Book of the Month - The Angel's Game

I’ve been absolutely dying to get my hands on Carols Ruiz Zafón’s latest oeuvre since the second I put down his last one, Shadow of the Wind. Zafón is a master storyteller, loved the world over. With brilliantly woven plots, vivid characterization, and finely crafted language, his works are destined to become classics.

The Angel’s Game is a gothic tale set in 1920s Barcelona. The main character David Martin, a young novelist, gets lured away from his pulp fiction career by a mysterious publisher who makes him an offer he can’t refuse. The commission is simple: David is to invent a religion and create a book for which “people will live and die”. Working out of a decrepit and poorly lit house bought with the proceeds of his Faustian bargain, he slowly unravels, becoming harder to penetrate and increasingly obsessed. He is also afraid – afraid of the man with the cat-slit eyes and angel pin to whom he in essence gives his soul.

This book has atmosphere, dark teetering on disturbing but not quite crossing that line. It is compelling. It is rich. It has turns of phrase that cry out to be copied into a notebook and preserved. One sips and savors this book and does not simply read it.

Book of the Month - The Book of Unholy Mischief

I am forever on the lookout for books like The Historian, Shadow of the Wind, and People of the Book. I love the mix of European history, books, and unfurling revelations. Finding read-alikes is a wonderful, though not straightforward thing. How do you recapture, let alone articulate, how a book made you feel? When I picked up The Book of Unholy Mischief, I got what I was looking for. It had all the right ingredients.

A historical novel set in Venice in the late fifteenth-century, this tale is about loyalty, corruption, growing up, food, secrets, and of course, power. The narrator is Luciano, a former street orphan who was taken in by a chef in a grand house. His voice is that of an experienced man looking back, and we follow him as he recounts how he sought love, forged his identity, and tried to unravel the mystery surrounding his master and an ancient book, about which all of Venice is abuzz. Throughout the novel we both recognize and applaud his cleverness and determination, but feel the strain as he makes (not always the right) choices. The book is imbued with the quest for immortality on many levels as well, not just of people but of secrets and knowledge, and their transmission from teacher to pupil through the ages.

Outliers

It doesn’t happen too often that I read the library’s copy of a book and then run and buy myself a copy, and then another to give as a gift. That, however, is exactly what I did after reading Malcom Gladwell’s latest opus, Outliers: The Story of Success. The author’s first major book, The Tipping Point, is still heavily discussed and it circulates regularly. This one is even better.

The book’s basic premise is that there is more than meets the eye as to why people are successful, coming down to such factors as date of birth, practice, and culture. The author examines a subject, gives you the basic outline of the facts, and then starts distilling it into its composite parts, getting to the heart of the matter. Every chapter highlights a different success factor, another angle in which to view the same issue.

True to his writing style, Gladwell makes everything absolutely fascinating and compelling. This is a great book for so many different kinds of people. It’s so universal in its appeal and promises to influence the way we see things. That’s a true sign of a successful book

Great YA Books for Adults

This past year, a lot of focus has been given to our Children’s Department, and staff (including me) has succumbed to the influence of our Children’s Coordinator and read a whole lot of kids’ books, moving far beyond the Harry Potter series. Some of them are just fabulous. I’m certainly hooked.

Adults in our library have already been discovering Markus Zusak’s The Book Thief. It’s incredible if you read it, but equally good in audio. It takes place in Germany during the Second World War, and it’s about this German girl whose family ends up hiding a Jew in their basement. It’s about her world, her neighbourhood, and most of all, friendship.

If you want an absolute page-turner, then take The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins. This author wrote the delightful Underland Chronicles series (again, AMAZING in audio), but this book is even better. Each district has to surrender a boy and a girl to the Hunger Games, where they compete to the death and are watched by cameras the whole time. Along with the population in the story, we follow the kids in District Twelve and root for their survival in these harrowing and often brutal games.

