Internet Book Clubs

Jul1

I started my own Book Club, Biblically Literate, in April, and it’s met with mixed success. I wasn’t able to meet with the members who live nearby in April, May or June, and then Eldest Daughter sort of took over. We’ve had a wonderful discussion of G.K. Chesterton’s The Man Who Was Thursday, and going with Eldest’s choices we’re going to be reading I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith, then The Moviegoer by Walker Percy, and finally Peace Like a River by Leif Enger. If you’d like to join in as we read any or all of these, please do. And if you email me your thoughts, I’ll post them or link to them at Biblically Literate.

I’ve found a couple of other group reads going on in the blogosphere in 2008, and I thought some of you might be interested in these:

A mixed group of novices and kindred spirits is reading or re-reading Anne of Green Gables in honor of the hundredth anniversary of its publication. They’re blogging about their thoughts on Anne and her adventures at Blogging Anne of Green Gables, and it looks as if they’ll be there all year, going on to read the sequels together, too.

Kate S., the originator of the Anne project, also lead me to Into the Parisian Underworld, a group blog dedicated to the reading and discussion of the unabridged version of Victor Hugo’s Les MisÃ©rables. Since Les Miserables is my favorite novel of all novels, and since I had planned to re-read it this year, I may join in the discussion, which seems to have lagged in recent days.

If you’re interested in any of these group reading projects, I’m sure you’d be welcome to join.

Canada Day: Reading Through Canada

Jul1

July 1 is Canada Day. Here are some suggestions, mostly fiction, if you’re ready to celebrate with a good book:

Picture Books:

Bannatyne-Cugnet, Jo. A Prairie Alphabet. Illustrated by Yvette Moore.
Carney, Margaret. At Grandpa’s Sugar Bush. Illustrated by Janet Wilson.
Carrier, Roch. The Hockey Sweater. Illustrated by Sheldon Cohen.
Gay, Marie-Louise. Stella, Queen of the Snow. Illus. Groundwood, 2000.
Ellis, Sarah. Next Stop! Illus. by Ruth Ohi. Fitzhenry & Whiteside, 2000.
Harrison, Ted. A Northern Alphabet.
Kurelek, William. A Prairie Boyâ€™s Winter.
Kurelek, William. A Prairie Boyâ€™s Summer.
McFarlane, Sheryl. Jessieâ€™s Island. Illustrated by Sheena Lott. Orca Book Publishers, 2005.
Service, Robert. The Cremation of Sam McGee. Illustrated by Ted Harrison.

Children’s Fiction:

Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery, of course and all its sequels. Essential Canadiana.
Our Canadian Girl and Dear Canada series.
Curtis, Christopher Paul. Elijah of Buxton. Semicolon review here.
Hobbs, Will. Far North.
Mowat, Farley. Lost in the Barrens.
Mowat, Farley. Owls in the Family.
Stanbridge, Joanne. The Leftover Kid. Northern Lights, 1997.

YA and Adult Fiction:

Craven, Margaret. I Heard the Owl Call My Name.
Freedman, Benedict and Nancy. Mrs. Mike.
Mitchell, W.O. Who Has Seen the Wind?

I haven’t read all of these, but I plan to, whenever I can manage to find time for a Canada Project.

Ian McKenzie’s Top Twenty Ways to Tell If You’re Canadian.

More Canadian books, mostly for kids by Becky at Farm School.

Celebrating Literary Canada at Chasing Ray earlier this year.

Any more Canadian book suggestions?

Home by Witold Rybczynski

Jun30

Recommended by Carol at Magistramater.

I’m not sure I have the interior decorator/homemaker/domestic engineer gene or talent or something. Although I enjoyed this book and found the history of the idea of “home” and a “comfortable home” interesting, I can’t say I felt that much of the information in the book related to me or my family or the way we live.

That is, I didn’t become engaged in the book’s ideas about home and how to achieve a comfortable home until the very end of the book when Rybczynski discusses comfort as both an objective, measurable ideal and a subjective, experiential idea:

We should resist the inadequate definitions that engineers and architects have offered us. Domestic well-being is too important to be left to the experts; it is, as it has always been, the business of the family and the individual.”

