Waiting For The Lull

When you are a true Reader of the obsessive variety, the story playing out between the pages of a book is as engrossing, and even more intimate, than any viewed on the big screen. I once missed my stop on the subway going home because I had only two pages to go and didn't want to close the book. I got off at the next stop and waited for a train going back, reading the whole time. Why couldn't I just close the book and pick up the story where I left off once I was home? I just couldn't that's all. In spite of knowing, logically, that the words on the page were static things and not about to carry on without me, I was convinced that, if I closed that book before finishing the story, something would happen and I would miss it! And that's not the only time that has happened.

I was reminded of that incident recently while reading Clive Cussler's Sahara. I have issues with Cussler's writing; that book in particular could have used a better editor, for one thing. But he's hard to beat if you want a story with lots of action and heroic feats of derring do. During the evening, if I had to stop reading for any reason I found myself giving my mother a blow-by-blow of what was occuring in the story at that point. "Okay, they haven't found the sub yet; but Pitt and Giordino have just escaped the clutches of the evil billionaire and stole his helicopter. Then they crashed it into the river to put the bad guy pursuers off the scent, and are now stealing the evil general's antique car." How's that for action-packed? And that's after blowing up the yacht and ... well you'll have to read it yourself, if you want to know. And although I didn't get the book finished that night, I did keep reading long after I should have gone to bed. I had to wait until the good guys were safe before I left them. Mom, being an obsessive Reader herself, understood perfectly.