So… that whole a good book let’s you forget you are on the couch and transports you away thing? Yeah, that happened today. I sat down at around 11:30am to read a bit more of Cutting for Stone. (I was feeling like a slacker for taking so long to finish. The Boyfriend’s work schedule changed and him being home more is great, except that it is totally cutting into my reading time. Balance will be found eventually.) By the time I finished the book, it was 3:45pm and I had no idea that much time had passed.
That’s the mark of a good book to me. If you suddenly look up and realize that it’s 3am and you have to work tomorrow but you don’t care because you want to just get through one more chapter. And when you don’t hear the phone or forget to eat because you are so engrossed in the story. When you genuinely care about made-up people and are emotionally invested in their lives. When I come across a book like this, that’s when I love being a book nerd.
Epic is really the only word I can think of to describe Cutting for Stone. There are so many labyrinthine paths and people. Twin boys Shiva and Marion born to a nun and emotionally numb doctor. Hema and Gosh who become their parents. Thomas Stone and Sister Mary Joseph Praise who’s tragic love initiates a series of events that takes years to unfold (I mean that in the least Romance Novel way possible). Missing Hospital and the staff and patients that populate it. Medical history and developments rooted in real events and people. Ethiopia and its hectic political turmoil - a view into a world I never knew existed. A 1980’s Bronx hospital and its view into the world of young doctors finding their way in medicine.
As I was reading, epic was the word that came to mind over and over. But not in a confusing there are too many people and places to keep track of way. Epic in the way that Abraham Verghese weaves together a story so complicated yet so human and familiar. He brings Marion, our narrator, to life with such vivid detail and such beautiful words it almost hurts to read. Every few pages there is a phrase so well written I had to pause and reread - just for the sheer pleasure of the written word.
I am someone who reads a lot. Obviously. And I fully admit that I enjoy fluffy brainless books with the best of them. But. This book. This is the kind of book written for readers. This is the kind of book that takes your breath away a little and makes you a little sad when it comes to an end.
Because I get so caught in the moment of a book I am a horrible underliner and highlighter. Creating the habit with this Kindle is even harder. But this passage struck me as so epically beautiful and as a representation of what I mean when I talk about epicness (is that a word? It should be.) and the beauty of language. As Marion becomes a doctor and reflects on the path his life has taken thus far:
“ I have excised the cancer from my past, cut it out; I have crossed the high plains, descended into the desert, traversed oceans, and planted my feet in new soil; I have been the apprentice, paid my dues, and have just become a master of my ship. But when I look down, why do I see the ancient, tarred, mud-stained slippers that I buried at the start of the journey still stuck to my feet?”
Gives you shivers, doesn’t it?
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