The Winter's Tale is a 750 + page book that resembles the bible in size. Once inside I found the novel to be filled with similar mystery and rich symbolism. It's a big book and a challenging read for busy broad- based individuals that make up the MOP. As men without pity would we wolfed down the prose and digested the mythical verse to form a well conceived rendition of how the destiny of justice is disguised within the natural forces of good and evil. 

The books girth rendered a two meeting book review; an MOP first.

Hmmmm

The first meeting was held at Readie's place on the deck. The evening was clear as we gathered around 7:30 and faced the linear glow of city lights  across the river from the precipice of his back yard. We faced the north and the chilling breeze that fit both the title and was apropos for the first half of the story.

Not that we needed any help but we elicited the support of a period cocktail to become more thoughtful in our understanding. The hallucinatory mystical cocktail of 1890 called Absente was called upon. We poured cold water of equal portion over a sugar cube into a 2 ounce pre-poured measure of the green liquor. The160 proof green liquor turned cloudy white before our unbelieving eyes. 



The second meeting was held after work on Friday, November 9th at Pompouse's home. Peter Lake and the Baymen would have been at home with the spread of freshly shucked oysters, shrimp, smoked salmon, and hot clam chowder.
  Pompous opened the meeting with the usual and customary rituals. We agreed the author, Mark Helprin was a brilliant writer. His level of description seemed tedious at times or perhaps it was our level of impatience? We found the novel to be a complex linkage of mystical characters interwoven into surreal scenarios. Sorting through the levels of fantasy, mystical, spiritual, and real life drama produces a great deal of reader interpretation. It 's a wonderful book to discuss in that sense. The book has a set of heroes and villains and a few still undecided characters searching for justice and everlasting peace in an overcrowded city of haves and have nots called NY. The author appears to be very sensitive to the big R (rationalization) that we all keep in our back pocket and use as needed like a snot rag. Such is needed to tell any story of good and evil and calibrate the history of mankind.

 On this night we again sought out the Absenthe. Perhaps seeking a higher plane of wisdom we soaked a sugar cube in the alcohol, ignited it for nearly a minute, dropped it in the green liquor producing a highly visible flame, and then extinguished with cold water before declaring" down the Richard".

You have to be patient with this great novel as it depicts the struggle of life over 750 pages. I came to find out that a movie of the book is planned with some great actors. I for one can't imagine how this can be done!!