A girl who I will never be...

I'm reading a book called The Girls by a Canadian author, Lori Lansens. I'm not sure if I've already mentioned that I'm reading this. Anyway, I've enjoyed it from the start, but about half-way through (where I am now), I've started to really get into it. It's that thing that happens when you're really enjoying a book. You forget where you are, and you forget the physical thing that the book is, and you are so consumed by it that it feels like less of an active reading, and more passive, in that the story is being told to you. Or you're right inside it. I love when this happens with books, and it's happening now with The Girls.

When I'm really into a book, certain snippets will really stand out for me, and I'll read them over and over. Sometimes it's because of the rhythm or rhyme of a phrase, or what it's saying is really powerful. In the case of the below quotation, it was both.

I hum some secret place into being, thinking of this other me, the one that only I can see, a girl called She, who is not We, a girl who I will never be.

The Girls is an amazing novel (so far... am sure it will stay that way) set in fictional Leaford, Ontario, and it is the "autobiography" of conjoined twins, Ruby & Rose Darlen. This may sound awful, but I'll confess that I have a fear of conjoined twins. I'm not sure what the fear is based on... knowing me, it's probably based on crippling empathy, but regardless, I have to turn the channel when TLC does a feature on conjoined twins. This novel, even though it's fictional, has changed my feelings about conjoined twins. It's so humanizing and beautiful, and a mix of tragedy and comedy... I love it! Definitely a great choice for book #2 of the 2011 RC-3.