SA4QE 2016 - Lindsay Edmunds - Southwestern Pennsylvania, United States

Russell Hoban called Turtle Diary his “gateway novel.” It was that for me when I found it in a Bethesda, Maryland, used bookstore one day. Since then, it has been joined by many other Hoban books, but it still is my favorite. Every time I reread it, I make new discoveries. With language Russ was an adventurer and a guide, too. He was a pearl-diver.

That trains mostly stay on rails, that the streets are mostly peaceful, that the square continues green and quiet below my window is more than I have any right to expect, and it happens every day.

Turtle Diary (Novel, 1975)