SO what furniture and what kind of design makes your home comfortable? What would make it more convenient and comfortable and habitable?

I know exactly what would would improve my home. I have a whole list:

1. I want new countertops. These kind.

2. I want my lower kitchen cabinets to open on both sides. I want bookshelves in the sides towards the living room, a divider in the middle, and shallower cabinet space in the kitchen. I don’t know if anyone else can picture what I’m talking about, but my lower cabinets are much too deep and dark with lots of unused space. And I always need more bookshelves.

3. I need better lighting for reading in the living room and the game room.

4. I would love to have a durable, but fluffy comforter on my bed and lots of super-sized cushy pillows that could be configured as needed. Right now I have a quilt covering on the bed because the comforters I’ve had in the past have not stood up to repeated Semicolon family use and abuse.

I may not be much of an interior designer, but as the amateur art critics say, “I know what I like.”

Belloc Does Something Hard

Jun30

Anthony Esolen at Mere Comments tells this story about Chesterton’s friend Hillaire Belloc: “It seems that when Belloc was serving as a young man in the French army, he met an American woman with whom he fell passionately in love. Once discharged from the army, Belloc sold his beloved complete set of the works of Cardinal Newman to scramble up the money for boat fare across the Atlantic. He landed in New York, and walked across the continent to San Francisco, supporting himself by manual labor. When he arrived at the young lady’s door in California, he proposed to her on the spot. She agreed. It was a long engagement — they were married seven years later, when she was 25 and he was 26. Read those last sentences again, carefully. Unfortunately, their happy marriage was broken by the early death of Mrs. Belloc, at age 43; and Belloc had already lost a son in World War I, and would lose another in World War II. But whatever you may say about the man’s writings and his polemical opinions, Belloc lived.”

Now that’s amazing! Did you catch that Belloc was eighteen or nineteen years old when he worked his way across the continent to propose to the woman he loved. This Bellocian sort of adventure probably wasn’t exactly what twins Brett and Alex Harris intended to challenge teens to do when they wrote their book, Do Hard Things, but then again, why not?

Some guys need to bite the bullet and do something really hard to win the hand of a lady. And some young ladies need to do whatever it takes to be worthy of such an effort.

Do you know of any stories about guys doing hard things to win a fair maiden? Guys nowadays?

Books Read in June 2008

Jun30

By A Spider’s Thread by Laura Lippman. Not bad, but I’ve already forgotten the details.

The Gollywhopper Games by Jody Feldman. Semicolon review here.

You Know Where To Find Me by Rachel Cohn. Semicolon review here.

The Missing: Found by Margaret Peterson Haddix. Semicolon review here.

Abbeville by Jack Fuller. Semicolon review here.

100 Cupboards by N.D. Wilson. Semicolon review here.

Blue Like Friday by Siobhan Parkinson. Semicolon review here.

When Crickets Cry by Charles Martin. Semicolon review here.

Gathering Blue by Lois Lowry.

Messenger by Lois Lowry.

The Man Who Was Thursday: A Nightmare by G.K. Chesterton. Semicolon review here.

The Totally Made-up Civil War Diary of Amanda MacLeish by Claudia Mills. A divorce book. I got mad at the parents, felt sorry for Amanda, and wanted the author to tell her characters, especially the dad, to grow up and take responsibility.

Don’t Talk To Me About the War by David A. Adler.

Shift by Jennifer Bradbury. A road trip turns into a mystery turns into a coming of age story about two buddies who choose different roads to adulthood.

Chasing Normal by Lisa Papademetriou. Semicolon review here.

Tennyson by Lesley M.M. Blume. Semicolon review here.

Old School by Tobias Wolff.

My Enemy’s Cradle by Sara Young. Semicolon review here.

Winter in Madrid by C.J. Sansom. Semicolon review here.

Best Book Read this Month: Old School by Tobias Wolff. I’l try to review it soon.

Second prize for the month: The Man Who Was Thursday, since I’m still thinking about it.

Several of the others were pretty good, too. It was a good reading month.

Still More Booklists

Jun28

Albert Mohler touts ten recently published books at Ten for the History Books — Summer Reading [Part 1] and Ten for the History Books — Summer Reading [Part 2]. Via Kathryn Judson at Suitable for Mixed Company.