Another book I just read that I thoroughly enjoyed was Inkheart by Cornelia Funke. It’s got a fairy-tale quality, and Lynn Redgrave reads it splendidly, if you opt for an audio version. The third instalment of this book just came out, though I haven’t gotten to it yet. You do have to read them in order. In the first book, Meggie and her father Mo, a bookbinder by trade, are visited one night by an old ‘friend’ named Dustfinger, who comes to warn them about the imminent arrival of Capricorn, the very vilest of villains. They flee to Aunt Elinor’s house, which is filled to the brim with books. Capricorn and his crew succeed in finding Mo, and they want to make use of a special ‘gift’ he possesses. There’s adventure, enchantment, and lots of books in this wonderful tale.

Lastly, I have to mention the Twilight series, which has taken the world by storm since the release of the movie this fall. Definitely geared towards females, this series is part of an ever-growing genre called ‘paranormal romance’. Set in a small-town called Forks in Washington State, Bella is in love with Edward, a gorgeous vampire. He loves her, but he’s not the only one, as Jacob (werewolf) is in the picture too. Then there are those nasty vampires who come to town and cause trouble... This series is enjoyable and easy to read, if the subject matter appeals to you.

Book of the month -- Traffic

Commuting is one of those things we have to do. Everyone on the planet spends a certain amount of time on the move. Actually, according to Tom Vanderbilt in his new book Traffic: Why We Drive the Way We Do and What it Says about Us, we pretty much spend the same amount of time in transit, car or no car, in big cities or the tiniest African village, every day.

I hate driving and everything to do with traffic, but I picked up this book because we spend so much of our lives in it. That, and the snappy sparkly cover. Anyone who knows me can tell you I love trivia and random tidbits of information, and this book is full of interesting factoids. Vanderbilt covers a lot of territory, examining psychology, urban planning, and social behaviour. He explains what happens to us when we’re on the road and why react in the way that we do.

Traffic is very accessible and can be read in an afternoon. I picked it as the book of the month because it touches all our lives and is quite fascinating. You will never see driving the same way again.

Some Mystery with Your Coffee?

I’ve been on a role lately with my mystery reading of all sorts, but now I’m stuck on the Coffee House Mystery series by Cleo Coyle. The first book, entitled On What Grounds, lays the framework for the rest, featuring coffee-house-manager-come-amateur-detective Clare Cosi. She’s a forty-something divorcée, lured back from a suburban New Jersey life to work once again at The Village Blend, a Greenwich Village institution. The deal, cut by its owner “Madame,” is that she gets to live in Manhattan above the shop and get a stake in the business if she resumes managing it.

All is promising except for the fact she discovers that Madame, also her ex-mother-in-law, has permitted her son Matt, the coffee-house’s buyer/still charming ex-husband, to stay there for the ten days a month when he’s in town. Then there is the issue of those pesky murders that crop up each book…

The New York City setting is perfect for this series, and you wish you could be a regular when you read the books. I like Clare herself, who’s sharp and has high standards, but Madame’s character alone is worth reading the books for; she’s French, she’s classy, and she does what she wants. There’s a bit of romance, a bit of suspense, but mostly these are fast, enjoyable reads.

We don’t have all of the series just yet, though we have ordered the ones we’re missing. Start at the beginning, and by all means, have a cup of joe at your side when you curl up to these cozy mysteries.

Book 1 - On What Grounds
Book 2 – Through the Grinder
Book 3 – Latte Trouble
Book 4 – Murder Most Frothy
Book 5 – Decaffeinated Corpse
Book 6 – French Pressed
Book 7 – Espresso Shot

Get Healthy @ your library

I am on a new kick these days, and one that I hope not only sticks, but spreads to those around me. I’ve been cooking almost all my food, eating ten servings of fruits & veggies a day, and otherwise feeling great.

Part of this involves thumbing through cookbooks. Ok, that’s not quite accurate. It’s more like obsessively poring over recipes, devouring pages and really putting the instructions to the test. I like owing them, but I take them out of the library as a sort of quality preview. If I dread giving it back, then it’s a sign that perhaps it needs to be purchased, and this has been done with abandon of late.

