Caucasian woman, 40s, with a broad mouth and slight space between her two front teeth, wearing a white pleather coat, black jeans rolled high, and black leather boots, zipped on the sides and tied up the back.

The Powerbook, Jeanette Winterson (Knopf)

Page 91:

Love is worth death. Love is worth life. My search for you, your search for me, goes beyond life and death into one long call in the wilderness. I do not know if what I hear is an answer or an echo. Perhaps I will hear nothing. It doesn’t matter. The journey must be made.

They decided together. She read to the children, tucked them into bed, then joined him in theirs where they made love once more, and decided, her suitcases packed but laid open so nothing would settle, wrinkle, make it harder on the other end. He would be fine. Besides, he wasn’t the one leaving town for the term, going to a lonely place alone. She could do what she wanted, come home, and the town would be none the wiser. But he would have to worry about the kids. Kids talk.

Last day to vote for the Canadian Blog Awards! Yours truly is nominated for “Best Blogosphere Citizen” and “Best Entertainment/Cultural Blog.”

Vote here.

Caucasian woman, 70s, with damp curly hair, wearing a grey sweatshirt bearing the image of a stained glass window. Two umbrellas rest between her knees, one for her, one for her grandson who sits beside her, nose buried in a Game Boy Micro.

In Cold Blood, Truman Capote (Vintage)

Page 15:

Perry folded the map. He paid for the root beer and stood up. Sitting, he had seemed a more than normal-sized man, a powerful man, with the shoulders, the arms, the thick, crouching torso of a weight lifter — weight lifting was, in fact, his hobby. But some sections of him were not in proportion to others. His tiny feet, encased in short black boots with steel buckles, would have neatly fitted into a delicate lady’s dancing slippers; when he stood up, he was no taller than a twelve-year-old child, and suddenly looked, strutting on stunted legs that seemed grotesquely inadequate to the grown-up bulk they supported, not like a well-built truck driver but like a retired jockey, overblown and muscle-bound.

The boy wasn’t getting into trouble anymore. That was good. And Mum was getting help, keeping straight, coming by each Sunday for dinner and a few shows before heading home. She had his room ready but knew it would take more than a couple of meetings to convince him she’d know when it was time to stop, to cool off and walk away. Yeah, he was in good hands with Grams, those soft hands that first dared to drain the bottle.

East African male, mid 20s, wearing black leather jacket, black cap, red glasses and slick lip gloss.

World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War, Max Brooks (Three Rivers Press)

Halfway through:

The name, Avalon, comes from some stock footage one of the students had shot during the siege. It was the night before their last, worst attack, when a fresh horde from the east was clearly visible on the horizon. The kids were hard at work - sharpening weapons, reinforcing defenses, standing guard on the walls and towers. A song came floating across the campus from the loudspeaker that played constant music to keep moral up. A Scripps student, with a voice like an angel, was singing the Roxy Music song. It was such a beautiful rendition, and such a contrast with the raging storm about to hit. I laid it over my “preparing for battle” montage. I still get choked up when I hear it.

He was 13, stretched out in the basement watching television. The window was propped open, the screen in place to deter curious cats from poking in their heads. The sound of feet passing by didn’t startle him. It was dark and all the street noises had become one–ball hockey out front, a car radio two houses down. Besides, the gate was locked. If someone was in the backyard, it would mean they’d scaled the fence, pausing beneath the window where his mother slept.

That was the night he learned to believe in monsters.

Caucasian male, late 20s, blond goatee in stark contrast to black knit cap, black leather coat, black turtleneck and black pants. He rests the book in his lap, fanning it with one hand, the other keeping a protective hold on his computer bag.

Exile: The Dark Elf Trilogy, R.A. Salvatore (Wizards of the Coast)

Page 10:

Jarlaxle’s vest was sleeveless and cut so high that his slender and tightly muscled stomach was open for all to view. He kept a patch over one eye, though careful observers would understand it for ornamental, for Jarlaxle often shifted it from one eye to the other.

He looks at no one, his back pressed flat against his seat, face relaxed, jaw slack. The car tops up at each stop, rush hour, bags banging his knees. A glass bottle rolls down the aisle, clumsy around each pole like a drunk trying to walk a straight line. He’s calm like a grenade, tucked safely inside until tripped. The car rocks a bend and the bottle veers onto a purposeful path toward him. Like a cloaked soldier, or your grandmother who could pluck pesky flies mid air, the evidence evaporating inside her powdery, lotioned hands, he raises his heavy boot, the bottle uncled until he damn well says so.

Black man, early 20s, wearing a black fleece and red scarf, a brown leather bag slung across his chest, a row of TTC subway buttons running the length of the strap: subway sonnet.

The Edible Woman, Margaret Atwood (Emblem)

Page 153:

When she went into the room he was doing the pillowcase. He seemed more relaxed: he was ironing with a long easy sweeping motion instead of the exact staccato strokes he had been using on the blouse. He looked up at her as she came in.

“I suppose you’re wondering what happened to the mirror,” he said.

“Well…”

“I smashed it. Last week. With the frying-pan.”

“Oh,” she said.

Last night, he made pancakes for dinner. He flipped each one with precision and care, standing over the cast iron pan seasoned with thirty years of Mother’s lamb chops, fast fry steaks, eggs over-easy — and pancakes. Blueberry, banana, corn and buckwheat, the slow rise of bubbles creeping to the edges, crisp and ruffled, an eight-year-old sleepy boy sitting hungry at the kitchen table, his tiny hands gripping a charred strip of bacon.

***

Seen Reading has made it to the final round of the Canadian Blog Awards. If you’re so inclined, VOTE HERE.

Seen Reading is nominated in two categories:

“Best Blogosphere Citizen”
“Best Entertainment/Cultural Blog”

You can vote once in each category. Voting closes January 30th.