gaspgasp

i have to say frankly and up front that i find the history of love absolutely astonishing. [but i'm discovering that i must be a sucker for romanticizing things.] apparently the book didn't go over so well, now that i dig into some reviews. the new york times wasn't complimentary at all, and managed to talk more about krauss's husband, jonathan safran foer, than about her. in any case, i'm undeterred. i could still read this book every day and never get sick of it.

why?

her writing is ironic and intoxicating and funny and lyrical and perfectly brief. how can you resist sentences like these:

"the soft down of your white hair lightly playing about your scalp like a half-blown dandelion. many times, bruno, i have been tempted to blow on your head and make a wish."

"night fell and still i was lost. i hadn't eaten all day. i called mr. tong. twenty minutes later, i was alone with my spring rolls."

"when i was a boy i liked to write. it was the only thing i wanted to do with my life. i invented imaginary people and filled notebooks with their stories. i wrote about a boy who grew up and got so hairy people wanted him for his fur. he had to hide in the trees, and he fell in love with a bird who thought she was a three-hundred-pound gorilla."

the book resonates for me, too, because of love. i think muranda hinted at it a little in her post -- but i can't read this novel without thinking that it is about one person. leo and alma and bruno and litvinoff and charlotte and everyone else are all bits of leo himself. ergo, there all bits of me, the reader. and each love relationship isn't complete by itself: it's only complete when you combine them. it only comes full circle when leo loves bruno and his son and alma, when alma loves bird and her mother and leo, etc etc etc. and so, sarajane, it's okay [in fact it seems perfect] that the book is titled the history of love because it is leo's book. and it's my book. and it's your book.

and i love this book.
[would it be stretching too far to say it loves me back?]