Two Great Adult Reads

One of the things keeping me busy these days is a course I’m taking on South Asia. (India, Pakistan & Bangladesh). It’s not a typical course in that it is not taught by a professor. Instead we are following the collaborative learning model. Led by a coordinator, a group of people who are interested in a particular subject agree to study and report on various aspects of that subject. For this particular course, we are also reading novels and viewing films about the countries of South Asia besides doing the research for our presentations to the class. The experience is further enriched by guest speakers who are native to the area, one a college professor and two others who are writers.

I’ve been enjoying the reading so much that I wanted to share two of the books with you. The first takes place in modern day India and tells the story of the interwoven lives of a wealthy Parsi widow and her Hindu maid. Their common experiences as women in unhappy, even abusive marriages, their care and support for each other over the years, and their sincere love for each other’s children cannot in the end overcome caste/class and prejudice. It’s one great story with the added bonus of providing insight into the complicated social system of India today. The Space Between Us by Thrity N. Umrigar.

The other book I recommend is A Golden Age by Tahmina Anam. This is the story of the Bangladesh war for independence from Pakistan in 1971-72. It centers around a young Muslim widow, Rehana, trying to protect her 17 year old daughter and 19 year old son, both swept up in the rebellion. Beautifully written, the novel describes Rehana’s secure life suddenly thrust into chaos and her slowly evolving acceptance of the risks and sacrifices required to save her loved ones and redeem herself. This emotional story has a lasting impact.

If you want a satisfying read and you’re in the mood to learn about an exotic culture, you can’t go wrong with either of these books.

The Sibert and Me

I came to the enjoyment of informational books in my adulthood. I was very much a typical ‘girl reader’ as a youngster ….. fiction, fiction and more fiction. I loved reading and I loved stories. But as I look back at my childhood and adolescence I find the seeds of my interest in nonfiction. I envied the chemistry set my brother got one Christmas and played with it more than he did. That interest followed me through high school and into college where I considered chemistry as a major before settling on Latin and ancient history, two other favorite subjects in high school. I was fascinated by the ancients and their ‘dead’ language and planned to share this fascination in the classroom. But by the time I graduated, Latin teaching jobs were disappearing.

My interest in becoming a librarian grew from my experiences as a substitute teacher in public and private schools wherever we lived during my husband’s Navy days. After his service concluded and we were settled in a community where we expected to stay, I got my first job as an elementary school librarian. I was inexperienced and just beginning to work on my library masters degree, but I got that job because my academic background meshed with the focus of the district’s gifted program. To serve the needs of my students and of the curriculum, I began to read more and more children's nonfiction and as I did, my interest in adult nonfiction increased. My adult reading expanded to include biography and American history, and the reading interests of my students led me to read books about other subjects I never expected to enjoy. The result is that my reading choices in both adult and children's books are eclectic.

Thus, first among my reasons for wanting to serve on the Sibert committee is that I enjoy reading informational books, and I especially enjoy the variety of ways today’s authors employ to convey information. Second, I believe I have the expertise to be an effective member of the committee and the temperament to work cordially with others without surrendering my responsibility to champion a book I believe in. Next, I have the time. While I am a very busy retired librarian, I have the luxury of allocating my time as I wish and committee work would be a priority. Lastly, I think it would be fun to meet and work with colleagues from other parts of the country with different professional experiences.

It may not be easy to understand why someone who already reads a lot would want to take on the task of reading so many extra books next year, but I hope I have explained myself well enough that you will consider voting for me and telling your colleagues about me and this blog. I’d be happy to respond to your comments or answer the questions you may post. Thanks for visiting.

