Booking Through Thursday

Here's today's topic:

What was the most unusual (for you) book you ever read? Either because the book itself was completely from out in left field somewhere, or was a genre you never read, or was the only book available on a long flight… whatever? What (not counting school textbooks, though literature read for classes counts) was furthest outside your usual comfort zone/familiar territory?
And, did you like it? Did it stretch your boundaries? Did you shut it with a shudder the instant you were done? Did it make you think? Have nightmares? Kick off a new obsession?

Wow, tough question. Since it says no textbooks, I can't describe the horrors of my Statistics text. Too bad, it ended up as a prop under a broken couch.

One book that I was surprised by was The Three Junes by Julia Glass. It was a National Book Award winner which is why I bought it. I was trying to impress people by reading good literature! It was one that I wouldn't have picked up if I really knew what it was about. There is one scene in that book that I will never forget and one character who I felt was incredibly heartless. The biggest thing for me was that it opened my eyes about AIDS - again.

There was a time, when the disease was in the headlines all the time. Characters in movies and tv shows dealt with HIV and AIDS, but it seems that it left my radar for some reason. I have not been personally touched by the disease, which may be why it wasn't in my mind. About the same time I read The Three Junes, I saw the movie Rent (I wasn't able to see the stage show) which deals with the same topic. It seemed that I was being given the opportunity to see things differently through this book and that movie.

So while that book wasn't my favorite, it was a moving story that ultimately taught me to be a little more compassionate, a little more tolerant and a bit more aware.