Carry On - by Rainbow Rowell

I've read a lot of reviews of books by Rainbow Rowell, but until now I had not read any of her books, so when I saw this one at a Little Free Library at a neighbor's house I picked it up. 

As I started to read it, I thought it was simply a Harry Potter clone (a story about an orphan who doesn't know he's a wizard, who goes to a school for magical folks) but I figured there was probably more to it than that and did a bit of research. I learned that this is in fact some metafiction on Rowell's part. She explains how she came to write the book in an author's note at the end of the book. She begins her note with the following information

If you've read my book Fangirl, you know Simon Snow began as a fictional character in that novel.

A fictional-fictional character. Kind of an amalgam and descendant of a hundred other fictional Chosen Ones.

In Fangirl, Simon is the hero of a series of children's adventure novels written by Gemma T. Leslie - and the subject of much fanfiction written by the main character, Cath.

Rowell goes on to say that while she was able to let go of Cath and her world, she could not let go of Simon Snow, so she wrote her own story about him. 

And so I read the story on its own terms.

When Simon Snow returns to Watford for his final year of school he discovers that his nemesis (and roommate) Baz is missing. Baz's mother was once the headmistress of Watford, but was killed when Baz was very young. The ghost of Baz's mother comes looking for him in his dorm room, but finds only Simon and so she leaves a message with him asking that Baz avenge her death. When Baz does return he and Simon make a truce in order to work together to find the killer (and the expected love story ensues). Meanwhile the entire magic world is fighting an enigmatic monster called the Humdrum who is creating "dead zones" across Great Britain where magic does not work. The Mage (current headmaster at Watford) is spearheading the fight by conducting warrant-less searches of wizard homes, raiding their personal libraries looking for information to find out who is working with the Humdrum. (Books are referred to as "treasures".) The Mage insists that those who have "nothing to hide" have nothing to worry about. Baz is worried because he knows that his family keeps "banned books and dark objects". The Mage banned some books (and words!) after Baz's mother died. Simon's friend Penny is likewise concerned about what the Mage and his goons might find at her family's house. Simon insists that her family wouldn't have anything, but Penny isn't sure.

You know my mum. 'Information wants to be free.' 'There's no such thing as a bad thought.' Our library is practically as big as Watford's and better stocked. If you wanted to find something dangerous there, I'm sure you could. 

Baz notices that the books in his mother's library are out of order. This is concerning because his mother always had them sorted by subject. Baz "was always allowed to touch her books...to read any book, as long as [he] put it back in its place and promised to ask in something confused or frightened him". Well, imagine that. Rather than censoring what he could read, Baz's mother "parented" him instead.  

In addition to their home libraries Simon and his classmates use the school library regularly. This despite that fact that "most of the magickal books have been removed from the Watford library. It is not okay, however, that Simon "snuck a few bound volumes  [of The Magickal Record - "the closest thing magicians have to a newspaper...out of the library", even if he does believe his reasons are valid. 

Daughter of Fortune - by Isabel Allende

My summer vacation was spent in Chile and Argentina this year. I watched a total eclipse of the sun in the Elqui Valley of Chile, and visited a number of wineries in both countries. Valpariso was not far from where we stayed in Chile, and is the location of much of the action in Allende's book. The story centers on Eliza Sommers, ward of siblings Jeremy and Rose Sommers. Eliza is an adventurer and thus the novel takes the reader not only to nineteenth century Chile, but also to China, and to California during the gold rush.

Libraries play a role in several character's lives. Jacob Todd "a charismatic redhead with the most beautiful preacher's voice" who traveled to Chile from England on a bet uses the archives of the British Museum to research the the land, and discovers that

in 1810 Chile opened its doors to immigrants, who had come by the hundreds...The English quickly made fortunes as merchants and ships' outfitters... 

Todd also spent some time in the Sommers' private library trying to find out more about the Patagonia Indians, but gave up after making a "a few half-hearted sweeps through some heavy tomes" when he discovered that "it made little matter what he knew or didn't know since ignorance of the subject was universal".

