Last week, I asked readers to share their favorite bits of their favorite books. (Last summer I asked readers to share their favorite books, so this seemed a natural follow-up: But you can still send lists of your favorite books. After all, this is a blog. We have all the space on earth.)
So, to begin:
From Pride and Prejudice, chapter 31, the snoot supreme Lady Catherine Debough on playing the piano: “If I had ever learnt, I should have been a great proficient.”
That’s a favorite bit from Jackie Van Willigen, who says: “I call it the perfect excuse which works for many occasions and activities.”
From Donna Moore Campbell of Lexington: “As someone who adopted a wonderful boy from Golden Retriever Resue), I found Dean Koontz’s suspense novel The Darkest Evening of the Year especially poignant.”
The passage Campbell cites is from page 314:
“After a hesitation, almost as gawky as a boy, Brian came to her and sat beside her.
“Following an awkward silence, he said, ‘Dogs’ lives are short, too short, but you know that going in. You know the pain is coming, you’re going to lose a dog, and there’s going to be great anguish, so you live fully in the moment with her, never fail to share her joy or delight in her innocence, because you can’t support the illusion that a dog can be your lifelong companion. There’s such beauty in the hard honesty of that, in accepting and giving love while aways aware it comes with an unbearable price. Maybe loving dogs is a way we do penance for all the other illusions we allow ourselves and for the mistakes we make because of those illusions.”
“Dear God, she heard nothing awkward in that. In that was the perfect truth of her eight years in rescue, as she could never have put it into words.
“For a time they didn’t need to speak, and they lavished on the dog, on this living Nickie, the affection they felt for each other.”
Got favorite books or passages? Send ‘em on. The e-mail is ctruman@herald-leader.com.
