Me and Mrs. Crane's...sentences

When I read Elizabeth Crane's When the Messenger Is Hot, I said on Amazon: I want to kiss this woman's sentences. So you can imagine the surprise and pleasure I felt upon opening her second book, All This Heavenly Glory, and finding the words:

for Ben
my favorite

Now, obviously, this isn't me. Much as I might like to construct a scenario in which Mrs. Crane immediately felt...understood by my sparkling, 175-word review (found helpful by 2 of 2 people), so understood that she had to repay my rare perception with a shout-out on her next dedication page.

Don't think I didn't try to construct just such a scenario for a few seconds there, but then I remembered I'm sane. "Her" Ben is the David Benjamin Brandt credited with the cute author photo, thanked in the Acknowledgements "for the happy ending," and her husband.

Still and all, opening a book by an author whose previous work you enjoyed and finding your name on the dedication page. That's got to be my favorite way to start reading something.

But anyway...will it explain to you anything about why me and Miss Crane's sentences got a thing going on, if I say:

The first story in Heavenly Glory is 10 pages...and one sentence. And it never gets away from her the way it could have. I am in awe. Let me give you a few examples from elsewhere in the book:

On page 50:

Charlotte Anne is of course pro-Betty, as it is already being established to her that the Veronicas of the world are an obstacle to be overcome, which is arguably a sort of victimy stance for a nine-and-a-half-year-old to be taking and which sort of contradicts the whole independence thing, because why would she even care about/need any Veronicas at all if she were so independent, except for everyone needs a friend, even if they do sometimes try to steal your Archie. Charlotte Anne has formally proposed to Archie Comics that they put out a Betty comic without Veronica, which doesn't happen for several decades but when it finally does happen she will say it was her idea and someone will say to her, Let it go.

And here is just a section of a sentence that begins on page 184 and keeps up until the bottom of page 185:

...as a friend I am always advising people to check their motives before they tell people where their head is at, primarily because I am of the belief that if you want to tell someone where your head is at with the intent of this changing them somehow, whether it be into some perfect person who understands you from that moment on or whether it's just that you want them to feel as crappy as you've been feeling, it either won't happen, which is most common if you are trying to get people to change, or it will happen, since people successfully punish people all the time for making them feel shitty...

Get where I'm coming from? In my just-posted Amazon.com review of Heavenly Glory, I upgraded to: I want to marry this woman's sentences and have children with them.

BTW, if you read that review and are wondering "What Julian Cope song?"



...this Julian Cope song. Probably one of Cope's finest, definitely the best on the My Nation Underground album, top 40 UK, a good and beautiful song. I rate it highly, is what I'm saying, and Crane's gorgeous book couldn't help but put me in mind of it.