The library is also a place of sanctuary at different times for Eliza and Jeremy. It also served as a place for Eliza to meet her clandestine lover.

Tao Chi'en, a Chinese doctor made use of the library of his mentor to learn the "two hundred twenty-two love positions" as well as the "countless ways of pleasing a woman". Additionally, he learned the necessary medical knowledge to make herbal medicines, and perform surgery.

This is a wonderful novel with just a touch of Allende's signature Magic Realism.

Loves, Lies, and Hocus Pocus: Beginnings - by Lydia Sherrer

Gotta love a magical librarian.

Lily Singer only had a vague sense that she was different growing up in Alabama with her mother, step-father, and step-siblings. She knew little about her birth father and her mother was evasive about him. Feeling like an outsider, she left home as soon as she could and ultimately became a librarian landing a job in the Archives at the Agnes Scott College McCain Library. The description of her office was enough to make me question the verisimilitude of the story, although the College and library are indeed real places.

Her office was a spacious room on the first floor, with a high ceiling and expansive windows. Tall bookshelves covered most of the other three walls, and a large, mahogany desk dominated the center of the room...The desk's dark wood surface was polished to a shine...

Also hard to believe is that not only has twenty-five year old Lily landed the prestigious position of Administrative Coordinator/Archives Manager, she did so without ever earning an advanced degree. While she has "four-years undergraduate work-study in the stacks" as well as a "BA in history and a minor in classics", generally such a position in an academic library in the 21st century would require, at the very least, a Master's of Library and Information Science (MLIS) degree. In Lily's case it looks like nepotism of the wizarding sort played a large part in her procuring the position.

Of course, Lily's love of books, organized nature, and library experience weren't the only reasons behind Madam Barrington's choice. The real reason was she'd needed someone to to take over as curator of the "Basement"- a secret archive beneath the McCain Library containing a private collection of occult books on magic, wizardry, and arcane science. Being a wizard herself, Madam Barrington had recognized Lily's innate ability soon after she'd begun her freshman year. 

This book contains two stories (or "episodes"). In each we find Lily using both her wisdom and her wizardry to solve a magical problem.

Death Overdue-by Allison Brook

It's Mystery Month May and so, although I don't really like mystery novels, I read one. Of course I picked one about a librarian.

This is a rather light mystery about a young librarian, Carrie, who with the help of a friendly ghost, Evelyn Havens (former library employee, and aunt to Carrie's nemisis "prune-faced" Dorothy), solves the 15-year old murder of Laura (another library employee) in the fictional town of Clover Ridge, Connecticut.

Some interesting tidbits worthy of comment here (besides the fact that Evelyn "shushes" Carrie when she first meets her).

Dorothy is quite an unpleasant sort and furthermore had been envious of Laura back in the day "because all the patrons liked her and wanted her to help them". Evelyn had tried to explain to Dorothy that she should smile more and speak in a "pleasant manner" so that patrons would like her too. Dorothy's response had been that

her job was to answer questions and look up information. She wasn't paid to be an entertainer as well 

And here I must give some acknowledgement to Dorothy's point of view. The expectation that we smile, and that part of our work must involve getting people to like us is a burden demanded heavily upon women. Somehow I doubt that if Dorothy had been a man anyone would have made the same suggestion. In fact, I expect that the opposite would have been true. Her serious manner would have instead have been seen as a sign that she knew what she was talking about.

Meanwhile, Carrie endures a bit of "mansplaining" from police Lieutenant Mathers who suggests that she can find out more about Laura's murder from the newspaper articles online, which she can read at the library.

I think the best line though (and what obviously makes this fiction is) when Carrie is offered the job of head of programs and events and is informed that while the work is demanding "the salary's quite good" LOL.

Love Sugar Magic: A Dash of Trouble - by Anna Meriano

I found out about this brand new book from "A Mighty Girl" on my Facebook feed.When I read that it was about Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead), and celebrated Mexican, Texan, and American cultures, and had a lesson in the importance of being bilingual I knew I had to read it. What luck that it was sitting on a shelf waiting for me in the Children's Fiction section of the very library where I work.