Sibert Committee

With the ALA elections opening within the week, it’s time for me to tell you why I’m interested in serving on the 2011 Sibert Committee. That’s the group which chooses the most distinguished informational books for children published in a given year. I hope that those of you who are ALSC members will consider voting for me.
My credentials are pretty typical … a lifetime of service to children, mostly in school but also in public libraries. In addition I worked as a school collection development specialist for Baker & Taylor, creating collection lists for new elementary, middle and high school libraries in all parts of the country.
During the course of my career the importance of informational books for children steadily grew. This growth began with the whole language reading movement (remember that?) which used materials from the library collection to extend and enhance learning in the classroom. Because of such demand, more and better nonfiction titles and nonfiction series were published making it particularly challenging to spend a limited library budget. Supporting the curriculum on a budget was not the only reason I needed to become a discriminating children's nonfiction buyer. Equally important was satisfying the needs of the students who didn’t like to read fiction without compromising quality. Those kids were constantly on the look out for books on bugs and snakes, dinosaurs and sharks, monster trucks and bats, jokes and riddles, UFOs and vampires, sports and crafts etc. Thankfully my professional career spanned a time when it became easier to find nonfiction that combined accurate content, exciting writing, stunning illustrations/pictures and helpful glossaries and indexes. Today there are so many wonderful nonfiction books published each year that it is a daunting task to choose the Sibert award winner and honor books. Now that I’ve told you why I think I’m qualified to be a member of the Sibert Committee, I leave for my next entry the reasons why I want to be a member.

Home Again

For the second time in less than 2 weeks I found myself using my map skills as I looked out the plane window and tried to determine which state we were crossing. After a much too quick visit to Baton Rouge where we enjoyed Mardi Gras, a tour of LSU where our daughter teaches and way too much cajun and creole food, we spent a few days visiting friends in Dallas and then winged our way home. It was hardly warm in those southern states but we did have a few days in the 70's ... much appreciated when we hit the 24 degrees and 8 inches of snow outside the airport here!

But back to maps. I love them. There's something about matching what I see on the ground with the memory of the maps I study that really appeals to me. I'm pretty sure we crossed directly over the Chesapeake Bay, the Delmarva peninsula (which we used to drive on trips home from Norfolk in our Navy days) and then over the Delaware Bay with a great view of Cape May, NJ. We flew straight up through the heart of New Jersey and I spotted NYC off in the distance to the east. It was a quick half hour up the Connecticut coast and inland along Narragansett Bay to our destination. I've been able to identify beaches and bridges and lighthouses ect. for many years now but the bird's eye view is still a delight. And sometimes the trip is even more wonder full. On the last leg of our earlier trip we flew from Philadelphia to RI just after sunset. It was a clear night with a full moon rising over the Atlantic. Absolutely spectacular! Every body of water and there are many in this little state, reflected the moon's light in flashes of silver. The string of lights from bridges and rotating lights from lighthouses dotting the shoreline added there own special effect. As often as I have made the trip over the bay before, nothing can compare to this one.

Kids Who Don't Like to Read

I had a break through of sorts on our visit to our grandkids in London. My oldest grandson(7),a reluctant reader(to use an out of fashion term), read one of his reading books to his 3 year old adoring brother and he actually enjoyed it! As I listened to his effort, I was reminded of the many children, mostly boys but some girls too, whom I tried to help through their learning-to-read days. We librarians know the secret to growing readers .... find the books they want to read. But just because we know the secret doesn't mean it's easy. Believe me, I've had some hard nuts to crack so to speak, and I certainly wasn't successful in every case. Those of us who didn't struggle to read probably can't even remember how we learned to read, so somehow we think it shouldn't take as long as it actually does to reach fluency. As in all things, success begets success and those children who start out slowly (I'm not talking about the kids with learning problems here)can get discouraged pretty quickly. There's no way they get better at reading if they don't practice reading. That's where we librarians come in. The first step is to find out their interests. My grandson loves all things Star Wars so I had bought him a few of the DK beginning reader books about the subject. We spent a fun half hour making a list of the books he wanted from the titles on the back of those books. We ended up with 32 titles! Intermingled with the expected space adventure type books are a few surprising ones .... Born to be a butterfly; I can swim!; A trip to the theater. But are they surprising for a boy whose other Grandma raises butterflies, whose aunt and uncle are actors and who loves boogie boarding? Now my job is to bundle up some of these books and send them off to London. I'm going to start with the easier reading level titles in the hopes he will read to his brother again. And I'll be sure to have a number of other titles from his list scattered around the house when he is here in April. I'm hoping he'll become a reader before he knows it.

