A Day in the Lonesome October-fest, October 22

The continuing account of reading A Night in the Lonesome October with an nine-year-old, out loud and during the day.




October 22

This chapter.

Ugh.

This chapter, man.

I'm a longtime and enthusiastic fan of Roger Zelazny's work, but people who have been reading the blog know that I certainly have my hobby horses. Chief among them are the character of Merlin (he sucks) and Chapter 22 of A Night in the Lonesome October. 

We had to break this chapter into two parts. I read the first part before school and stopped after Graymalk and Snuff had been sucked through the portal. When we got home and homework was finished for the evening, I gave Lily the following choice.

Me: So the next part is Graymalk going into a trance and reciting five pages of boring poetry. Read it, or skip past it?
Lily: Oh yeah! Read it!
Me: Fuck.

She was kind of distracted, and I took advantage of that. She's usually very astute about noticing when I'm something, but she was finishing up an art project, so I would read something, skip to the next paragraph. I think I skipped an entire page near the end.    ". . . And there is Urg of the low domes, a stop on the way to Inquanok, frequented by onyx miners..." flip flip flip ". . . And there is Sarkomand, beyond the Leng Plateau." flip flip flip " ". . . Coming at last to fair Celephais in the land of Ooth-Nargai on the shores of the Cerenerian Sea. . . ."

Next time, I'll just dig out my audiobook copy and let Zelazny read the chapter for me.