Secrets to Happiness

“The problem was this: writing made Leonard feel anxious and ashamed. He felt, while sitting in front of his computer screen,, watching the words stack up in ways that were somehow less than he’d hoped, pressed up against his inadequaies,forced to face his creative limitations, tormented by the awareness that this was the best he could do.”

Reading Sarah Dunn’s funny and smart new novel Secrets to Happiness with its cast of angsty New Yorkers (including Leonard and his writing partner Holly) when I should be reading Beowulf. But this book is a delight, particularly but not exclusively its bits on the writing life. Also, I had four glasses of Chardonnay last night, so today I don’t feel a whole lot of ambitious.

Tomorrow, Beowulf. Today, Holly, Leonard, Betsy, and that crazy adultress Amanda. Plus the Big Buddhist.