Tim Keller’s Summer Reading list: Nine nonfiction Christian books picked by Mr. Keller, then beach picks by Kathy Keller, “series picks to keep you busy at the beach (mostly secular fiction, except Lewis, Tolkien, and Chesterton, but nothing offensive).”
Of the nine non-fiction picks, I am ashamed to say I’ve only read one: Mere Christianity, a very good book by the way.

Common Grounds Online Summer Reading List, 2008–Non-Fiction. The only one of these I’ve read is the one fiction title that accidentally got onto the list: Cry, the Beloved Country by Alan Paton.

Common Grounds Online Summer Reading List, 2008–Fiction. I’m doing a little better here in fiction territory. I’ve read Gilead and The Great Gatsby. And I’m definitely planning to read Leif Enger’s new book, So Brave, Young and Handsome.

Image Journal has a list of 100 Writers of Faith. Of the works listed, I’ve read fourteen and also read something by a few more of the authors listed.

Bloggers on Selfless Service

Jun27

Ken Brown on Selfishness and Self-Sacrifice in LOST.

Peter learns a lesson on selflessness in the school library.

Here’s another lesson on the rewards of unselfish service from Irena Sendler, a woman who should have won the Nobel Peace Prize.

Sometimes you don’t get your rewards in this life, and that’s O.K. Jesus said:

Blessed are you who are poor, for yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are you who hunger now, for you shall be satisfied. Blessed are you who weep now, for you shall laugh. Blessed are you when men hate you and ostracize you and cast insults at you and spurn your name as evil for the sake of the Son of Man. Be glad in that day and leap for joy, for behold, you reward is great in heaven; for in the same way their fathers used to treat the prophets. But woe to you who are rich, for you are receiving your comfort in full. Woe to you who are well fed now, for you shall be hungry. Woe to you who laugh now, for you shall mourn and weep. Woe to you when all men speak well of you, for in the same way their fathers used to treat the false prophets

Convicting, much?

Poetry and Fine Art Friday

Jun26

One of my favorite books of poetry came out of the Harlem Renaissance in New York in the 1920’s (1927), James Weldon Johnson’s God’s Trombones: Seven Negro Sermons in Verse. So I looked at You Tube to find a spoken version of one of Johnson’s poem/sermons. There I found pastor Wintley Phipps performing “Go Down Death.”

It’s a moving performance, poetry and the art of drama combined.

Today’s Poetry Friday round-up is hosted at Biblio File.

Happy Birthday to Charlotte Zolotow

Jun26

Charlotte Zolotow was born Charlotte Gertrude Shapiro on this date in 1915 in Norfolk, Virginia. Because her books have been so beautifully meaningful to me and so treasured by my children, I included ten of her more than seventy books in my preschool read aloud curriculum, Picture Book Preschool. (Only two other authors, Peter Spier and Gail Gibbons, have that many books on the Picture Book Preschool reading list.)

Big Sister and Little Sister. I love this story of how a little sister hides from her slightly overbearing big sister, but repents when she hears Big Sister crying. It’s the classic sister story.

I Like To Be Little. Originally titled I Want to Be Little, a child rejoices in the things she can do and enjoy because she’s still small.

Mr. Rabbit and the Lovely Present. This book won a Caldecott Honor for Maurice Sendak’s watercolor illustrations, but I love it for the story. According to Ms. Zolotow, Mr. Rabbit is inspired by Harvey, the six foot tall friend of Elwood P. Dowd. But Mr. Rabbit is so wonderfully helpful and at the same time a bit dense as he suggests the same sorts of impractical presents over and over.

Over and Over. A little girl experiences the year as a series of holidays and events and then learns that everything will happen over and over every year. “She remembered a snowman and a pumpkin, a Christmas tree and a birthday cake, a Thanksgiving dinner, and valentines. But they were all mixed up in her mind.”

Sleepy Book. The perfect bedtime story about how pigeons and bears and kittens and fish and finally children go to sleep, the children “warm under their blankets in their beds.”

Something Is Going to Happen. Unfortunately out of print, this book describes how a family wakes up with the feeling that “something is going to happen,” and they discover that it has snowed in the night.

