While waiting for A Game of Thrones to arrive in the mail, I cast around for something short to read and ended up re-reading Jonathan Livingston Seagull, something I haven't read for several years, but something I always learn from.

This is one of several books I have to thank Virginia Atchinson for introducing me to. She was the librarian at Longfellow Jr. High School in Enid, OK, when I was there. She also taught the advanced readers in a special session. This was the first book I ever read to open my mind to a spiritual concept that was not the Pentecostal hellfire and brimstone I was exposed to on Sundays. To this day, Bach's idea of heaven is still more palatable than a place where streets are made of gold. (I mean, really, we're told not to love money here, but heaven is full of golden streets and pearly gates?)

Having read more of Bach's work now, his metaphor of flight and his technical terms just make this story even better than it was the first couple of times I read it.

I absolutely recommend it.