What’s not to love about a new meme? Check out the rules (actually, there’s not really any rules) and join in Six Degrees of Separation here.
We begin with Hannah Kent’s Burial Rites. It’s set in Iceland. I’m not a fan of cold weather (at all) and yet I really, really, really want to go to Iceland.
Which leads me to Like Water for Chocolate by Laura Esquivel – because I also really, really, really want to go to Mexico. But it’s also a book about food. And love. And anyone who has read it does not forget the wedding cake with one very special ingredient. If we’re talking food and love then I can’t pass Nora Ephron’s semi-autobiographical novel, Heartburn.
Heartburn leads me straight to the most enjoyable ‘chick-lit’ I’ve read in a long time – What Nora Knew by Linda Yellin. It’s the story of a woman using Nora Ephron’s films as a guide for her romantic life. This book is begging to be made into a film. Begging.
Another book that made me think ‘film’ the whole time I was reading it was The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion. It almost read like a script (and when you know the history behind the book, it’s not surprising).
The Rosie Project is set in Melbourne, predominantly at The University of Melbourne. Think Melbourne Uni and Helen Garner’s controversial non-fiction book, The First Stone comes to mind. The First Stone is an account of a 1992 sexual harassment scandal at Ormond College, one of the residential colleges of the University. I was an under-graduate at the University at the time – needless to say it caused a furore on campus.
Residential university colleges propel me toward numerous books (I have a thing for stories set in boarding schools) but the standout is Chad Harbach’s The Art of Fielding – it’s a baseball story set in a college in New England.
So there we have it – from Iceland to Mexico to New York to Melbourne to New England and from the 19th century to the present – all in six moves.
Just quietly, I have loved taking part in this meme – thanks Annabel and Emma.
