A blind date gone bad (whodathunkit?)

Props to our local library for this month's gimmick to get people to read.  Blind date with a book.  And, as there is a contest of sorts involved, I was all in.

The short and short of it is that the library staff wrapped up some books in red paper and labeled them along the lines of "If you like fiction, then check me out!" but not so cheezily (???) as that.  Then, you simply read the book, fill out a name/phone number form when you're done, and drop it in the contest box when you return the book.  Fun times to be had by all, right? 

I tried 3 times to hook up with a book, but I must be the person on eHarmony with whom no one wants to talk. 

First attempt:  Nothing of interest.  The selection was for those who enjoy technology and something else equally uninteresting.

Second attempt: I like satire, so I came home with a sweet little satirical number and once unwrapped realized that I accidentally tried to date the book equivalent of my younger brother's annoying friend.  Gulliver's Travels, I don't care for thee.  I've trudged through you before in my undergrad youth, and I don't wish to revisit you nearly a decade later.  I even remember (wow, right?!) reading you outside the Admin Building, by the fountain, in the sunshine, late in the spring semester on one of those gorgeous, spring-flirty days where professors who are equally cabin fevery randomly decide to take the class outside and everyone tries to sit comfortably on stone walls and iron benches, though that's relatively impossible to do.  It was assigned reading in Dagny's class (not that we'd ever refer to her by her given name to her face, but given that her husband was also a retired prof, it's easier that way...which reminds me, I should write about my Jan term trip with this dynamic duo sometime), which explains it all.  She chose this completely horrid text.  It's just dumb and ridiculous.  It's dumbly ridiculous.  The short of it is turning long.  Needless to say, I returned that one after slogging through one page of pure bile-inducing blah.  "A Modest Proposal" it is not (passive voice...anyone catch that?).

Third attempt:  This is where my blind dating improved, probably because I, obviously, needed my husband to help me with this.  He was going to the library anyway, so he picked up another red-wrapped wonder for me.  Lo and behold--success.  So far.  I'm only about 15% of the way through it.  Metaphorically speaking, we're still making some nervous small talk over coffee while we're measuring each other up, trying to decide if we're going to stick to our dinner reservations.  But there haven't been any deal breaker surprises so far, so I'm thinking a wishful "yes."