Published 1943 ~ 243 pages
Red Berries
I love books with “red berries.” In the book, Perelandra, a man named Ransom is alone on the planet Perelandra and is scrounging around for something to eat. He notices something hanging from a tree that looks like a fruit, so he tastes it. It turns out to be edible with a bread-like flavor and texture. He decides to make a meal of it.
After eating a few pieces, Ransom bites into a fruit that has a red berry in the center. It is delicious! He loves it and searches for other fruit that have the red berries. In doing so, he discovers two things: (1) The red berry fruit look the same as the berry-less fruit and (2) the red berries occur infrequently.
To me, books are like the fruit; some of them contain words that are a delight to read and some do not. The red berries in books are similar to the red berries on Perelandra. One cannot tell by the cover or the title of the book whether or not it will contain a red berry, and the red berries show up infrequently.
(Note to self: I should call the red berry books “Read” berry books; that’s a rank Frank joke.)
Like Ransom, I don’t mind that the red berries are rare because that is what makes it so lovely when you find one. The red berry books are the most satisfying to read; those are the books from which I get huge ideas – like the whole red berry thing in Perelandra. Thus Perelandra is a “read” berry book.
(Note to self: I wonder of other readers have their own red berry books. If they do, I wonder what name they call them. Just curious.)
Objects in a Bag 