What was your favorite book of twenty twelve? And can I have your phone number?
– Joe S.
Dear Joe,
Favorite novel? I'd have to say Goliath, about the life and death of a North Carolina furniture town. Susan Woodring is the queen of omniscient point of view. She's like one of the characters she writes about in an early chapter, when a pilot comes to town and takes people for three-dollar rides in his plane. People aren't used to seeing Goliath from above, and the sight is "marvelous and upsetting."
Mia Robins remarked, "Why, I could just reach down there and change everything around!" For years she remembered the sight, and she could always recall exactly what it was she had said. "Change everything!" she exclaimed, clasping her hands together. Much later, she was still telling her niece Rosamond and her great-niece Agnes, "You have no idea how small everything really is."Susan's book also has my favorite cover of 2012.
And no, Joe, I don't give out my phone number, sorry. I don't like talking on the phone. I prefer letters.
Love,
Cartoon Girl
