I TOLD YOU SO

I told EVERYONE. NO ONE LISTENS TO ME.

For many years now I have been preaching the joyous gospel of my own reading philosophy, which involves knowing the end of a book as early as possible. Books are better when you know the endings. They just are.

But there was this one incident involving the sixth Harry Potter book, which I have mentioned before, where I glanced at the end and received some information I didn't actually want, and even though in some ways it eased my tension (which was nice because I was the only one awake in the house in a shithole city (Frank Harris' home, incidentally) in a foreign country), it really made me rethink my whole policy of reading the ends of books wherein suspense is key.

Which is why I did not read the end of Special Topics in Calamity Physics. Although I wanted to. I frequently and repeatedly wanted to, and I kept telling myself, Jenny, if you want your first time to be really special, you have to save yourself.

Patriarchal bullshit, as I have always suspected.

I finished Special Topics in Calamity Physics with very mixed feelings – the end was brilliantly insane, but the middle sort of bogged down in some ways, but I seriously think that if I had known the end when I was reading the middle, I might have loved it the entire time and come away with a new favorite book. But because I got BRAINWASHED by the BULLSHIT PARTY LINE, I may have really spoiled that elusive brilliant best-thing-in-the-world, The First Time Reading a Good Book. Dammit.

Look at this! LOOK!

"That very morning your mother had talked to me of plans to enroll in a night class, Intro to Moths of North America, so rid yourself of such dour thoughts. Natasha was the victim of one too many butterfly nights." Dad gazed at the floor. "A sort of moth moon madness," he added quietly.

That is genius, genius, and I DIDN'T EVEN KNOW.

Or, oo, that bit where that woman came over and bashed things and it was too awful and I couldn't stand to read it, oh my God, that was not just an unbearable section of book, it was elegant foreshadowing! GODDAMMIT!

If you want to really enjoy this book, my advice to you is this: Read the introduction; then skip ahead and read from Chapter 31 ("Che Guevara Talks to Young People") to the end; then go back and read the rest of the book. My way of reading books has been proven to be best. I only wish I could have been proved right not at the expense of what may be a thoroughly excellent book.