Travel

We’ve been in London this last week and it may be for the last time. Strange to think of it that way. My son and his family have been living here for five years so we’ve visited often. Two summers ago I came and stayed for 6 weeks to help out when our third grandchild was born. London feels very much like a second home to us. But this summer the kids will be moving back to the US and we’ll have no more reason to make the trek. Of all the experiences you gain when you become a parent, sharing your children’s adult lives is not the one you think much about or even expect. When we married, we ventured a state or two away from home. Not so our children’s generation. And the upshot is that not only has their world expanded but so has ours. When we return to RI next week, we’ll be anticipating a visit with our daughter and her husband in Baton Rouge. They moved south last July and this will be our first trip there. I expect it’s quite different from New England or London. My husband and I both look forward to discovering another place we never could have anticipated would be a significant part of our lives.

By the way, last Monday London ‘enjoyed’ the biggest snowstorm they’ve had in 18 years…. 6 inches. The kids had two snow days and made a snowman on the patio. Yesterday (Thursday) the snow was gone and we’re back to the usual rain.

And the winner is......

The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman wasn’t even on our Mock Newbery radar. I think the main reason was that we thought of Mr. Gaiman as a Brit and therefore ineligible, but now that he is a US resident his eligibility status has obviously changed. I did read his book and enjoyed it quite a bit and there is no doubt that children will love it. (Guess it’s been on the best seller list for some time.) I especially liked the humor and the characterizations of the all too ‘human’ ghosts in the graveyard. I’m just not sure it’s “the most distinguished contribution to children’s literature” this year. It is a coming of age story like no other and be warned ….the opening scene is pretty scary stuff, not for the sensitive child prone to nightmares.

As for the Honor books, we didn’t read After Tupac and D. Foster (Woodson) or The Surrender Tree: Poems of Cuba’s Struggle for Freedom (Engle). I can only imagine how many books Newbery committee members read ….. many, many more than our mock committee did. We did read Savvy (Law) and The Underneath (Appelt). While Savvy was discussed, there wasn’t much enthusiasm for it in our group. I think the magical realism aspect of the story was off-putting to some but there is much to admire about it. Character, setting and voice ring true and are memorable, and the idea that everyone has his/her own special savvy to be cherished and shared wisely may set a young reader on a journey of self-awareness. The Underneath is an entirely different matter. All of us found the plot to be difficult … both confusing and very dark. It is true the language is lyrical, the characters engaging and the setting a palpable presence. These are the novel’s strong points and strong they are. But the story is hard to follow as it jumps through time and space and the cruelty of several characters will be (or should be) disturbing. Yes, it all turns out well in the end but I wonder how many young readers will get that far. One of the biggest problems in my opinion is the adorable cover art by David Small. Many teachers and parents will think the book is a sweet animal story ….not!

So, the only title that I mentioned before which showed up on the winners list is Waiting for Normal (Connor). It is the middle school Schneider Family Book Award winner for books that embody the artistic expression of the disability experience for child and adolescent audiences. This and the other books mentioned in my previous blog about the Newbery I recommend without reservation.

Moving with an MLS

There’s a photo collage hanging in my front hallway. It doesn’t consist of family pictures or vacation spots or even our grandchildren. There on the wall are pictures of the 6 homes we have lived in …. not counting this one, number 7. Except for the 12 years we stayed in one place so our kids could grow up in one school district, we’ve averaged 4 years per house. Thankfully we never moved very far from our home base in southern New England, but just about any move means a new start. Through the years my friends have expressed their wonder at how I survived so many changes and sometimes I wondered too. The truth is that had we not moved, I would have remained an elementary school librarian, a job I loved, but I also would have missed out on so many other enriching experiences. I never would have competed for and won the job of creating a school library from scratch with a $100,000 budget. Nor would I have tried my hand in the public library field and discovered my talent for storytelling. If we’d stayed put, I wouldn’t have worked as a school collection development specialist for Baker & Taylor and found myself training the school sales reps in various parts of the country. And I wouldn’t now be spending a part of each week exploring the world of Victorian children’s literature in the billiard room of an 1870’s mansion. I marvel at the varied career an MLS degree can provide. From children’s literature to telling stories, from research to computer/media expertise my degree has served me well.

President Obama

I was moved and proud as Barack Obama took the oath of office and gave his inspirational inaugural address today. With so many others I pray that he will have the wisdom and fortitude to set us on a better path toward the future. Could the political idealism and optimism of my 60s youth be back? It feels so good to believe that.

