Last Notable Commitee Meeting

I will be heading off to Boston soon to chair the meeting that will decide the Notable Books Council Award, a list of 25 very good, very readable, and at times very important fiction, nonfiction, and poetry books for the adult reader. This is a list that is used by librarians for collection development and by the public to discover quality new literature for the reading pleasure.

After four years of living and breathing this award (not to mention being buried in books) I will be attending my very last Notables committee meeting at the American Library Association Midwinter conference. While I am looking forward to more free time to read some light and frothy books, catch up on some movie watching, get in shape and spend more time with friends, I am also quite sad to see it end. It has been four years filled with discovering new authors, making new friends, talking nonstop about literature and finding that I do indeed know how to pick out extraordinary books.

I'm Back!!!

In the exhibit hall at ALA....AKA: Librarian Nirvana

I have to admit, I had a fabulous time at the American Library Association. Apart from stalking Cory Doctorow, I finished my to-be-read pile (leaving books scattered throughout the country), met with my committee, attended publisher events, went to interesting programs, met cool people like Vernor Vinge (I am currently reading Rainbows End) and drank a little too much good California wine. I did forgot my business cards so I didn't do a good job with the whole networking thing and blithely told Vernor Vinge that I would email him my contact info, never dreaming that a computer scientist/author wouldn't have an online fan email address.

Oh, and I gathered up approximately 40 pounds of books to drag home with me even though I have a basement full of books that has been growing and growing and growing....but really, who can resist an advance copy of the Neal Stephenson book, Anathem even if it does weigh 30 of the 40 pounds? FYI: If you are very nice to me, maybe I will let you borrow it before the rest of the world gets to read it.

Within thirty years, we will have the technological means to create superhuman intelligence. Shortly after, the human era will be ended. – Vinge, 1993

How I spent my non-Librarian time in Philadelphia - Reposted from my other Blog

This weekend I went to Philadelphia. Most of my time was spent in meeting with my book award committee but I thought I would entertain you with my touristy pictures. Most of them were taken on my phone at night but I got a couple good ones for ya.

No trip to Philadephia would be complete without a picture of the Liberty Bell. Apparently this is considered a very big terrorist target because there were security guards everywhere (at 11 at night) and when my friend stood on the wall I thought they were going to drag her away in chains.

This was the last stop after a wine and cheese reception at the Mutter Museum of College Physicians of Philadelphia. I loved this place.

The sign says "Why would you want a dried hand?"

If I remember right this was a "cutaway of the human body". Cool, huh? Sadly my syphilitic head and the wall of skulls would not download tonight but if asked nicely I might put them up in a future blog.

Interesting note: Before I went to the museum I was telling my book award committee members about my plans for the evening and three of them had gone the night before. They said that the museum had reminded them of me.

Notable Book Council meetings

All of the pictures from the Notable Book Council meetings came out really dark but this gives you an idea of where I spent three days straight, eight hours a day to debate, discuss and lobby for the best books of the year.

RUSA Announces 2007 Notable Books

Here are the books we picked for the book award.

The Notable Books Council of the Reference and User Services Association (RUSA), a division of ALA, has compiled its year 2007 list of outstanding books for the general reader. These titles have been selected for their significant contribution to the expansion of knowledge and for the pleasure they can provide to adult readers. This is "The List for America's Readers:"

Fiction
Bigsby, Christopher, Beautiful Dreamer, St. Martin's, $21.95.
Dean, Debra, Madonnas of Leningrad, Morrow, $23.95.
Desai, Kiran, The Inheritance of Loss, Grove, $24.
Doig, Ivan, The Whistling Season, Harcourt, $25.
Grenville, Kate, The Secret River, Canongate, $24.
Khadra, Yasmina, translated from the French by John Cullen, The Attack, Doubleday/Nan Talese, $18.95.
Lansens, Lori, The Girls. Little Brown, $23.95.
McCarthy, Cormac, The Road, Knopf, $24.
Meek, James, The People's Act of Love, Cannongate.
Mitchell, David, Black Swan Green, Random House, $23.95.
Murakami, Haruki, Blind Willow, Sleeping Woman, Knopf, $24.95.
Savage, Sam, Firmin: Adventures of a Metropolitan Lowlife, Coffee House Press, $14.95.

Nonfiction

Bechdel, Alison, Fun Home: A Family Tragicomic, Houghton Mifflin, $19.95.
Egan, Timothy, The Worst Hard Time: The Untold of Those Who Survived the Great American Dust Bowl, Houghton Mifflin, $28.
Flannery, Tim, The Weather Makers: How Man Is Changing the Climate and What It Means for Life on Earth, Grove/Atlantic, $24.
Greene, Melissa Fay, There Is No Me Without You: One Woman's Odyssey To Rescue Africa's Children, Bloomsburg, $25.95.
Hessler, Peter, Oracle Bones: A Journey Between China's Past and Present, HarperCollins, $26.95.
Horne, Jed, Breach of Faith: Hurricane Katrina and the Near Death of a Great American City, Random House, $25.95.
King, Ross, The Judgment of Paris: The Revolutionary Decade That Gave the World of Impressionism, Walker, $28.
Kohlberg, Elizabeth, Field Notes from a Catastrophe: Man, Nature, and Climate Change, Bloomsburg, $22.95.
Philbrick, Nathaniel, Mayflower: A Story of Courage Community, and War, Viking, $29.95.
Phillips, Julie, James Tiptree, Jr.: The Double Life of Alice B. Sheldon, St. Martin's, $27.95.
Zoellner, Tom, The Heartless Stone: A Journey Through the World of Diamonds, Deceit, and Desire, St. Martin's, $24.95.

Poetry

Flenniken, Kathleen, Famous, Univ of Nebraska Pr, $17.95.
Satterlee, Thom, Burning Wycliff, Texas Tech Univ Pr.
Slavitt, David R., William Henry Harrison and Other Poems. LSU Pr, $16.95.

This list will be available on the Notable Books Web page on the RUSA/ALA Web site (http://www.ala.org/rusa/notable.html).
Since 1944, the goal of the Notable Books Council has been to make available to the nation's readers a list of 25 very good, very readable, and at times very important fiction, nonfiction, and poetry books for the adult reader. The Council consists of members selected from the membership of RUSA /CODES (Collection Development and Evaluation Section). RUSA is a division of the American Library Association.