"The Wind in the Willows" by Kenneth Grahame (1908)

 

Not sure are you familiar with the website Goodreads but it is a very nice little web corner for the book lovers and it often gives you recommendations, reviews and opinions about books + creates virtual friendships + gives you statistics how much you read. They even have something called Reading challenge where you decide how much you want to read per year and according to my statistics, I was far behind my decision - once, long time ago, I used to read 4 books per month so 48 titles per year was pretty standard for me - with beginning of a new life, moving to another country and everything around Covid epidemics, I slowed down my reading quite a lot and now I am struggling to even finish 1 title per month. I thought that 12 books in a year should be realistic and here I am in November with only 8 books - to fix this, I had to quickly force myself to leave internet browsing and focus on reading. So I gulped "The First Men in the Moon" and cheated a bit with what is called novella but its actually a short story, "The Turn of the Screw" in order to pump it up a bit + I started listening audiobook "The Wind in the Willows" while walking to my work and back. 

Now, why did I decided to listen "The Wind in the Willows" I have no idea - it is a beloved British children book and a classic but as I mentioned previously, I was born and raised elsewhere and in my country the focus was on different children's authors. Kenneth Grahame wasn't even translated into Croatian until 1989. when I turned twenty and was not reading children's books anymore. I think I wanted to actually read "Watership Down" and somehow accidentally started this one instead. Listening audio book was actually surprisingly rewarding experience, because I love my walks and listening to a gentle, soothing voice was just brilliant, I must admit that these moments were the highlight of my day. If I was reading, I might skip some pages but since I was listening, I simply followed the reader's voice and my heart almost burst when at some points he started gently singing as it was part of the story. 

"The Wind in the Willows" is adorable fable with four friends (Mole, Ratty, Badger and Toad) as the main characters - they all live as friendly neighbours and its kind of Hobbit animal world where animals and humans somehow live together and nobody finds it unusual. In fact, some of the best moments come when situation is clearly impossible, as when Toad is driving the horse-drawn caravan or when he is camouflaged as a washerwoman and nobody notices. Because all four of them are so different, the story about their friendship is a pure delight and this might be my biggest literary discovery of the year - there was something soothing about listening to somebody else reading the book to me, not to mention the whole magic of the story itself. There are many hilarious, happy chapters mixed with superb poetic moments as when the Rat and Mole encounter "Piper at the Gates of Dawn" who is clearly God Pan protecting the animals. I think this was the prettiest thing I read in 2023 and might just continue with children's books.