Best of Books 2021: Tomorrow by Damian Dibben and Middlemarch by George Eliot, again

I started off the year reading a lot of poetry and ended the year reading mysteries, and for the first time in awhile, a mystery series, one book after the other. I marveled at how Andy Weir repeated and even surpassed his gripping success with The Martian in Project Hail Mary.

But the book I was obsessed with this year was Tomorrow by Damian Dibben:

Excellent. Some similar themes to vampire novels, the role of death in life, what it would mean to be immortal, but without the blood and feeding. Strong characters. Loved the portrayal of the dog protagonist: wise, loyal, doggy, but not silly or a caricature. Loved the 19th century setting.

I loved the theme:

"'Tomorrow we begin again,' he'd say, sometimes over a trivial thing, a burnt dinner, our coach getting stuck in the mud, but other times, uttered in defiance, a call to hope, when something had shaken us to our cores."

And I loved the dog protagonist:

"'Well, you have your four-legged companion at least.'... 'He is not my family.' 'He is my soul. What am I without my champion? Just a box of notions and logics.""

This year, as well, I listened again to George Eliot's Middlemarch. It's such a comforting read and then Sam gifted me a beautiful Folio Society edition of the book and I have been slow reading and blogging the senses from it in appreciation.

"I should like to make life beautiful--I mean everybody's life...It spoils my enjoyment of anything when I am made to think that most people are shut out from it." — Dorothea Brooke

"The best piety is to enjoy--when you can. You are doing the most then to save the earth's character as an agreeable planet. And enjoyment radiates." — Will Ladislaw

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Shel Graves' Sensorium

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