Sylvia Patience, Author

I’m sorry to have been absent from the blog for too long. Last week we celebrated not only Thanksgiving, but my birthday. I mention this because, with Facebook, it seems everyone knew it was my birthday. I kept running into people who wished me a happy birthday and I’d think, “How did they know?” until I realized what had changed. But, besides all these goings-on, I’ve had a bit of blogger’s block.

However, I am finally inspired to write because I just finished Jonathan Franzen’s latest novel, Freedom. I must say, “Wow!” I read Corrections, and it was good, but Freedom is magnificent. Franzen delves so deeply into his characters and gives the reader an understanding of even the ones that s/he may not like. He does the same thing with relationships. But in this book, he also explores many of the problems threatening our world: overpopulation, destruction of the environment, corporate corruption, imperialism. He doesn’t preach or espouse, but lets his characters do the talking. He is masterful. And I loved the ending.

If you haven’t read Freedom, I highly recommend it. I got it from my local library, and the waiting list was about sixty long when I requested it. I read a lot, so I mostly get books from the library: saves money, trees, and shelf space (I’m trying to befriend the colon, as Franzen does). As a writer myself (though as yet unpublished), I would be happy to have my books in libraries, not necessarily on everyone’s shelf.