I tried to read "The Handmaid's Tale" and failed. Too, too sad; I can't stand to feel that angry about anything that isn't in front of my face.

The top item in my bedside stack is William Manchester's "A World Lit Only By Fire". It's about the transition from medieval to Renaissance culture in Europe -- imagine a pop-lit take on Johan Huizinga's "The Waning of the Middle Ages". It was on special at our favourite bookstore, and not a bad way to while away a cold, wet spring; Manchester is a really good writer, if annoyingly prone to judge past times by the standards of today (well, 1990).

I'm also picking away at a collection of A.J. Liebling, and a detective story by Peter Robinson.