Leonora Logroño (Leo) is the youngest of five sisters. Her family owns a bakery and as everyone is busy preparing for Leo's favorite holiday, Día de los Muertos, it seems that they are hiding something from her. Maybe she should learn some more Spanish so they wouldn't be able to talk without her understanding. Beyond language abilities, though, Leo is sure that there is something else that everyone in her family knows, and she doesn't. When she discovers that she comes from a family of brujas (witches) Leo decides help her friend Caroline by deciphering a spell using her rudimentary Spanish-language skills and her decidedly untested magic only to find herself getting deeper and deeper into magical trouble as she attempts to undo her botched sorcery.

Of course it wouldn't have a place on my blog if it didn't include at least a mention of those most magical of places - libraries. The first place we find them is with the famous "going to the library" excuse in order to sneak out to do something else. There is also a classroom library, used as a decoy destination so that a note could be passed. Leo and Caroline do like to read though, and Leo wonders, while looking at Caroline's bookshelf, if Caroline might "reopen her lending library" now that she has moved back to Rose Hill.

The novel does also give a bit of a shout out to information literacy when Brent (the unfortunate object of Leo's failed hocus pocus) asks Leo if her "methods" had been "tested and "peer reviewed". Although I had to wonder how many sixth graders would know about the peer review process I had to smile at the passage.

In addition to being an avid reader, my other passion is cooking, so I was especially happy to see that I would be able to make use of this book on my other blog "Una Nueva Receta Cada Semana". I am looking forward to making "Leo's Lucky Pigs" (aka "Piggies", or "Puerquitos"); and "Pan de Muerto Mensajero" (Bread of the Dead) and documenting my experiences later this year.

A book for lovers of Harry Potter, the Spanish language, and baking. Looks like I hit the jackpot!

I'll Take You There - by Wally Lamb

Film professor Felix runs a club that screens classic movies in an old vaudeville theater. It is there that he meets the ghost of movie director Lois Weber. Weber informs Felix that he is being given a special opportunity to watch movies featuring his younger self, and that he would also be able to enter and be part of the films. Episodes focus on the summer before he (Felix) begins first grade when he and his older sisters are excited about helping their former babysitter win the Miss Rheingold title; and the year his twelve-year old self watched as his sister Frances (aka Fran) developed anorexia and a family secret was revealed.

There wasn't much about libraries in this one, but it doesn't take much to make the cut on my blog. I was optimistic at first that there would be some good library stuff when I read that Felix's daughter's boyfriend, Jason, was a New York University Special Collections librarian, but he barely makes any appearance in the work beyond the first mention early in the story. The Miss Rheingold contest is brought up in several contexts in the book, and one is that of a lonely newlywed bride,Verna, ripping an entry form from a magazine she reads at the New London public library (she "looked over at the desk to make sure the librarian was busy" first).Verna also found solace at the library during her long solitary days as the wife of a Merchant Marine. And on a final note about libraries, Felix's daughter, Aliza, writes an open blog post to her mother, Kat, and in something I will dub Gen Y-splaining, reminds her mother that young women in the 1950s had few career options. These included "mother, teacher, nurse, secretary, librarian, fashion model". Furthermore she says Aunt Fran (who eventually became a denist) didn't want to be any of those things. She probably just didn't realize how fun being a librarian could be. I imagine she saw the job as just stamping out books.

The Library Window - by Margaret Oliphant

Reading is cyclical. I had barely just started reading The Meaning of the Library: A Cultural History, edited by Alice Crawford, when I found out about this story (mentioned on pg. xv of the Introduction) written in 1896. A library ghost story, this is a metaphor for all the mysteries in libraries, those solved as well as those yet to be discovered. Is there a false window in the Library, or is it a view into another world? The entire story is embedded below. A synopsis can be found here.