First, it's small enough to fit in a pocket. The book, not the moose. And there's something charming about that, right? And something seductive about the idea that you can easily sit down with a book and meet its characters and stay with them, in a single sitting,
It's not something you hear much about anymore: once, people more commonly pitched fits, threw fits, had fits, staged fits. Hissy fits. Crying fits. (Now rants and tantrums.) A fit of rage. A fit of pique. A fit of temper. Blustery and ephemeral. Unpredictable and dramatic. Fits, whether in human nature
I borrowed books in this series repeatedly as a girl. I knew exactly which shelves they were on. If that old library was still operational, I think I could find them in an instant. What I wasn't so sure of, was whether I would enjoy the stories as much as
The final window opens with talk of ice wine, the paradox that "the hardest weather makes the nicest wine". And then I learn a botanical term, vernalization, which refers to "seeds that can only thrive in spring if they have been through the severity of winter". But how
Adam Gopnik's notes for this lecture/chapter read like this: "Chance to talk at length about ice hockey." If the idea doesn't thrill you, don't let it put you off the book entirely. The rest of that page and the next is about the Russian troika "racing through the snowy wastes".
