Just for fun today I’m posing a question and I hope all my blog readers will participate. I got the idea from the Goodwill Librarian Facebook page.
Here’s your question:
What was the job of the main character in the last book you read? If you don’t remember, think of the occupation of the main character in one of your favorite novels. Can you see yourself in that job?
My answer:
The last book I read was The Borrowed Life of Frederick Fife: A Novel, by Anna Johnston.
The main character in the book was a man who was at the end of his rope, so to speak. He was on the verge of being evicted from his home when he came upon a man his same age who was in a wheelchair by a river. The man in the wheelchair ended up in the river by accident and the other man assumed that man’s identity. Their resemblance is uncanny. He tried to set things straight, but no one would believe him.
It is a delightful story of forgiveness and unconditional love and is told with lots of humor.
The main character in the book didn’t have a job. He was in his 80s, so his situation doesn’t exactly fit the question I’ve posed today; however, if I try to put myself in his shoes – in my 80s, losing my home, and having a chance to move into a retirement home with someone else footing the bill — I’m not so sure I wouldn’t do what he did. I remind you, he tried repeatedly to tell the authorities who he really was, but they all thought he was confused. After all, the man they thought he was had dementia.
It’s your turn…
What was the job of the main character in the last book you read? If you don’t remember, think of the occupation of the main character in one of your favorite novels. Can you see yourself in that job?
Until my next blog post
I hope you have a good book to read.
Never take your right to read – or your right to vote – or your right to be in charge of your own body – for granted.
Janet
The job of the main character in the last novel I read was that of a features writer… imagine that!
I am reading Jane Austen’s Ladies in Waiting about minor characters in Jane Austen’s novels who were never developed much past a paragraph of description. One of them is a younger sister of the two main sisters in Pride and Prejudice. She livee with her parents in New York City. She is a playwright and while not that type of author, I do write essays and poems
.
The last book I finished is A room of one’s own by Virginia Woolf where was answering the question of women in fiction through a fictional character, not sure what that character’s job was exactly but I think a writer too? As the whole book is about women writing or being written about.
Currently reading Nothing to Envy, stories from North Korean detectors, the main narrators are a doctor, teacher, academic, mine workers, Mrs. Song did everything some.
With writing, I think I would have to be able to write professionally and publish books that people like, but I don’t think I have that level of the skill yet nor am I even trying to. Content with writing blogs for now.
I am a teacher, so at least don’t have to imagine for one of the careers from the second book. Will not imagine myself in any of their shoes though.
I am currently reading a brain candy book, taking a break from heavy subjects. So it’s a novel that takes place in Paris. There are at least 10 main characters as it is a multiple plot line narrative. I’d say I could be any one of the characters as long as it was in Paris, though I’d rather not be the woman in the nursing home or the 99 year old man lining for her. I also would not be a very good rock star.
The last book I read was a collection of short stories by Michael Gilbert, Game Without Rules, telling the exploits of two British secret service agents in the 1950s and 60s, who seem to deal with every problem by killing either a foreign agent or a traitor. Hmm, not sure I see myself in that role! But the last actual novel I read was Rosemary’s Baby by Ira Levin, and the role of the main character in it was to be pregnant with the devil’s child, so I’m feeling that being a secret service assassin might be the better option! 😉
The last novel I read is Winter Journeys by Audrey Driscoll. The main character has a new job working with figures in cubicle world. She is let go early in the novel and doesn’t have a job for the rest of the novel. I’ve never had the type of job she had, and I would be very bad at it. I freeze at this sight of a spreadsheet. All those little numbers in little boxes.
Eloise Blexham (Ella) was orphaned and “baseborn” living with an uncle who was a lord. His wife treated Ella as a commoner, so I guess she was a maid. No, I wouldn’t do very well as a maid, not even when I was younger. I did enjoy the book: The Heir’s Beloved, an Eizabethan romance set in the 1500s in the Scottish Lowlands.
How appropriate, Francis!
How fortuitous that you and Francisco were reading about writers!
How interesting! Don’t sell yourself short about your writing skills. I love your two book choices. I’ve never read A Room of One’s Own… and books like Nothing to Envy intrigue me. I’m adding both to my TBR. Thanks!
Alison, I can imagine you’d be happy in most any occupation in Paris! Sounds like an interesting book, but I would have trouble keeping up with that many main characters.
I’m with you on that conclusion! The secret service assassin sounds preferable to the other option! You might want to reconsider your book choices. LOL!
I’m with you on that, Liz. Numbers are not my friend. My stint as a bank teller was a disaster. I rarely balanced at the end of the day! Needless to say, it was at a time when I was desperate for a job and bank teller paid slightly more than what I was doing before that. I also shudder at the thought of a spreadsheet.
I wouldn’t do well as a maid, either, Joy, although any book set in Scotland is a draw for me!
I’m glad I’m not the only one!
😁
Math was NEVER my thing! There’s the dreaded balancing of my checkbook every month…. Fortunately, I don’t have enough money to turn it into a true nightmare!
That’s what I thought…
😂
I am having trouble, too. Not a great book but a great backdrop.
Just read the location descriptions? That might work. If you don’t care about the characters, you don’t have to finish the book. That’s my new rule.
Great blog as usual and as usual I like your reasoning. It’s what we learn about ourselves the is gifted to us through books and if you happen to be very lucky then you shift and grow that little bit more. My last book was a vampire romance. The good guys were the vamps but they did some interesting things that push the moral code. They also demonstrated what real love is about, not just romantic but it the emotion it takes to rule with justice.
Take care
Thank you, Barb. I must say that I’ve never read a vampire romance. I didn’t realize vampires had a moral code. What I know about vampires could fit on the head of a pin, though. It’s always good to see a comment from you. Happy reading!
Lol, I cannot share the occupation of the character in the book I recently finished and reviewed on my blog. That would be a huge spoiler! 😊
Now you have my curiosity up, Debby!
I do read different things but this was a freebie I had received. It wasn’t about the whole vampire thing that impressed me but rather that the author’s creation/imagination allowed for some human qualities that we humans ourselves have forgotten.
Keep up the good work.
Thanks for the explanation. That puts it in a different light. It certainly seems that humans have lost some core things that make us human.
Writing about Anna Quindlen’s Black and Blue, I would be a lousy nurse and a lousy parent. Kudos to parents and nurses.
I saw a documentary film recently where the patient went into a full cardiac arrest in front of the camera. Like a well-practiced symphony, the caregivers started working up the patient. I could learn nursing but would never be good at it.
I’m with you there! I don’t have a medical-leaning bone in my body, and I never had the patience a good parent must have.