In the silence between whisper and shout

Was thinking about The Secret Garden this morning (don't ask me why; I haven't read that book in years) when something occurred to me.

Why did no one ever tell Mary about Colin? She found him on her own, and by accident. Would "You have a cousin named Colin. He's too ill to receive visitors at the moment, but you might be able to meet him someday" really have been so hard to say? And why did everyone try to hide him from her? In the chapter where Mary hears Colin moaning and crying, Martha insists it's the wind.

The things you think about at six in the morning.

I just finished The Hammer of Thor. I'm SUPREMELY disappointed. Except with Alex. Alex is wonderful.

I'm upset, too. I'm so upset that I can't yet articulate WHY I'm upset.

Will I read the next book? Sure. But only because I might as well see how it ends.

I have never read a novel about Norse mythology that (A) I liked and (B) actually got the mythology right.

It's sad. I was enjoying Witches of East End up until the last few chapters, at which point Norse mythology was introduced and promptly thrown out in favor of some utterly WTF shit. On the other hand, The Sword of Summer and Loki's Wolves did a pretty good job with the mythology, but the story and characters failed to interest me.

I won't give up, though. I still hold out hope that one day I'll read a book that meets both of these criteria. And if I don't, well, maybe I'll just have to write it.