I bought Olive Kitteridge some weeks ago now, but have only just started reading it. Normally I read non-fiction, but I will read fiction if it catches me. When I hear about a work of fiction that I might want to read, I get a copy, open it randomly and read. If those few paragraphs reach out of the page and get me then I buy the book. If they don’t I put it back. Harsh I suppose but there it is.

However, in this case I didn’t do any of that. I bought the book based on the recommendation of a friend. I ordered it from my local bookstore along with two or three others. When they came in, I went to pick them up but since I was in the middle of several bits of non-fiction, the novels went on the shelf for “later.”
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