Mission Impossible

Let me confess, this mission I am talking about is nowhere nearly as complex as the plot of a MI movie. Even then, Ethan Hunt has completed five missions, while I am still stuck on my first.

This happened at a home warming party recently. 

I joined the party late due to horrid traffic and was in a really foul mood. Immediately went to the make-shift bar and poured myself a liberal amount of alcohol. I had just downed a few sips of some rather potent gin, when the new home owner caught me and excitedly started showing me her home.

As we neared the end of the passage, I could hear loud voices from the bedroom. I was in no mood to socialize with this loud bunch and started making excuses to my friend. Drunk conversations need a different energy level and I was not up for it.

Paying me no heed, my friend pushed the door open. 

‘Have you read Snowman?’

‘No way, you need to start horror with Carrie’

They were discussing books! I guffawed in my head and with a rather goofy grin entered the room with her.

Quick introductions went around and I was just making myself comfortable at the corner of the bed - when this group asked me my favorite book.

I was stumped. Just one?

I could talk for hours to anyone about books. I have made friends at my library over authors. I can discuss characters, plots, twists in the plot - hours on end. But choosing a single book as a favorite? I had never thought of it before. Everyone was looking at me expectantly. It must not have been more than a few seconds really, but in my head it was at least an hour.

‘I don’t know. I can’t pick one’ was my honest answer.

It was not the duration of time I was given to respond. The discussion moved on to other topics. The heat was off me. And yet, I was highly distracted. I kept running through my favorite reads.

The Bone Collector? The Pelican Brief? The List? Shall we tell the President? Sherlock Holmes?

Through sheesh kebab and chips with assorted dips, I still kept at it.

Shogun? Little Women?

When I ran into my friend sometime in the evening, told her about my dilemma and asked her for a favorite book. She is as avid a reader as me.

‘Harry Potter’, she said without batting an eyelid,’ or could be Lord of the Rings’, she added cautiously a few seconds later.

She could not settle on one book either, but she had narrowed it down to two. My mind, on the other hand, was suggesting more books with each passing minute. 

Game of Thrones? The Bridges of Madison County? The Ten Kings? The Da Vinci Code? And how could I forget Harry Potter? Mental whack to self.

Though the conversation ended with the party, my mind was on a mission looking for the elusive answer. It has been more than a month since the question and I am none the wiser.

I could tell you authors I love to read – writing styles I enjoy reading. Maybe tell you a favorite in each genre? But no, I can’t choose one favorite book. It is mission impossible for me.