Littlest kiddo was sick over the weekend, so both her parents had an excuse to watch our favorite movies with her. She made it through Hunt for Red October in two sittings, and did about 45 minutes of Chariots of Fire with me, which was enough time to remember that movie is just all Scenes. Like there may be connective tissues, and they couldn’t happen in any other order, but each one is its own set piece, for particular purpose, in order to establish the moment. And it’s probablyy because I watched it young and with an uncle I thought was really sophisticated and so imprinted in odd ways, but I absolutely adore it.

“- that I am, and will be whilst I breathe … (cow moos, all laugh, the intensity dissolves in comedy briefly) … a Scot”

Anyway I’m also reading The Sentence (and looking forward to reading Abigail Nussbaum’s review once I finish. It’s an excellent speculative legal thriller, and at times is reminding me of Chariots of Fire. There’s something in both of working out “what, exactly, is the thing I need the reader to see and understand at the end of this” (in Chariots, I think it’s the tensions of the moment, a center which cannot hold, but also the idealism that makes you at least believe that they can be put aside for a while, and perhaps that while can be long enough. Montague’s opening line to his mother about: I know you and pa are disappointed I’ve given up my shorthand, but if you were me, with the chance to compete for the world championships, you’d be just as big a fool). And then carefully working out exactly what is needed to convey that wholeness and putting together only what’s obsolutely necessary to construct that whole. I’m really looking forward to forward to completing The Sentence, and unlike the last book I said that about, I also trust the author along every step of that journey - feeling in very very good hands.