I'm mailing off this book to a friend. Before I do, I want to share a quote on change. In the book, the protagonist has just been sent to work for a family because her family has fallen on hardship, and this is a great shift from all she had previously encountered.
From Girl with a Pearl Earring:
It was strange to meet so many new people and see so many new things in one morning, and to do so apart from all the familiar things that made up my life. Before, if I met someone new I was always surrounded by family and neighbors. If I went to a new place I was with Francis or my mother or father and felt no threat. The new was woven in the the old, like the darning in a sock.
And, yes, it's a novel about the painting by Vermeer.
