Saturday, September 26, 2009

I heard that

Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson, first published in 1999, could have been written yesterday, or tomorrow. Note to parents: the date-rape thing? get over it. Your girl child really ought to read this.

Even quite-uptight Common Sense Media rated it "age appropriate" for 13 and up. Of course there was that one "iffy" scene because a teacher makes an anti-immigration speech.

(Ohmygoodness!)
(#GetOverIt)

Read on...

Friday, September 25, 2009

Finally, I Know Why "Mockingbird" Sings

I don't know how I escaped high school, let alone two college honors classes in English lit, without reading To Kill a Mockingbird, but I'm sorry. Sort of. Reading Mockingbird any time in one's life is probably good for a person; reading it in middle age sort of keeps one's perspective on track.

Of course as much as I love reading, I'm plagued with writer's reading disease, symptoms of which include losing touch with a story here and there while I puzzle over the author's process, construction, possible disagreements with an editor or publisher, and so on.

Because of that, I suspect I enjoyed Lee's "forward" more than most people; I've lost count of how many times I re-read it. In February 1993, Lee wrote:
Please spare Mockingbird an Introduction. As a reader I loathe Introductions. To novels, I associate Introductions with long-gone authors and works that are being brought back into print after decades of interment. Although Mockingbird will be 33 this year, it has never been out of print and I am still alive, though very quiet. Introductions inhibit pleasure, they kill the joy of anticipation, they frustrate curiosity. The only good thing about Introdutions is that in some case they delay the dose to come. Mockingbird still says what it has to say; it has managed to survive the years without preamble.

Well, with apologies to Ms. Lee, that was a hell of an introduction. How could anyone NOT turn the page and commence with To Kill a Mockingbird after that?

So I did. And while I didn't need any (further) introduction, I did re-read the first chapter after finishing the book. It wrapped everything up more neatly for me.

Anyway, if you never read To Kill a Mockingbird, I suggest that you do. Next stop - to the library to borrow the movie, which I also somehow missed thus far...


Interesting -
- that this was the second of my 'favorite books of the year' that featured Charles Lamb rather prominently. (The first being The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society.) In addition to Lee's charming non-introduction, Mockingbird is prefaced by Lamb's quote, "Lawyers, I suppose, were children once."


Recommended reading -
I found the National Endowment for the Arts' biography of Harper Lee very interesting, as well as a shorter one at Teenreads.com). Because Mockingbird is Lee's only published novel, it's almost all we have. Though I intend to find those articles...

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

When a Kiss is Not a Kiss

What I learned before breakfast this morning:

When your dog "kisses" you, he's really just hoping you'll throw up on him.

Have a tail-waggin' kind of day!

Thursday, September 3, 2009

Back to School We Go...

I had a heck of a time finding good new picture books intended for new students. Even harder was finding good new books that were really interesting stories, rather than primarily designed to reassure, a la The Kissing Hand.

Not that there's anything wrong with The Kissing Hand - but my son was rarin' to go to school, not worried about it.

Here, my review in The Plain Dealer of five books young students (and their parents) can enjoy.

Happy reading!