Thank Goodness for Labor Day Reading

I'm currently in enormous need of a 3-day break. I'm so grateful for three days to let down and rest my brain.

I'm going to begin Jane Austen's Mansfield Park tomorrow morning, which I'm reading for the Jane Austen Read-a-long at James Reads Books. (See sidebar.)  And I'm so glad to know that on Sunday we will have rain. It seems assured.  That will give me time to "sink in" with the books I'm reading, to let my whole being relax, without the feeling that I should take advantage of good weather and hike all day. 

I am also totally absorbed by Anita Shreve's latest novel, The Stars Are Fire, which was published in May. This novel revolves around an actual natural historic event in Maine, in the fall of 1947. My Ken was born in Portland, Maine, during the catastrophe that befell some communities during one of the worst droughts to ever afflict the region. That prolonged drought and unusually torrid summer gave way to autumn wildfires that engulfed thousands of acres in coastal Maine. Ken's parents lived in South Portland at the time, which was spared the fires, but some coastal communities were not so fortunate. (By the way, Stephen King was born in Maine in November 1947).  

Shreve has made a compelling, compulsively readable story of one young family who barely survived the ravages of the wildfires. I heartily recommend this book. I haven't finished it, but I'm glued to the page.