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Wondering what staff members are reading, listening to or watching? We see vast numbers of selections as they cross our desks in the Library, but what have we recently chosen to devote our free time to? This page chronicles some of our favorites. Reviews include adult, teen and kid's items. When we return to Joshua Road, we plan to have a Staff Picks shelf, so you'll be able to browse our favorites.
Nemisis by Philip Roth. Some of the simplest stories are most profound, begging questions about self-worth, guilt and our beliefs. Nemesis is a compact novel set in the 1940s when war raged abroad and polio struck fear in the hearts of those at home. Bucky Cantor is in charge of a public playground in a poor Jewish area in Northern New Jersey. He wishes he were fit for combat like his friends, but fate has consigned him to trying to keep young children in his care at the playground safe and healthy. Roth tells us the story of Bucky Cantor's life and the lives of his charges in such a way that we must marvel at Roth's storytelling ability and wonder where heroism starts and ends, where responsibility ends, - and when guilt and anger are inappropriate, and perhaps, evil, a "stupid hubris" to quote Roth. This book has much to say to all decent and good people who live with disappointment and guilt, and that is nearly all of us. Nemeisi is a beautiful little book with a great life'sesson.
I just listened to a book on CD called The King's Speech, written by Mark Logue, the grandson of Lionel Logue, the speech therapist who helped King George VI with his stuttering problem. The audiobook includes sound clips of some of the real King George VI making his speeches, and excerpts from Lionel Logue's diary are quoted throughout. The author, Mark Logue, was also consulted when The KING'S SPEECH movie was being made.
I loved it! The number of bombings London sustained during WWII was staggering. I did not realize how bad it was until I listened to this book. I loved the movie, too!
A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan. I think I’ll start by telling you the one thing I couldn’t figure out. A “goon squad” is a group of hired thugs and Egan’s goon squad is time itself-how it beats us down. This is an elegantly written book which jumps from time to time. A character who is central in one chapter is peripheral in another or maybe just much older or younger. Lately, I've been reading many music based books; and this is one of them. The central characters are all somehow involved with a former rock band member, Bennie Salazar, who becomes a successful music mogul. This is a very structured book, with each chapter existing almost as a short story. The points of view, the characters and the action all move through time and location in a brilliantly bizarre way. One chapter is actually a 70 page PowerPoint presentation written by a pre-teenage girl about her life and her understanding of her brother, mom and dad. This book was an ambitious project by a gifted writer. Parenthetically, Jennifer Egan is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania.
What The Dog Saw: And Other Adventures (AudioBook format) by Malcolm Gladwell
When we go for a long car ride, there’s a special kind of audio book that works for both of us: the action/mystery lover and the character/writing style lover. This non-fiction work was a big winner.
Gladwell, author of “Blink” and “The Tipping Point,” collected a batch of his articles into this book, narrating it himself…and what a collection it is. He starts out with a story about Ron Popeil, the late-night tv pitchman, inventor of the Chop-o-Matic and the Pocket Fisherman. We learn about his wacky family, his million-dollar insights, and a lot about the world of info-mercials. In another story he investigates ketchup. Why are there dozens of kinds of mustard on our supermarket shelves, but only one kind of ketchup – and only one brand anyone cares about? One story is about high-tech imaging, its powers and its shocking limitations.
The title of the book comes from his story about Cesar Millan, the “dog whisperer”. Gladwell examines and breaks down into very understandable images, the art of being a dog’s master. Change your shoulders and you can change your dog’s obedience.
Every chapter is a look into a new and amazing world (even if that world is as ordinary as ketchup) and each is told with a very sly wit so the audio made the hours fly by faster than the miles.
A Fine Balance by Rohinton Mistry is a huge book in every sense: long, emotionally powerful, and panoramic in scope. The place and time, India during the government of Indira Ghandi, are more than background. The searing events of the story are inextricable from the historical setting, which describes the horrors of Ghandi’s population control program. But this novel is much more than a historical depiction. It has rich human characters and great psychological depth. Keep an eye on all of the references to fertility and note what happens to the four main characters with regard to having children. During the course of the book, you may realize that you can attach the title of the book to the circus-type children's act that is shown on the cover of the book, but think about the title again at the very end of the book; you'll find that it has much deeper meaning.
Anthropology of an American Girl by Hilary Thayer Hamann
Reviewers have cited D. H. Lawrence as a similar author and Holden Caulfield as a similar hero (heroine). This is a novel of manners, but very much the manner of now, resonating of its time, the turn of the 21st Century. I’ll warn you this, is a long book—over 600 pages. Evie Auerbach is a seemingly typical high school student in the Northeast as the book begins. A young man with a theater background who is also a professional boxer comes to town and he directs the school play. Evie and Harrison Rourke are drawn to each other but it is not until after she graduates that they begin a summer love affair. The intensity of their affair is rocketing but it seemingly burns out with Evie left hollow and empty inside. A friend (or better, an acquaintance) of Rourke’s with plenty of money picks up the pieces of Evie but those pieces never seem to be quite in the right place again as she enters a pampered life as the paramour of Mark Ross. Add in a touchy mother-daughter relationship with 60s counter-culture survivor Irene Auerbach, a full complement of other relationships, plus the return of Harrison Rourke, and you have a compelling story of a girl becoming a woman. I enjoyed reading this book but it was overly long and I found myself unable to wait for the end, looking ahead to see what would happen after I was ¾ of the way through it.
Animals in Winter by Henrietta Bancroft & Richard G. Van Gelder, illus. by Helen K. Davie
Next time you are in the library don’t forget to check the shelves of non-fiction books for your preschooler. You can find many informational books that are appropriate for them. One such book is Animals in Winter. The book begins with a description of the coming of winter and describes how some animals prepare for the winter – migration, gathering food, eating to build fat for hibernation. The book then tells about animals who do not prepare, but must find food during the winter months. The final pages include ideas of how people can help feed animals in winter, with a warning to continue feeding the animals once you start and they have begun depending upon you. I like the book because of the straight-forward text, illustrations and the examples the authors give for the different ways animals cope with winter. The book packs a lot of information into the 32-page picture book format. Preschoolers and children in K-2nd grade, too, will enjoy the books and learn about animal adaptation.
Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout
Here's a kaleidoscope of a book. It's a pack of 13 stories that take place over the course of about 30 years in one town in Maine. Each story provides a different glimpse of one cranky, overly blunt math teacher. She's the main character of some stories, plowing her way through other people's lives as well as her own. The stories are funny, touching and peopled with fully-formed, believable characters. Strout's eye for details, both physical and emotional, is razor-sharp. Olive can't see her husband's pain or hear the resignation in his voice, but is torn apart by an unflattering comment she overhears about her flower-print dress. She's a tough old bird, but one you tolerate, then appreciate, and finally, amazingly, really love.
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