Mrs. Fletcher - by Tom Perrotta

Divorced Eve Fletcher is getting ready to send her only son, Brendan, to college. In this case the college is the fictitious Berkshire State University in Massachusetts (aka BSU - the shortened version of  the non-fictitious Bridgewater State University in Massachusetts, where I work). This novel alternates between a third-person narration of Eve's life and a first-person narration of Brendan's.

Brendan meets Amber while trying to study at the University library. She comes to the library along with a group of students who are protesting the Michael Brown shooting (Ferguson, Missouri). For Amber Brendan is a "bouquet of red flags" but the two do share the fact that they each have an autistic sibling in common. This, however, is not enough to sustain a relationship. And despite the fact that he occasionally goes to the library to study, Brendan doesn't do well in college, and drops out by Thanksgiving.

Eve, meanwhile has been attending classes at the local community college. She enjoys her class in gender studies and interacting with her classmates, but in the spring when Brendan decides to enroll in classes there she gives this up so as to "spare him the embarrassment of attending the same college as his mother, of possibly bumping into her at the library..."

Something else Eve explores when she becomes an empty-nester is her own sexuality. One way she does is through a three way involving one of her much younger classmates (Julian) and one of her employees (Amanda). Not surprisingly Amanda leaves her job at the Senior Center shortly thereafter in order to take a job at the Public Library as Director of Children's Events "in charge of story time, arts and crafts, author visits, holiday celebrations...Kind of like here (the senior center) just with kids instead of old people." It is at the library that Amanda finds her soul mate "an excommunicated Mormon research librarian named Betsy".

This is good satire. Looking forward to watching the HBO series.

Life, Animated: A Story of Sidekicks, Heroes, and Autism - by Ron Suskind

This is the book Bridgewater's One Book One Community steering committee chose for our spring 2016 read. We considered several different books about autism, but ultimately chose Suskind's memoir about his autistic son's love for Disney animated films. I wasn't completely thrilled about the choice, as I get weary of the ubiquitousness of all things Disney, however, once we choose a book I get behind it, and so I read this one, and I have to say I am glad we picked it.

This is the story of Owen, and his family, and how they were initially able to connect with each other watching, and acting out scenes from Disney films together. Ultimately the family discovered that Owen related deeply to the stories and the characters, which allowed him to also start relating to other people. Suskind contextualizes the Disney stuff well, and he is a brilliant storyteller. This is also simply a remarkable story.

Libraries play a rather small role in this work. Twice they are mentioned in passing as part of a longer list of things one expects to find in a school building, along with classrooms, gymnasiums, and the principal's office. However, the DC Public Library is the site of an "incident" complete with a "sotto voce..., bespectacled" librarian who isn't sure what to make of the young boy acting out a scene from the 1994 film The Pagemaster by parting the books and wedging "nearly his whole body in the dark space between the bookcases". Even if I hadn't otherwise enjoyed the book, that scene was worth reading it for. I've added The Pagemaster to my Netflix list. Watch for a review of it soon.

I don't think anyone on our committee knew that a documentary of Owen's story was being made when we selected the book, but I found out it recently opened at the Sundance Film Festival. Another movie I'm looking forward to watching.