There's been no shortage of praise for Pope Francis as a passionate preacher and pragmatic man who prefers public transportation to private cars. - CNN, March 15, 2013
Optimistic that someone will finally do something about “mass” transportation, I was motivated to pull together another installment of the MARTA Book Club, a list of what people are reading on Atlanta area buses and trains. His Holiness knows that waiting and waiting for transportation in the grimy underbelly of a city affords the perfect opportunity for reading, self-reflection and practicing patience. It's great that one of our own has gone on to bigger and better things so I am not taking offense that public transportation continues to sound like something for (working) poor, simple-minded, and humble folk. This is in comparison to the majority of commuters in Atlanta who ride their version of the Popemobile every day to work.
Thus inspired, here's a list of what people have been reading since our last installment of the MARTA Book Club:
Cold Hit by Linda Fairstein
Vampires in the Lemon Grove: Stories by Linda Russell
Dark Harbor by Stuart Woods
The Centurion's Wife (Acts of Faith, Book 1) by Janette Oke and Davis Bunn
The Bible (a perennial favorite of the MARTA faithful)
The Joy Luck Club by Amy Tan
Fifty Shades of Grey by E.L. James
Her Sky Cowboy: The Glorious, Victorious Darcys by Beth Ciotta
Beautiful Chaos (Beautiful Creatures) by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl
Miracle at Midway by Gordon W. Prange, Donald M. Goldstein and Katherine V. Dillion
White Teeth by Zadie Smith (my contribution)
Books by H.P Lovecraft, Farley Mowat, and David Baldacci.
Zadie Smith's White Teeth (2000) is partially to blame for the lack of titles in MARTA Book Club #22. I have almost finished reading her novel about two “non-traditional” British families living in North London headed by the middle-aged Archie Jones who marries a Jamacian woman half his age and his Muslim Bengali friend, Samad Iqbal who has twin sons -- one of which Samad sends back to Pakistan to fortify his Muslim heritage. It is a book that I have found absorbing and her witty prose is rich without being oppressive. The book is full of interwoven short sidebars that add to the completeness of narrative. It's a style and scope that I find similar to Jonathan Franzen, but I certainly think this is a much more enjoyable novel than Freedom, which I did not finish. (I did like Corrections though). Smith's White Teeth takes us into the multicultural world of our own backyard (kind of like riding MARTA) with intellect, grace and humor. And I picked it up for $8 at Books Again in Decatur.
For a complete history of the MARTA Book Club, visit the category link on the right and check out our Sponsor's link on the left for info about Books Again.
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