What Have I Gotten Myself Into?

After finishing The Yearling, I was determined that I would read something very light and fluffy, the mental equivalent of bolting down a bag of potato chips. I even bought a historical romance on my Kindle for that specific purpose. However, since we live in the boondocks where Amazon's Whispernet can't whisper, I wasn't able to actually download the book to the Kindle when I was ready to start reading (I'll have to take the Kindle to town to be able to do that).

As an alternative, I started a YA book I had downloaded once after seeing a review on the Teen Lit Review blog, The Red Necklace by Sally Gardner. It's historical fiction about the French Revolution, and both my daughter and I liked the sample chapters from Amazon.

I've read about five chapters now, and last night as I finished the reading for the evening, I had that unreasonably anxious feeling I get when I know the main characters are going to get into trouble. It's the feeling I had several times while reading the Harry Potter series. I want to just shake the characters and say, "Don't do that! Can't you predict that's going to cause problems down the road?"

What brought on that feeling last night is that Yann, the young boy who is the hero of the story, stole a red necklace from the story's villain when the villain didn't pay Yann and his friends for a theatrical performance. (Actually, the villain did worse than stiff them on the payment; he murdered one of the friends in an "accident.") Even as Yann is picking up the necklace and putting it in his pocket, I'm thinking, "sure, like this incredibly sharp and incredibly vile villain is not going to notice a necklace of red jewels is gone! Come on, Yann!"

OK. I know suspense is one of the things that many people enjoy while reading. But honestly, it seems to lessen my pleasure in a story if I have to constantly be looking around the corner for the characters, waiting for something bad to jump out of the dark. I think it must be a personality thing!