Blog Post #25

Now wait just a minute. Chris's mother poisoned herself and the twins? When?! Between chapters, apparently. And it's stated there just as casually as if Chris is reporting a change in the weather. I don't appreciate being kept in the dark for long stretches of time, so I guess I'd better keep reading. Oh, this is sad. It sounds like Chris has given up all her dreams and now she has no future. And then there is gossip--lots and lots of it. I'm familiar with talk getting around in small towns, so this is not altogether surprising even if it is rather obscene. It doesn't sound like a very nice place to live, what with the scarcity of conversation topics and the subject matter considered to be interesting/worth relating. I have to say, I'm starting to wonder if the story really is about Chris or if it's about everyone else who lives in and around Kinraddie as well. Now a barn has burned down and Long Rob of the Mill is smoking his pipe and saving furniture from the wreckage. I like Chris's comment "there was surely enough smell and smoke without that." :) But how awful that Will and Mr. Guthrie can't be friends since they've hated each other for so long. Somehow it's both childish and complex. New Year's sounds like fun, though!! Also, what does childe mean? Clearly it is not another spelling of "child" because it has been applied to grown men up to this point in the book. The blushing that goes on in the book is fairly endless, but I suppose Chris does have a reason to be embarrassed now that she knows it was Ewan who kissed her that night. I smell more gossip cooking in the near future!