Attention deficit Monday
December 13, 2004 | Comments Off
Damned Internet providers.
I was frantically scrubbing the bathroom floor at midnight, throwing myself into the usual Sunday night wave of denial that blog duties and the work week were resuming (believe me, I only clean when I’m desperate), but I was feeling pretty good about things. I had notes for a few posts. It wasn’t going to be a frantic, up-until-4:30 a.m. Sunday night, for a change.
The cleaning mania subsided. I logged on and answered three email messages. And then my Internet connection went down. I tinkered with the modem and the router, figured out that the cable itself was the problem.
Oh, I should go to bed, then, I thought. Might as well get a decent night’s sleep and wake up early.
But I’d just started Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Purple Hibiscus yesterday afternoon, and I had to know what happened next.
Besides, I never wake up early. Everything I do, every moment of my life, happens by the seat of my pants. Take this post. I should’ve left for work by now, but I’m sitting here in my pajamas, typing.
So I stayed up until 5 a.m. to finish the novel.
I always feel a little dirty when I race through a book in the middle of the night like that. It’s like nearing the end of a jumbo bag of candy corn. I already have the sugar jitters — my hands are shaky, I feel wild — but I can’t stop until every piece is gone.
Purple Hibiscus is an excellent read, though — fully deserving of the Orange Prize nomination, Booker longlist placement, and accolades from J.M. Coetzee. Christopher Hope’s straightforward Telegraph review describes the setting and major conflicts. And here’s Laila Lalami’s interview with Adichie.