All of this – all of it – began with a book. I read the Omnivore’s Dilemma by Michael Pollan and it affected me greatly. I got to thinking about what it is that I’ve been ingesting, and how processed our food is, and how much gas is used to get these fruits here from across the world. Then I started reading labels and noticed the chemical content of what we eat. It led to different choices, but also, to more books: The 100-Mile Diet, for example, and the more practical Cooking with Foods that Fight Cancer. We have so many titles that could fuel this fire.

This post isn’t just about food and eating though. It’s about many other things too. Informing yourself through reading. The ability of books to change lives. Acquiring skills through books (yes, that is how I learned how too cook). Using your library as a life tool.

If we help you help yourself, then we have done our job. Eat, read, love.

The State of Things

Earlier this week, we hosted a public libraries class that came for a tour and to hear about what we do here for our public and as professionals. Apart from the fact that they were really delightful, it hit me when we were talking that we really are a dynamic bunch.

I love this library. I love experimenting with new ideas and that we have the freedom to do so. I love trying to pull off really cool programs and watching people relish in the results. I love that our staff has some of their own and that they’re successful. I love that we keep adding new things and that our public is enthusiastic about it. I love that we work in the kind of city where even the City Manager has a book club. I love my management team, who really reinvented their respective departments to make them fabulous. I love that we have a volunteer program that allows residents to contribute to the betterment of the library. I love that we always look forward. I even love our new furniture.

I was toying with the idea of posting a year in review, recapping everything that happened in 2007, but somehow it didn’t feel right. Don’t get me wrong, I could go on and on about events like the one we had for Marie Antoinette, or our new AV Department. The truth is, I am always more excited about what is to come than what has been. In a library setting, resting on laurels means stagnation. We must always look ahead and strive for more.

Harry

A couple of hours ago, I finished Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. The weekend has been filled with bouts of concentrated reading interspersed only with sleeping and eating. I had to get through the book quickly; not only did I not want anyone revealing what happened before I got the chance to find out myself, but it seemed fitting, given that this whole last week has been namely about Harry.

On Saturday, we had our Harry Potter Extravaganza in the library and it was really great fun, for those organizing it as much as for the kids. It felt awesome to be partaking in what was a global phenomenon – celebrating the close of an amazing chapter in literary history. For every person who has been following these characters for the last decade, the end of the series is sad, but the closure necessary. We can now release our breath as we learn what happened to every figure we had come to love or loathe.

The thing about the Potter books is that they will endure. They are already classics, beloved by children and adults alike, and it’s not about sales figures (which are astronomical), or good reviews, or anything like that. It’s about magic, not the wand-driven variety, but the kind that you feel within you as you read these books. You get into that world and don’t want to leave. The characters are as wonderful as the settings; the friendships, as strong as the animosities. Every person finds within those pages a person with whom s/he identifies.

When I give people the Harry books for the first time, I am excited for them and the wonderful journey that lies ahead. Many newcomers to the series were up to this point too young to read the books; others hadn’t gotten around to it but meant to. In fifty years we will still be reading them, and probably in a hundred too.

As I closed the last book for the last time, I knew that I would visit these friends again someday. I have to.

Remembering

The way my intellectual curiosity is satisfied as an adult is the same as it was when I was a kid: I stumble upon a topic, leap head-on into it, find out all I can about it, and then move on to something else. Often enough though, subjects come back, even years later. For me, one of those is genocide.

I first grasped the concept in Hebrew school in grade 6, when we had a course on the Holocaust. It hadn’t touched my immediate family, who came here at the turn of the last century, so I discovered it through learning. Our teacher was a survivor herself, and she was brutally honest with us, not shielding us at all from the horror. That was the first time I understood that not everyone was good.

It came back again in my second year of university, when every course I took and every paper I wrote about concerned mass death, terror, and the very worst of humanity. Again I focused on the Holocaust, voraciously reading memoirs and histories. What struck me this time was the industrialization, the planning, the pseudo-scientific justifications, and worst of all, the actions of those who stood by but who knew what was going on.

In the last couple of years, I have turned to Rwanda. Dark as it is, I can’t stop reading about the massacre of Tutsis, how neighbour was able to kill neighbour face to face, how the entire world turned away and let it happen. It is that last question that has stuck on my mind. Hitler watched what happened to the Armenians in 1915 and took notes. It always seems to be “Never again. Again and again, and again.” I wonder why we never learn, and more importantly, what we can do as individuals to try to prevent it from happening yet another time.

