English Corner – Book Corner
Friday, November 17, 2023, at 10.30 pm. I finished reading a book written by Deborah Ellis, In From the Cold. The book was published by Grass Roots – Good Reads, and you can easily find it in Xreading.
I have actually been a fan of Deborah Ellis, an award-winning writer from Canada since I first enjoyed her books.
Two years ago, in 2021, when we started the implementation of extensive reading in Seminary I read the Breadwinner series, consisting of 4 books: The Breadwinner, Parvana’s Journey, The Mud City, and My Name is Parvana.
Recently, Deborah has added one more book of The Breadwinner sequel, that is One More Mountain.
I can’t wait to swallow the book myself.
When I finished reading The Clear-Out and In From the Cold, I felt like a part of my hunger for the work of Deborah Ellis had been satisfied.
I would like to take The Clear-Out into my focus of writing this time.
Duncan was a wealthy man, with his wife named Tess, and Bobby, the only son of theirs.
Duncan liked to play tennis, a typical hobby of the wealthy man. And, as always, he would throw his shoes and socks and all the tennis gears anywhere, messing up the room, for he knew that Tess would tidy them up tirelessly day in and day out.
One day, strange things happened. Table and expensive China tablecloth, and all things in the dining room disappeared.
He was proud of his dining room, and yet, all the furniture vanished.
It was actually Tess who took all the things out.
To make a long story short, she changed the dining room into a library, the room she longed for so long.
Duncan’s anger broke. He hated reading books, let alone changing his very proud dining room into a library.
But Tess stayed firm with her decision. She was so absorbed in the stories of the books that she didn’t care about Duncan’s irritation.
Cancer came and struck Tess. Duncan tried to serve his wife as possible as he could. There was one thing that Duncan couldn’t bear – to see his wife reading. He tried in every possible way to prevent this.
However, Tess was so into reading that nothing could prevent her from the book, not Duncan, not even the disease.
“What happened?” was the last question of hers when she was dying. Unfortunately, Duncan didn’t understand. He took the book away from her only to notice that Tess was gone forever.
Several months after the death of his wife, Duncan was haunted. He experienced strange things again and again, which made him believe that Tess was there, in the house.
The question, “What happened?” appeared again and again until he finally found the book that Tess read the last time.
The book was written by R.A. Dick, and the title was The Ghost and Mrs. Muir.
He read the book for Tess, hoping that Tess would not haunt him with that terrible question.
It indeed worked. He felt the warm and loving presence of Tess, and he soon got absorbed in the stories. He enjoyed reading, for hours.
However, he didn’t want to finish reading the book for fear that Tess would not visit him anymore. He took another book, and another, and another. He read more and more.
At the end of the day, Duncan was changed into a book lover, and he could taste a piece of happiness in the stories.
Stories are powerful. Get rid of the stories, and your life, or the life of the one you love becomes flat, uninteresting, useless. You become restless, not at peace. You lose the power to live.
Enjoy the stories, and you’ll feel connected with people, even the souls. Stories teach you to love, to care. Wow! You cannot hate reading!
If you hate reading, look at Duncan: the dead will teach you how to love books!
Thank you, Deborah!!
(Nani Songkares)