For Merced de Papel

I want to take a moment to extend two big thank yous:

First is to Liza Corr for sending me a book entitled The People of Paper.  Her package arrived last December but the book just sat beside my bed for months. Tempting but only briefly skimmed through.  I don’t know why I delayed, but I’m glad I did. I feel like I picked it up at just the right moment and mood.

Second is to Salvador Plascencia the author of The People of Paper. I would like to tell you Mr. Plascencia how much I am enjoying your writing and characters. I have spent the last few days enraptured and daydreaming about little Merced, Baby Nostradamus and origami capillaries. Your writing is even more enticing than the great cover.

I carried you with me to the field yesterday where we were to lead an “exchange of experience” between two groups of weavers. Just after settling into the training, the skies opened up and poured down. After standing under a tree for 15 minutes there was no sign of it letting up, so I made a mad dash to the car. There I sat, behind the wheel of a parked African Landrover, windows fogging over the view of a rural village, and me engulfed in pity and hope that Smiley would eventually be acknowledged and given due credit for his theoretical mathematics and rejection of the war. 

Maybe somewhere in this crazy world and 6 degrees of separation, you’ll hear my compliments Salvador. Perhaps though, it’s enough to just send my gratitude out to the universe and say thank you for beautiful prose and compelling literature.