Pleasantly Disturbed: A fond look back at Labor Day weekend

Time for another weekly edition of Pleasantly Disturbed Thursdays, originated by our recently engaged friend Duane Scott. He’s wandered off somewhere, meeting his fiancée’s parents, so we’ll just have to soldier on without him.

Last Saturday, to kick off Labor Day weekend, my wife and I joined 800,000 other St. Louisans at Forest Park. There wasn’t anything going on in the park; it was just an incredibly beautiful day and St. Louis decided that was a perfect excuse to go to Forest Park. After fighting ridiculous amounts of traffic, we did manage to find a parking place and walked around a bit. We even sat on a bench by the Muny Opera (photo of entrance at left), our outdoor summer theater which is a tradition in a city that thrives on tradition. The tradition is to sit outside on hot summer nights and sweat while you watch musical plays. Yes, I’ve done that. What’s more, I even sat on stage during a live performance of Godspell – a small on-stage audience was one of the props. There were about 20 of us, and we were told to act like an audience. We did. It was fun. I had two hours of no-name fame. And yes, I sweated.

Anyway, after walking around the park, we drove over to the Central West End. My wife found chocolate on sale at Bissinger’s at Maryland Plaza, which not only is a chocolate shop but also a chocolate lounge. She likes their block dark chocolate, and it was on sale for half price. I found something less fattening but more expensive around the corner – Big Sleep Books, a bookstore devoted exclusively to mysteries. I decided an early birthday present was in order. Or actually my wife looked at what I was buying and decided it (a stack of books) was an early birthday present.

One of the books I bought was Pirates of the Levant, the newest translated mystery by Spain’s Arturo Perez-Reverte. These stories are set in 17th century Spain, and detail the exploits of Captain Diego Alcatriste and his young companion and chronicler Inigo Balboa. This is the sixth in the series and I love these books. They’re full of sword fights and shootings with harquebuses and history and intrigue and betrayal and plenty of buckles to swash.

On Sunday after church, we went apple-picking, also with the rest of St. Louis (notice a trend here – St. Louis does things in large groups, like we’re all one big flash mob). We drove to Eckert's Orchards in Belleville, Illinois, and rode the wagons to the orchards. We hauled in about 50 pounds of Jonathan and Golden Delicious apples.

Monday evening, in a fitting conclusion to the weekend, we went to my son’s house for dinner. And I got a Cameron fix. I’m so glad you asked about my grandson.

Sally Wright's Mysteries

About 10 years ago, I was wandering the shelves in a local Christian bookstore. I was looking in the fiction section, and almost by habit I went to the end of the alphabet first (likely a feeble attempt to counter the curse of alphabetical order; a lifetime of standing at the end of the line or sitting in the back of the classroom can do weird things to you).

There, in the bottom shelf of the last row, I saw a book called Publish and Perish by Sally Wright. It was a mystery, with a historian named Ben Reese for a detective, set at an Ohio college. It was published by Ballantine, a mainstream publishing house, and nothing about it suggested a reason for it being found in a Christian bookstore. I read the first page or two, was impressed with the writing, and bought it. What I found remarkable about it was that it reflected a Christian faith without hitting the reader over the head with it.

It was also a great story.

The bookstore later closed, I went through a major career change and lost track of Sally Wright. That is, until I wandered into Big Sleep Books in St. Louis' Central West End about three weeks ago. It's a bookshop devoted exclusively to mysteries and suspense. My wife and I wandered around, I gravitated to the end of the alphabet (seriously, this is like Pavlov's dog) and I found Sally Wright again. I picked up Pride and Predator and Pursuit and Persuasion, and learned there were at least two more in the Ben Reese series. I'm well into Pride and Predator now, and it's delightful -- well written, well plotted and containing a subtle theme of faith throughout.

I also bought Carlos Zafon's The Shadow of the Wind and Arturo Perez-Reverte's The Painter of Battles. I wanted to reread the Zafon book before tackling his latest work translated into English, The Angel's Game, and I'm a huge fan of Perez-Reverte. But those are stories for another day.

It's a great pleasure to rediscover Sally Wright.