(Re)reading The Moonstone on the Raniest of Saturdays

M and I recently spent a week with my parents on the coast of Alabama. We had one beautiful afternoon at my mom's house on the water before some serious rain set in--21.75 inches of it in three days! Instead of kayaking, swimming, and reading on the pier, I curled up in a chair by the window and read Wilkie Collins' The Moonstone for the second time.

There are certainly worse ways to spend a rainy Saturday.

What I learned rereading The Moonstone, in the words of the novel's second narrator, Gabriel Betteredge:

• "You are not to take it, if you please, as the saying of an ignorant man, when I express my opinion that such a book as Robinson Crusoe never was written, and never will be written again. I have tried that book for years--generally in combination with a pipe of tobacco--and I have found it my friend in need in all the necessities of this mortal life. When my spirits are bad--Robinson Crusoe. When I want advice--Robinson Crusoe."

• "Persons and Things do turn up so vexatiously in this life, and will in a manner insist on being noticed."

• "Cultivate a superiority to reason, and see how you pare the claws of all the sensible people when they try to scratch you for your own good!"

The Moonstone is a detective novel, and at times laugh-out-loud funny. If you haven't read it, pick it up for your next rainy weekend.