These are the books that should keep me occupied for the rest of the month. I started four of them yesterday.

Because I waited too long to order, I wasn't able to snare tickets for Romeo and Juliet at the North Carolina Shakespeare Festival (S. shed no tears over the matter). Seating was still available for The Taming of the Shrew, however, so we'll be going to a performance of that later in the month. I read the induction yesterday.

I read David Quammen's The Reluctant Mr. Darwin over the weekend and loved Quammen's writing style. I've had The Song of the Dodo and Monster of God on the shelf for some time (I bought The Song of the Dodo after Jim Crace claimed it as his favorite book during a visit to Readerville), but I decided I'd go with a collection of essays before tackling either of these. The Flight of the Iguana is perfect treadmill reading: "Thinking About Earthworms," for example, mentions Dostoevsky in its first paragraph, moves into a discussion of Darwin and his devotion and study of earthworms, segues into Pierre Teilhard de Chardin and unanimity of thought, delivers a mini-rant against television, and in its conclusion offers a few other choice facts about earthworms for those who wish to mentally wander off on their own and think about things no one is concerned with. That'll keep me walking.

I read the first chapter in Little Big Man last night at the library and half a chapter of Rebecca West's third novel while attempting to stay awake for Dwight Yoakam's appearance on the Tonight Show. I can already tell Harriet Hume is an excellent choice for the R.I.P. challenge.

I hope to start In the Shadow of Young Girls in Flower by the weekend, and I'll dip into Robinson Crusoe once I've finished Little Big Man, which has a looming due date.

I'll also be squeezing in James Joyce's "The Dead," the next selection for A Curious Singularity, if and when I can determine where my copy of Dubliners has wandered off to and Steven Millhauser's "Eisenheim the Illusionist," the story the just-released The Illusionist is based on, although I doubt I'll have a chance to see the movie until it shows up at Netflix.