More Sunday Shorts

• I spent the entire day (from 7:00 a.m. until after 5:00 p.m.) traveling from one ballpark to another and watching my grandson play in three different baseball games, so I haven't read much at all today.  It's on days like this, though, that I really enjoy tucking my Kindle into a pocket and sneaking in some reading during the downtime between games.

• I'm a bit over halfway through a British novel by Neil Grimmett called The Hoard that has turned into a really dark, almost surreal, thriller about high grade explosives being sold by a group of well placed Brits to any terrorist in the market for such things.  I was a bit slow to warm up to the plot, but now that the characters have been fully developed, I am well and truly hooked and can't wait to see how this one ends.  (I managed to read about 30 more pages of The Hoard today off my Kindle.)

• I am also about one-third of the way through By Sorrow's River, the third book in Larry McMurty's "Berrybender Narratives," and I'm really enjoying the saga.  I think this series will particularly appeal to female readers because it is filled with so many female characters - some of them British and some of them Indian.  I find myself consistently rooting for the oldest Berrybender daughter, Tasmin, in her quest to carve out a new life for herself and her family, but I have absolutely fallen in love with the two youngest girls.  I don't think I have ever met two more precocious (and literate) little girls than these two in any book I have ever read.  Kate, the four-year-old, is a brilliant little troublemaker I will never forget, and I am fascinated by how much young Mary enjoys stirring things up - and how good she is at it.

• Is anyone else familiar with "The Berrybender Naratives"?  Have you read any of the books and, if so, what did you think of them?  I need to do a little research to see how well received (or not) these four books were when each was first published.  As a dedicated McMurtry fan, I was aware of them as soon as they were available, but I don't recall them making a very big splash in the book world.

• My brief reading slump is all over.  I'm enjoying my reading again, and I'm really looking forward to what comes next.  At least for the moment, I seem to be choosing wisely, and as long as that continues, the slump is not likely to return.

• Now it's on to another week of work, dealing with the insurance adjuster on Tuesday in order to assess the hail damage my wife's car suffered last Sunday evening, and fighting the VA and Treasury's efforts to harass my 93-year-old father to an earlier than necessary death.  It promises to be an interesting week for sure.