The Storm Book. In this one, Ms. Zolotow writes about an impending summer storm instead of a snowfall, but the sense that something exciting is going to happen is palpable in this book as the children play outside and then watch the storm come and go.

Summer Is. A seasonal concept book that takes the reader through all four seasons with a poetic text full of tangible, memorable seasonal details. Also out of print, darn it.

The Summer Night.

William’s Doll. Here’s the story of how Willliam’s Doll came to be, and although it was somewhat controversial back in the 1970’s when it was published, William’s Doll has become a beloved picture book portrayal of how all children need to learn to nurture as well as build and throw a ball. In talking about WIlliam’s Doll, Ms. Zolotow says that she’s a feminist, but that the book wasn’t written to bolster feminist ideology. Well, I’m not a feminist, but I think William’s Doll is a fine story for boys and girls who want to play with the toys that give them joy whether they’re “boy toys” or “girl toys”.

Now it’s your turn. Please leave a link to your post celebrating Charlotte Zolotow’s birthday, her work, her influence as an editor, or anything else Zolotow-related. Ms. Zolotow’s daughter, author Crescent Dragonwagon has promised to stop by and read the posts to Ms. Zolotow who is vision-impaired, but still living in her home.

Crescent Dragonwagon: me & my semi-famous aging mother: navigating love with fierce persistence

The next Semicolon Author Celebration will be July 10th, a celebration of the life and work of John Calvin, an author of a very different stripe from Charlotte Zolotow. However, if you’re a fan of Mr. Calvin, a Calvinist, or a semi-Calvinist, think about writing something to link on that date.

Tennyson by Lesley M.M. Blume

Jun25

Strange things had happened at Innisfree before. In fact, strange was usually normal at Innisfree. But what had happened the night before was a new sort of strange. A frightening, unsettling sort of strange, the sort of strange that nags at you when you try not to think about it, flickers behind your eyelids when you try to go to bed at night and won’t let the sleep come.

Sadie hadn’t come home.”

The setting is the backwoods of Mississippi during the Great Depression, and Sadie is the wannabe poet and writer mother of our heroine, Tennyson. She disappears during a game of hide-and-seek, at dusk, when Tennyson, her little sister Hattie, and their father Emery come home but Sadie doesn’t. Emery is so besotted with his Sadie that he goes to look for her and leaves the girls at his childhood home, a decaying hulk of a Louisiana plantation home called Aigredoux. There the two girls make the acquaintance of their long estranged family members:

Aunt Henrietta Fontaine, a faded Southern matriarch who writes dozens of letters on thin blue paper to the U.S. government each week, asking them to return her family’s fortune, lost in the Civil War, so that Aigredoux can be restored to its former glory.

Uncle Twigs, the President of the Louisiana Society for the Strict Enforcement of the Proper Use of the English Language.

Zulma, the black servant, cook, and confidante, descendant of slaves, who stays at Aigredoux because “there’s more of my family’s bones buried out back than there are Fontaine bones. Aigredoux belongs just as much to me as it does to you–more so, maybe.”

While reading this hauntingly strange Southern novel, I felt as if Blume were channeling Faulkner—for children. Then again, I’ve never actually read Faulkner, so how would I know? The atmosphere of faded and rotting gentility built on a foundation of slavery and brutality was so strong and was just what I would imagine would be found in Faulkner’s novels. Aigredoux “pushed its way into Tennyson’s dreams and made her see funerals and spiders.”

I must say that I liked this novel, but I’m not sure children or even most teens would “get it.” It’s not very realistic, but then I’m not sure it’s meant to be. (SPOILERS) Tennyson dreams things that actually happened. Then, she writes stories that are accepted by a New York magazine and published to universal acclaim. No explanation is given for these events. No ghosts. No clairvoyance. No magic. No precocious genius. Zulma does call Tennyson a “voodoo girl.”

Still, there was certain something about the story that has me still thinking about it days after reading it. Tennyson might be for the poet and the dreamer and the quirky, individualistic wild child in all of us.

Other reviews:

The Reading Zone: In many ways, Tennyson reminded me of Natalie Babbittâ€™s Tuck Everlasting. Both books treat children as intelligent human beings by handling realistic situations and stories. Yet they both embrace the magical realism that is all too often missing in childrenâ€™s fiction.