In Cold Blood

I recently read Capote's "In Cold Blood," which I had never read before and I was totally blown away. The language is so beautifully crafted, the story so intimately told. It was as if you had an angel in your ear, whispering the inner thoughts of those around you, always in stunning language.

At one point, Capote is writing about the friends of Herb Clutter, who perform the solemn task of cleaning the house where the family was murdered. They drag the bloodied mattresses and artifacts out into a back wheat field and start a bonfire. And the friends watch the flames and smoke and think of their friend and their mortality. Here's a quote:

How was it possible that such effort, such plain virtue, could overnight be reduced to this -- smoke, thinning as it rose and was received by the big, annihilating sky?

Just imagine standing in a wintry Kansas field and how the sky streaches above you as you stand on the plain, grey and ominous, for as far as you can see, unbroken by anything except the occasional tree that only points out what a spec you are.

I was so overwhelmed by the sky when I first went to Iowa that I felt naked and uncovered and quite panicky driving from the airport to Iowa City. The sky on the plains is a weighty thing.

These birch trees are so beautiful with their white branches against the sky.