I started the "Earmarks" thread with a quote from Henning Mankell's [u]Italian Shoes[/i]. Here's another sentence from the same book, which fits perfectly in the context:
"I went into the other room and showed the ants my new shoes."
Or how about
"Dog, bone, sorrow."
Mankell is primarily known as a mystery writer (see earlier posts about the Kurt Wallender series), and mystery isn't my favorite genre. I've read a couple of his and they are well-done. He is described as "the master of atmosphere," and for good reason.
[u]Italian Shoes[/i] is not a mystery; it's a book about a man living on an island off Sweden's coast, a man "so lost to the world that he cuts a hole in the ice every morning and lowers himself into the freezing water to remind himself that he is alive." (from the jacket)
It is, the jacket also says, a book about redemption.
For me, most of all, it's a book that makes me wish I were a better reader - that I retained and understood enough detail to be aware of how the various characters balance each other, to note the use of moods and symbols.
He's a Really Good Writer. And the mysteries I've read (so far) aren't bad either.
