Pick out a book blindfolded at the library and read it. - Check!

When I put this one on the list, I thought I would pick some random book, like A History of Clowning, How to Rebuild an Engine, Dragon Song, or The Influence of Charlie Brown on Theater Thru the Decades (none of which I am sure actually exist, but I had hoped). I wanted to read something I never would have otherwise.

Instead, I picked one of the books I would have picked with my eyes wide open, at least at first blush: A Dead Man in Trieste - a work of historical fiction based on the British Foreign Service in the years leading up to World War I. It's like I have a homing beacon.

Well, I almost would have picked it. I skimmed the first two pages there, and the writing of those two pages...well, too many commas and run-on sentences. There was no flow. Or maybe, too much? Definite logorrhea. Interest gone.

The original point of this item intact, I set about to read the book. And am I glad I did! It was intelligent, amusing, just mysterious enough without taking itself too seriously, informative on political sensitivities at the turn of the last century, and long enough to be a complete story but short enough to be read in an afternoon. In the end, I understood why the first two pages were the way they were (the rest was an easy read) and everything wrapped together nicely.

Bonus: it is part of a series, making my next book choices easy.