Tonight I Will Shrug an Atlas for the First Time

Just moments ago I finished reading the final book of the Millenium series. The last book took a bit of effort because I wanted to finish it before beginning Atlas Shrugged, but I also wanted to just put it on the back burner and begin Atlas Shrugged immediately. I stayed strong though and finished The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest first.

Now I get to start figuring out who John Galt really is. I'm really excited but I'm also really, really nervous. What if over the past couple of weeks I've gotten my hopes up far too much and I'm disappointed by what I discover? What if I have no idea what's in store and things are even more awesome that I could imagine in my wildest dreams?

It's going to be good. I'm pretty sure about that.

I intend to write numerous posts about reading this book. I have a feeling I'm going to have a lot to say about it. I want to read all of it tonight, but I also want to digest each piece very, very carefully. My goal is to finish by the end of the month, but I may take a little longer than that in the end. We'll see.

Atlas Shrugged is On the Horizon...

It won't be long before I start reading Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. I posted a little while back that I wanted to read it pretty badly after watching the movie, but despite my desire I couldn't bring myself to start a book of that size without finishing the other two series' that I was currently in the middle of.

I'll admit I'm extremely excited but also terrified that I'll be let down after my own rather immense expectations have now taken root. At the moment I'm thinking that I may blog about some thoughts as I go through, perhaps summarizing here and there about what is happening so I don't lose sight of the big picture, which happened a little bit when I was reading The Fountainhead a few years ago.

So, all I have between me and finally discovering who John Galt really is is to finish the final book of the Millenium series which I have started just a few moments ago. I think I'm going to read like a man possessed until I finish it so I can get started solving the mystery of John Galt.

Atlas Shrugged May Have to be the Next Book I Read

Alright, let me say something first. I don't read things like the "classics" very often in my free time. It's just not my sort of thing, nor is it really my cup of tea to say the least. As a matter of fact, I think that the only classic literature I've read in my life was a direct result of being required to do so for some sort of class in high school or college.

Except one. The Fountainhead  by Ayn Rand.

When I first met my wife, we went on five dates in six nights the week before winter break at BYU. On one of the last dates that week we went to the local Barnes & Noble bookstore because she wanted to show me some book known as the The Color Code and I needed to pick up something to read during the break while I was at home.

Long story short, I thought I would be pretty smooth and told her as we walked in to go get me a copy of a favorite book of hers. She did, and I bought it along with the book I was there for, promising to read it over the break so we could talk about it when I got back. In my mind it was a pretty slick way of setting myself up for another date when we both got back to campus.

The Fountainhead was pretty good. It's long as hell, but the story was pretty good, and I liked a couple of the characters a lot. Blah, blah, blah, we wound up married. Cool, eh?

Anyways, a few days ago, my wife and I went to the Redbox down the road and grabbed the Atlas Shrugged movie to watch. It's her favorite book of all time, hands down, and she was intrigued to see how the low-budget film that was released in 2011 stacked up as far as character depiction and so forth. I, having absolutely no clue what the book was about except that it involved trains in some fashion, had no sort of preconceived notions as to what was going to happen.



Yeah... shouldn't have watched that movie.

No, the movie wasn't horrible. As a matter of fact, as someone who had never read the book or had any idea what the story was about I was quite intrigued and enjoyed it far more than I was expecting to. The problem lies entirely in the fact that now I'm obsessing over two things:

Who the hell is John Galt?
What the hell does he have to do with Atlantis?

I'm not kidding. I've thought about it every single day since we watched that movie, and if I hadn't just started reading Fate of the Jedi: Conviction the day before I probably would have downloaded Atlas Shrugged to my Kindle immediately that evening. For all I know, the movie is completely off-track from the actual book. I won't allow my wife to tell me either way as I have a burning desire to discover for myself.

As a result, I did have plans to read the other Fate of the Jedi books and then finish the rest of the Millenium series books, but now those plans may have to change. My only hesitation is that Atlas Shrugged is long, and I worry I may lose myself in it if it really does have anything to do with Atlantis for some reason.

My wife should know better than to expose me to these things.