A Volunteer Job

It’s a sunny but cold New England morning with the promise of bitter cold to come. Here I sit in my cozy home and thankful to be here except for one thing. I won’t be venturing out to my new "job". Sometimes the most unexpected and extraordinary things can happen. Last month a childhood friend contacted me to find out if I’d be interested in cataloging the personal library of a friend of hers. “This will be the most amazing volunteer opportunity you could ever get.”, she said. And so it is!

It seems that just down the street and around the corner there sits hidden among the trees, atop a hill overlooking the bay, an impressive 1870s Victorian which has been inherited and occupied through the years by female members of the original owners. The current owner is in the process of turning it into a house museum and study center in Victoriana. These facts alone were enough of an enticement, but when I walked through the doors for the first time I was hooked. The house and its contents are mind boggling … the result of the melding of several prominent families in state history from the mid-19th century to the present. Now imagine what treasures the 3000+ book collection must hold!

My "office" is in the billiard room on the top floor with a spectacular view of the bay through the winter landscape. I’m beginning the project with my specialty, children’s books. So far I have found early and first editions of The Secret Garden, Peter Pan in Kensington Garden, Pinocchio, Winnie the Pooh, Little Women and the works of Jules Verne among many other significant but lesser known titles. I am using The Encyclopedia of Collectible Children’s Books: Identification and Value by Diane McClure and Rosemary Jones as a resource but if anyone knows of other particularly useful guides or can offer advice, I’d appreciate the information.

Mock Newbery

I’ve got to get better at adding posts to this blog. Never having kept a journal, I’m just not used to putting my thoughts on paper. Guess I need some discipline here.

I’ve been busy with two library related projects since December. One is participating in the Mock Newbery meetings that take place every fall into January. Since I started my reading later than usual, I pretty much read every spare minute through the holidays. In my opinion this year’s crop of children’s fiction is quite good. We didn’t consider any non-fiction although I understand that the real Newbery committee can do that since the award is given to the author of the “most distinguished contribution to American literature for children published in the United States during the preceding year”.

Still, given the range of genres and subject matter in children’s lit and the 8 to 14 age range, it was no easy matter deciding on our winner, especially when there wasn’t a title that jumped out as a clear favorite. Our final/voting meeting occurred Wednesday. After a terrific discussion, several votes and no more time, we decided on Keeping Score (Park) as the winner by 1 vote over Waiting for Normal (Connor). The actual Newbery committee members would have to keep voting until a clear winner emerged.

Other titles that were contenders included my favorite, Masterpiece (Broach), The Hunger Games (Collins), Diamond Willow (Frost), Greetings from Nowhere (O’Connor) and the title I think will actually win, Shooting the Moon (Dowell). Hopefully the winner and several honor books are on this list but I’ll have to wait until the announcement on January 26th to find out.

I have to mention one more title that won my heart, Alvin Ho, Allergic to Girls, School and Other Scary Things (Look). It will probably be the first in a series but Alvin is someone worth knowing. He's funny, smart, wants friends but can't bring himself to speak to anyone in school. The father/son relationship depicted is especially winning. It's a perfect book for 2nd and 3rd graders, but older children will enjoy it too.

The Children's Room

The other day I subbed in the children’s room of the small town library where I previously worked part time … two evenings a week. It’s difficult to work at all when your husband is retired and your children and grandchildren live far away. We’re healthy enough and lucky enough to have the means to travel when we wish, and the freedom to do so is very sweet. So when I decided that I didn’t want to work evenings anymore, I thought I was ready to give up the children’s room. For a while it seemed I was right (although I never gave up reading childrens books). But when I walked into that space on a recent cold Saturday morning it really felt like coming home. All the pleasures of the job revealed themselves during the day…. warm greetings from colleagues, seeing the regular Saturday patrons and catching up on their news, getting a hug from a graduate of one of my story hours, and of course, finding just the right books for my young patrons. The day would have been perfect as is but then one of those moments occurred that a children’s librarian is privileged to witness. One of our young regulars was sitting at a table directly in front of my desk. He was engrossed in the book he had been reading for quite some time. A toddler holding his board book, climbed up on the chair with the older boy who made room for him without taking his eyes off his own book. The little one began to “read” softly. I am sure that they did not know each other. They were just two guys sharing the love of books. That day I was reminded of the richness of my career as a children’s librarian … why I’ve loved it so. That’s just one reason I’ll probably always be a not so retired librarian.

Happy 2009!