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More questions - from allthatjazmyne
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Anybody miss the first round (from, like, 2 days ago)? Comment with a random fact and I'll give you 5 questions.

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Unless, by Carol Shields. This is a novel in which not a lot happens (though there is a decent amount of backstory to fill you in on how our characters got to their current set-up and situation). Nevertheless, there were a handful of really brilliant lines/passages. One of my favorites was a discussion of the word "So...." and how it is used to start a discussion, or introduce a new line of conversation: "So is like an oboe, signalling the A pitch to the strings." Short summary: the main character's eldest daughter has withdrawn from society, from talking, from everything, and is living on the streets. Reta is trying to puzzle out why, and also feeling her way through her own life. There were some meta-levels to the novel too - Reta is a writer, and talks about how writers like writing about characters who are writers (which, of course, Carol Shields is doing here). Not my favorite novel of Shields (I'd pick The Stone Diaries or Swann first), but still very very good.