Vacationing with Geek Gal

Last year, when I went to the very spa I'm visiting next week, I brought a book about the Lincoln assassination. It was the book I happened to be reading and it didn't occur to me that it was at odds with my restive and rejuvenating surroundings until I got there.

This year, here's what's atop my TBR list:

Oxygen -- a novel about an anesthesiologist who makes an error during a routine surgery and "must explain the nightmarish operating room disaster and face the resulting malpractice suit." (A friend survived a harrowing anesthesia incident almost a year ago.)

Clara's War -- "The heart-stopping story of a young girl hiding from the Nazis ... from her years in an underground bunker with 17 other people." Could anything be further away from the luxury of a spa?

And I'm still reading The Kennedy Legacy. JFK is still in the White House, Bobby is Attorney General and Ted is preparing to run for Senate. Everything is rosey now, but in the remaining 200 pages I have two assassinations, Chappaquiddick, divorce, miscarriages, plane crashes and brain cancer to look forward to. Good times!

I'm really phenomenally geeky, aren't I? I'll have to bring Glamour and Allure with me, too. Just to make sure leaven the heavy subject matter with skincare and fashion advice.