Let us begin with education, and at the very least, remembering. The fact that this subject moves me intensely is one thing; we are also fortunate enough to be hosting Barbara Coloroso, who will discuss her new book Extraordinary Evil: A Brief History of Genocide. This author is famous for her books on bullying, and this one is just an extension of that. She argues that the extreme version of bullying is genocide, and the roles everyone plays in that act perfectly match schoolyard behaviour. You have your perpetrators, victims, cheering squad, bystanders and a tiny few who try to stop it.

It is important for this library to be a resource on this global topic, not just because we can count many in our membership who were touched personally by genocide. This is everyone’s concern, everyone’s problem, everyone’s tragedy.

Barbara Coloroso speaks at the Library at 7:30 p.m. on May 29th. Tickets are $3.00.

Reading with Your Ears

People always ask me how I find the time to read so much. Apart from the fact that it’s a priority in my life so I make the time, the fact is, audiobooks help a lot. I first discovered them a couple of years ago, and I’ve become a veritable junkie ever since. I can’t get into my car without the assurance that I have CDs to last me the way to work. Once you start with them, you really can’t do without them. Traffic becomes meaningless and stress-free. Empty time is filled with delicious words.

Besides the car, I listen to audiobooks on my walks, when I cook and clean, and when I’m in bed during bouts of insomnia. We have a great collection of them in the library, although a huge chunk of them are out at any given time because of their popularity. As a format, they’ve come a long way. We still have the cassette versions although we no longer buy them, and we are looking into the viability of the downloadable kind. Besides fiction and non-fiction, we also have these absolutely amazing audio courses which I recommend wholeheartedly.

One positive offshoot of audio addiction is that you discover new genres and authors. Often enough, you end up taking out books you normally wouldn’t because of availability and are happily surprised. Also, some of the actors are just fantastic, and make listening to the book a more delightful experience than reading it. The Harry Potters are a case in point: Jim Dale is so incredible I had to buy a set for the Adult side of the library. Even my Dad loves them!

I urge everyone to try just one audiobook and see what happens. You will never be the same.

Just for You

I always wonder, as a person but also as a library director, why people come to the library. You’d think it was a straightforward question but in fact it’s not. There are about as many ways to use a library as there are people. Some are in-and-out, get-their-books-and-go types; others take out nothing but sit comfortably all day and read newspapers. There are also, of course, those people for whom going to the library is a ritual and highly interactive event.

I try very hard to approach this library as a member of the public, but it’s really difficult to feel like a patron. That said, I am always and forever an awe-filled reader. Like many of you, I meander through the library looking for something to read. Not just anything, mind you, but the ‘right’ thing, which an entirely different story. We know that’s not always so easy to find, which is why we started a new service at the library that can help you. It’s called the “Reader Roadmap” and with it, your reading life will change forever.

Basically, you fill in the form at the Reference Desk that asks you a variety of short questions about your preferences (everything from your ideal book length to the types of characters you like). It has a few pages, but it doesn’t take too long. Within a couple of weeks, we’ll have prepared a tailor-made reading list just for you. You’ll know what to read next after that!

Fresh Eyes

Since February of last year when the renovations began, visitors to the library have probably noticed something new every time they come in: shelving in A/V, the study room, the new program brochures... I walk around the library constantly, and I’m always amazed and proud of how far it’s come in so relatively short a period.

When you work in a place for years, it becomes so familiar to you that you take the way things are for granted. The library has become so dynamic that now I see it with fresh eyes every day. I know what the plans are but when they actually manifest, it thrills me every single time. Yesterday, for example, we mounted in the Audiovisual lounge a piece of art we commissioned from Justin, who works at the circulation desk. It looks fantastic! Last week we launched our first ‘Friday night at the Movies’, a new program for film buffs. And of course, this blog is new too.

Creativity bubbles in this library and more than ever, you will see our staff playing a leading role in making it extraordinary.