The life of Arve - or my caterpillar becomes a butterfly

 This is the short [life] story of one of my Painted Ladies raised in my flat in Oslo this summer and released from my balcony together with his four other cousins in August 2014:

This is Arve, my adult Painted Lady (Vanessa Cardui)

Here Arve is just about to "escape" his pupa (chrysalis) after his transformation from larva

Just about to pull himself out

Finally outside, pumping his wings

Almost there!!

Perfect - ready to fly out into the big world and possibly even to south Europe or Africa!

The Goldfinch

Donna Tartt is an excellent storyteller and The Goldfinch is a "brick" of a book that draws you quickly into a present time with a small kid who experiences a terror attack and who grows up in very diverse environment and culture that forces you to think through your own life and choices that makes this book a book you would like to last for ever.

Donna Tartt is very thorough and "wordy" in her storytelling, but with very few exceptions I really love her writing and can easily understand why she got the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction 2014.
From time to time, the story gets really exciting and is even close to a crime story, but what I really value the most is her warm description of some of the people the main character meets and gets close to - that even includes his best friend Boris who has a very "bad" influence on the main character, but has his way of showing love under his "bad" exterior that is fascinating and a bit scary.
Enjoy this excellent book it would take a while before you get across something as good as this - and if you have seen some of the great European art in any of the great museums in Amsterdam, the story gets even better :-)