes been. But, all other things being equal, could it ever top the last week of November? Or the first week of January?

Even as I welcome the release from the heat, I find myself looking back over my shoulder with regret, like Persephone, at the bright skies, warm nights of fireflies and crickets, and full-leafed trees of summer now receding. Orion is rising, but Persephone is fading. Three months from now, I'll be dreaming of July. Have I ever dreamed of December?

Reading With Others

This summer, I tried something new with reading. I usually pick out books by either browsing or selecting titles I've heard about that sound intriguing. This year, I came across NPR's "Book Lists," which provide recommendations in various categories like "Books for Introverts," "Travel Memoirs," and "Intelligent Romance." I figured my tastes were probably a lot like those of most NPR listeners, so I looked over their suggestions and decided to take some of them on. I was also assisted by a recommended reading list I saw in Real Simple (a short list of five, all of which I ended up reading eventually).

Call it a book lover's experiment. How does picking out books on my own, based on my own predelictions and idiosyncratic interests, stack up with relying on the suggestions of intelligent tastemakers? (OK, I am a librarian, but I don't think that's relevant -- I never worked in a public library or in reader's advisory.) I was curious to see how closely my tastes coincide with those of other "discriminating" fiction lovers (I stuck with novels) and whether this might give me a short cut to that most elusive and highly desirable thing, a joyous banquet of summer reading.

I was excited to encounter these lists because, to tell you the truth, finding the kind of books I enjoy isn't that easy. It's wonderful to come across serendipitous finds, but a truly momentous book doesn't come along every day (or even every month). I guess it's a lot like relationships, where the really big finds are few and far between and therefore precious. I figured taking suggestions from others would get me out of my rut and expose me to writing I wouldn't find on my own, sort of like a Match.com for bibliophiles. It was worth a try (which is what I said when I tried out the real Match.com).

In June I started checking the library for the Real Simple titles, which are what I started with, and I finally realized that when you're interested in the same books everyone else is reading, you have to reserve them if you want to get your hands on them before Christmas. Then it wasn't until the end of June that any of my reserved titles became available. The first was The Innocents, a contemporary version of The Age of Innocence set among a close-knit, well-to-do Jewish community in Hampstead, in the north of London.

The mythologist in me always likes seeing an old story appear in a new guise, so I enjoyed the way the author made the story her own and found it to be, in true postmodern fashion, more nuanced and ambiguous than its predecessor. Who was sympathetic and who wasn't? Hard to say. Next, I read Seating Arrangements, the story of a Cape Cod wedding, whose wealthy characters I deemed greatly annoying throughout most of the book. My main take-away was genuine surprise at the end when these characters, whom I had found unlikeable, suddenly became understandable, each in his or her own way, in the last pages.

Next, I dipped into The Spoiler, a sharply written send-up of publishing, newspapers, and the collision of entertainment and journalism. I liked it, despite the dark and ironic ending, and appreciated its evenhandedness and crisp style. The Uninvited Guests, which I had been especially anticipating, turned out to be an almost indescribable blend of an English comedy of manners, Dawn of the Dead, and a bit of Jean Paul Sartre. It had one of my favorite characters of the summer in Smudge, the family's enterprising youngest daughter (and the only child in the story). Next, I tried to read Overseas, an unabashed romance/time travel combo, but I somehow couldn't make headway with it, in spite of the fact that I kept picturing Hugh Jackman as the male lead. (This novel was highly popular and NPR recommended, but I guess I need my romance more subtle, not to mention that time travel is a tricky thing in my book.)

I also delved into a couple of NPR's picks from last summer, both of which had Shakespearean themes, which I seem to be slightly obsessed with lately. The Great Night, a re-write of A Midsummer Night's Dream set in San Francisco's Buena Vista Park (near Haight-Ashbury) seemed like a sure thing. Alas, it was full of broken characters and a downright scary troupe of fairies that left me sad, despite a very imaginative handling of the magical realm. The Tragedy of Arthur, which involved twins, their relationship with a scoundrel of a father, and the discovery of a purported new Shakespearean play, was like a bookend to Great Night, with its tale of betrayal, tragic flaws, and a curious amalgam of true and false. I couldn't bring myself to read the play, which appears at the end, all the way through.

By August, I had covered The Girl Giant (which starts out sad but gets better. Moral: don't put off those doctor visits) and The Red House. I had read Mark Haddon before, but to me The Red House is his most accomplished work, poetic, insightful, and engrossing. It reminded me of Seating Arrangements with its sly way of slowly revealing all its characters as multidimensional, upsetting any judgments you may have made along the way. It also had an unforgettable and truly disturbing ghost story intertwined with the family drama. I moved on to The Age of Miracles, which was accomplished and original but depressing. I wanted to say to the author, hey, couldn't you at least have left Julia and Seth alone to spin out their story? It's the end of the world, for crying out loud, do you have to kill off the romance, too?

To finish my experiment, I read Mission to Paris, the tale of an actor caught up in the moral quicksands of pre-World War II Europe, which I found fascinating. I liked the main character's intelligence and principles, but I found the sex scenes, which seemed heavy on adolescent male fantasy, jarring. The last book on my list was Gone Girl, an addicting, unpredictable mystery combining black humor, a Manhattan couple, the recession, and a bucolic Midwestern locale to unforgettable effect. The end was a bitter pill but hardly surprising considering the psychotic nature of the couple's relationship. (Note to self: Is this what marriage is really like? Must find out before doing it.)

So that was it, my tour of what other people are reading. What was the outcome of my experiment? I have to say, honestly, that while these books provided moments of amusement (and at times, incandescent writing), I'm not sure I did any better with this list than I would have on my own. A good book (like beauty) really is in the eye of the beholder. My taste, offbeat and unique as it sometimes is, is still, I think, my best compass when it comes to the wild and woolly terrain of reading. (I came to the same conclusion about Match.com, it may not surprise you to know. I guess I really do have to figure things out on my own.)

To celebrate the end of my experiment, I went back to an old favorite of mine, with almost the feeling of someone who's been eating all her vegetables only to break down and get what she really wants, a hot fudge sundae. It's been over a decade since I came across Nicholas Christopher's A Trip to the Stars, and I've read it two or three times since then. I never heard of anyone else who's read it. I don't know if it was ever on anyone's Top Picks or bestseller lists. I'm not sure if the library even has it . . . and that arcane quality is probably part of the appeal.

I finished it a couple of nights ago, with some sadness. It will be a while before I can re-read it (you have to pace these things). But I've already started another book, one which I found by browsing in a bookstore some months back, and so far I'm really enjoying it.

To each her own.