Inseparable

I'm out.

I never do this - or I haven't in a long time - but, I quit this book halfway through. I just couldn't get through another page.

Who cares, right? I mean, life's short - if you don't like a book, don't finish it. Still, as a good Irish Catholic girl and someone who minored in English in college, I feel guilty about not finishing something that I started. That guilt, though, isn't enough for me to waste any more time.

Many of you will look at the title and subject matter of this book and say, "Geez, lady, what did you expect?" On its surface, a book about the original Siamese twins who came to America as "freaks" in the 1800s doesn't exactly sound like a rollicking good time. But, this book was widely praised - and, how could you not be interested in two men who were paraded around like chattel, only to eventually own slaves themselves? The lives of these two men is fascinating to me, but this book took way too many historical breaks and broke up the fascinating direction of their lives.

I don't mind a little historical context built in to provide color and understanding of their lives. But, every time the actual story of these twins got more interesting, we took a detour that sucked the energy and inertia right out. I tried even skimming, just to get through. Even the skimming bored me.

I'm fascinated enough with the lives of these men, I'll probably try to find some Cliff's Notes version or an Atlantic article or maybe go see their fused livers in Philadelphia (for real, that's a thing.) The book, though, will go back to the library with a bookmark stuck smack dab in the middle.