Draft: The Prayer of an Unconventional Family

This essay from Anne Lamott brought tears to my eyes.

Testimony - by Anita Shreve

First, a word to the wise: People who send their kids to New England boarding schools should probably not read novels about New England boarding schools. This is especially true if the novel is about a sex scandal. Just saying.

When Mike Bordwin, Headmaster of Avery Academy in Vermont, is presented with a videotape showing  three members of the school's Varsity basketball team, and one freshman girl having sex, he acts swiftly to keep the tape from going public, in the hopes of handling the situation "internally". His plan falls apart when the girl's parents call the police. Testimony, tells the story of what happened before and after the making of the videotape, and the resulting loss of life, derailed careers, and ruined marriages.  Told from a variety of viewpoints; including those in the tape, their parents, friends, as well as other other members of the school and local communities, some players, like Mike Bordwin, appear again, and again; others, like Daryl a townie who supplied the students with alcohol, only get a chapter or two. One character who we only learn about through others is the basketball coach, who, not surprisingly, is fired after the tape becomes public. Not because he had anything to do with it, but rather because in situations like these, there must be a scapegoat. The story did leave me wondering, once again, why institutions (schools and churches particularly) think they can (or should) handle these crimes on their own.

Libraries are scattered in several places throughout this work - as part of a pastiche making up the town, or school, or as places inside of homes. The most significant role a library plays, however, is as a workplace for Rob Leicht, one of the basketball players seen in the tape. After his expulsion, and loss of scholarship at Brown University, he moves with his mother to a town near Boston, where he gets a part-time job in the library. This is not really seen as any kind of salvation, just a place where he works, and can get books to read in his "generous spare time". It is all portrayed as a bit sad, actually.

Although there is some reflection, there is little in the way of redemption here. It is more a story of people trying to put their broken lives back together with pieces that no longer fit.

50 Jobs in 50 States: One Man's Journey of Discovery Across America - by Daniel Seddiqui

Three years ago, when I was working on my "year of reading year of books" blog, I learned about Daniel Seddiqui's project to work for one week in each of the 50 states over the course of a year. He tried to select a job that was representative of the culture and/or economy of the state (e.g auto mechanic in Michigan; lobsterman in Maine; cheesemaker in Wisconsin). I was looking forward to reading his book, as it also fit in with my (then) upcoming year of Celebrating the States. My Geographer husband and I planned on reading this together when we picked it up at a bookstore in the summer of 2011. A few weeks later, but before we had a chance to start reading the book, we had the wonderful opportunity to host Shay Kelly of Project 50/50 at our home. After losing her job, Shay decided to travel to all 50 states over the course of a year and do a volunteer project in each one.  We asked her if she knew about Seddiqui's project. She told us that she had heard of him because he had contacted her to let her know that she "stole his idea". Hmmm, well this put us off of Seddiqui a bit, nevertheless, James and I started to read the book in January of this year. We finally finished it about a month ago. It took us so long because, frankly, we didn't like it much, and could only read small bits at a time. We would often set it aside for weeks before coming back to it, finally picking it up with a sigh that we should "probably finish it". We kept waiting for it to get better, but it read as if the raw writing from his diary or blog were published with few revisions.  It was poorly edited, rife with awkward sentences and grammatical errors, and had little in the way of the reflection I expect to see in a memoir, but much in the way of complaining when work was hard, or hours were long, or a job in the desired industry didn't pan out. Of course I was not only disappointed that he never considered library work, but also that with all the research he did (and I will say that he did an admirable job of finding appropriate work) he never even mentioned going to a library to do any of it. There is only one library mentioned at all - working in Arkansas as an archaeologist, he reluctantly turns over a horseshoe he finds to the artifact library.

Beauty Queens - by Libba Bray

In Beauty Queens Libba Bray  takes a line that was fed to her by her editor: "a plane full of beauty queens crashes on a deserted island..." and runs with it. With most of the pageant contestants dead, along with the the plane crew, and chaperones,  the 14 girls who are left create their own story that is part "Lost", part Lord of the Flies, and part Pirates of Penzance, with just a trace of "Harry Potter" thrown in. Bray deftly develops the characters from girls who appear to be one-dimensional clones created by the Teen Dream Pageant into strong young women with dreams, intelligence, and chutzpah, who not only figure out a way to get food and fresh water,  they vanquish their foe, the evil Corporation, which creates all the nasty products, and television shows that our teen heroines thought they are supposed to love.

