To Say Nothing of the Dog, Connie Willis

To Say Nothing of the Dog: Or, how we found the Bishop's bird stump at last by Connie Willis is a book that I picked up in the Labor Day sale thinking that it would be good to have something funny on the shelves.

Started: 3/25/2020
Completed: 3/30/2020
Recommendation: Mild Recommendation
Recommended By: Nobody

Words for which I sought help:

Aspidistra -- a genus of flowing plants native to eastern and southeastern Asia

jumble sale -- a sale of miscellaneous secondhand articles, typically held in order to raise money for a charity or a special event; a rummage sale

MacGuffin -- an object, device, or event that is necessary to the plot and the motivation of the characters, but insignificant, unimportant, or irrelevant in itself.

Review:

Completely disoriented again.  Of course, so is the protagonist.  Still mostly confusing.  This reminds me of Jonathon Strange & Mr. Norrell which I started 3 times, but could never get through.

I did not find this book funny.  It is several layers of love story facilitated by time travel, which is truly just a mechanism to tell the story and allow most of the story to occur as though it were a historical novel.  The mechanism of time travel also allows for both confusion and for the protagonists to reveal their hearts to one another (as the "time lag" causes them to say things they would otherwise not).

The Bishop's bird stump is a MacGuffin, so one needn't really focus on it.  It could be that the book is a mystery, although I didn't really feel it was. It sort of defies a clear catalog.