(17/05)

This is a nice gentle book which follows the adventures of an ageing parish priest (a distant relative of the fictional Don Quixote!) and his friend, the communist ex-Mayor ‘Sancho’ as they travel around northern Spain in the formers trusty ‘Rocinante’ - an old Seat 600. There are deliberately a lot of parallels with their famous namesakes, although mostly lost on me, not having read the Cervantes epic. Within this somewhat lightweight package, there are some interesting discussions between the 2 friends on their respective faiths, their beliefs and doubts in Catholicism & Communism respectively and how they (we all?) try to live by a set of personal morals (the famous Don had his works of Spanish chivalry). "It’s only human to doubt...but to doubt is to lose the freedom of action".

A couple of periphery characters are discussing the choices one makes in life, in this case Faith, to put aside thoughts of fact or fiction (‘in the end you can’t distinguish between them’).

"When one has to jump, its much safer to jump into deep water"

Reserved for crazy-book-lady in Toronto, waiting for an address

RELEASE NOTES:

On its way to Canada. Enjoy :)

Wow! I think this book made it here in record time. Looks like it was mailed by BookGroupMan on May 25 and it arrived in the mail today! Thanks for the postcard and bookmark too!

This is a late journal entry as I actually finished the book five days ago, approximately one week after finishing Don Quixote (my summer vacation reading). I can't thank you enough for sending this book to me, BookGroupMan (see above for his synopsis). It was absolutely THE perfect book to read after finishing the "real thing".

Upon finishing Don Quixote (click here for my journal entry) I was a bit sad because I had spent so much time with the characters and had grown very attached to them, but reading Monsignor Quixote was like taking a final journey with old friends who had changed with the years, but were still recognizable. There are many parallels to the Don Quixote story, as well as direct references to incidents in the older novel. I must admit that I even teared up at the end. I think it was partly for the fate of Monsignor Quixote, partly for the old Don, and partly for the fact that my Quixote adventures had finally come to an end.

Got this as a gift from crazy-book-lady during the convention because she knew I had read and enjoyed Don Quixote.

Thank you!