You Must Read This

I just finished "The Story of Edgar Sawtelle" by David Wroblewski.  It's been on my TBR list for a while now.  I don't know why it took me so long to buy the book.  Then another few months to crack open the spine to read it.

I forced myself to move slowly through it, when my usual practice is to practically inhale books, but something about the language of this book practically begged me to savor it.

So I did, or as best as I can ever do with my passion for reading.  I spent a week with this text.  Mulling over the story and its meaning in my mind between reading sessions.  And when I got to the final pages, I had to slow down even more, read and re-read them because I knew it was the end and I didn't want it to be.

I won't tell you about the plot.  You probably know the basics anyway.  I'm not even going to really review the book--the last book reports I wrote were in 4th grade.  My parents kept them for many years because they were amused by how I ended them.  It was always the same:  "So if you want to know how this story ends . . . read the book and you'll find out."  Probably with a bunch of exclamations afterwards.

What I will say is "The Story of Edgar Sawtelle" is a terribly beautiful story.

It will wound you.

Read it anyway.

Read it because it will.

Just read it.


And if there were Sawtelle dogs, I would work harder than I've worked on anything to be worthy of one of them.