BOOKS

Dark Nantucket Noon by Jane Langton. 1975
Book Description
Sleuthing Harvard professor Homer Kelly, on Nantucket island researching Herman Melville, sets out to prove the innocence of poet Kitty Clark, arrested for the murder of her ex-lover's wife during a total eclipse of the sun.

The Memorial Hall Murder by Jane Langton. 197?
#3 in the Homer Kelly series. This one uses Handel's Messiah as a theme. Delightful! I've requested the next book in the series. Enough said.

Literary Theory: A Very Short Introduction by Jonathan Culler. 2000
Not short enough. But I suppose I learned something, which is the whole point of reading these...

On tape:
The Professor and the Madman by Simon Winchester. 1998
A tale of murder, insanity, and the making of the Oxford English Dictionary.

A Common Life: The Wedding Story by Jan Karon. 2001
#6 in the series, but chronologically it comes after A Light in the Window.
Book Description
Mitford's Lord's Chapel seats barely two hundred souls, yet millions of Jan Karon's fans will be there for the most joyful event in years: the wedding of Father Tim Kavanagh and Cynthia Coppersmith. Here at last are the long-awaited answers to these deeply probing questions: Will Father Tim fall apart when he takes his vows? Will Cynthia make it to the church on time? Who'll arrange the flowers and bake the wedding cake? And will Uncle Billy's prayers for a great joke be answered in time for the reception?

These High, Green Hills by Jan Karon. 1996
Book Description
For years, Mitford's sixtysomething rector has been happily married to his parish. Now he's also married to Cynthia, his vivacious next-door neighbor. For Father Tim, life in Mitford has never been so full of surprises. His wife is "aging" his already ancient kitchen walls, not to mention burning his draperies. The mountain boy he's learned to love as his own makes a heartrending decision. And the agony of mastering the church computer system is as boggling as the pandemonium that breaks loose when his quiet rectory becomes a nursery. All this, however, is small potatoes compared to what happens on a wilderness camping trip that sends him home a changed man.

Out to Canaan by Jan Karon. 1997
Book Description
Thousands of readers have come home to Mitford, the little town with the big heart, whose endearing and eccentric residents have become like family members. But now change is coming to the hamlet. Father Tim, the Episcopal rector, and his wife Cynthia are pondering retirement; a brash new mayoral candidate is calling for aggressive development; a suspicious realtor with plans for a health spa is eyeing the beloved house on the hill; and, worst of all, the Sweet Stuff Bakery may be closing. Meanwhile, ordinary people are leading the extraordinary lives that hundreds of thousands of readers have found so inviting and inspiring.

Nope, I'm not tired of Mitford yet...