There were apparently no libraries on what turned out to be a not-so-deserted island, but Bray finds three places to include them in her work. Mary Lou (a.k.a. Miss Nebraska) remembers planning to become a pirate queen with her sister Annie. Mary Lou and Annie give themselves tattoos with a blue sharpie with Mary Lou choosing "an ancient Celtic design she'd seen in a book from the library." Annie, agreeing that becoming pirate queens is a "very good plan," suggests ideas for their adventures by reading "from a copy of On the Road she'd checked out of a library." My favorite library part though, is the last one, which comes very near the end of the book. An angry crowd is shouting down the evil Ladybird Hope: "A bonfire billowed up. Some of the crowd tossed copies of Labybird's book into the fire while a librarian pleaded with them not to do that and grabbed a fire extinguisher." Bray includes a footnote to this that reads: "Really, being a librarian is a much more dangerous job than you realize."  Readers of this blog know that if there is one thing I really can't stand it is censorship - even censorship of bad ideas from evil people. Libba, my friend, you just made yourself an official fan. Now I suppose I will have to read all your books. I've got a good start with Beauty Queens, and Going Bovine. Four more to go. 

The Distance Between Us - by Reyna Grande

As in Jeanette Winterson's Why be Happy when You Could be Normal the author of this memoir finds salvation from her dysfunctional family in books, reading, and, the library.

Reyna Grande was born in the town of Iguala, Mexico. She and her siblings are left in the care of her paternal grandmother when her parents cross the border to make their way on "el Otro Lado". Fascinated by stories that there is no poverty in the United States, and mistreated by her grandmother, Reyna longs to be reunited with her parents. When her mother finally returns it is with the news that the children's father has a new wife on "el Otro Lado" and they will be staying in Iguala. Years later, her father returns and illegally crosses the border with three of his four children, including Reyna. While she recognizes the one-bedroom apartment she now shares with her father, stepmother, brother and sister is the nicest place she has ever lived, and appreciates the educational opportunities she receives at her new school, she is at the same time disillusioned by life with her abusive, alcoholic father, whom she did not know at all before the crossing. Painfully shy, and embarrassed by her heavy accent, Reyna discovers solace in reading.

Over the last year, I had become addicted to reading, in part because I was not good at making friends. I shied away from kids because there was always something for which they could make fun of me: my ridiculous name, my height, my Payless tennis shoes, my thick accent, the unfashionable clothes I would wear...

Every Friday before heading home, I would stop at Arroyo Seco Library for books. The maximum I was allowed to borrow was ten, and I would read them all during the week.

As a young girl Reyna is drawn to the Sweet Valley High series, and V.C. Andrews books, but as a college student her mentor exposes her to Latino literature for the first time, and also gives her the first book she can keep, and Reyna realizes that she may also have what it takes to become a writer.

This is a wonderfully written, painfully honest, and inspirational book.

Nice Girls Don't Have Fangs - by Molly Harper

I am fascinated by vampire legends, lore and stories. I have visited Dracula's boyhood home in Transylvania, and have taken the vampire tour of New Orleans. I am a bit embarrassed to admit how much I like Stephenie Meyer's Twilight series of vampire books. I read all four of them in less than a month, and while I will say that I thought the fourth one left a bit to be desired, overall, I really enjoyed reading them. I found them thrilling and sexy. I also watch a lot of vampire movies, my favorite is Transylvania Twist, not because it is is an exceptionally great movie, in fact, it is pretty goofy, but because it features both vampires, and librarians. For this same reason, I couldn't resist reading Harper's romance/fantasy about a vampire librarian. In the world created for this series the dead and undead co-exist in the land of Half-Moon Hollow, Kentucky. Our protagonist, Jane, is a newly "turned" vampire, and unemployed children's librarian who shares the family home with the ghost of her great aunt Jettie. This work did not pique my interest as much as I expected it to. While the consummation of Jane and Gillbert's relationship only took place after several frustrating encounters, the sexual tension wasn't built up in a way that made me care one way or the other if sex ever happened. And, while this was not the first book I read to feature sex in the library, it is the first that made it out to be so unsatisfying.

Dave Chandler left me on the ninth floor of our university's research library without my panties after we lost our virginity together. He never called me again and actually turned on his heel  and walked in the opposite direction whenever he saw me on campus...Dave and I were both student library workers...It turned out that while the Russian folklore section offered plenty of privacy...the shelves left really weird bruises on your back.

I also grew weary of the one-dimensional characters - the obnoxious sister; the overbearing mother; the nasty supervisor librarian, among others.

It was a quick read, and I believe it may have been the first book I blogged about here to actually mention Banned Books Week (which coincidently was when I read it), and while I did not dislike it, I did not find it engaging enough to read the rest of the series.

Bill Moyers for Banned Books Week

Tell it like it is Bill!