The Rhythm Of The Road by Albyn Leah Hall

This is one of those books that I am going to have to sit on for a while to decide if I want to nominate it or not. Superbly written and full of twists and turns, it is an engrossing and thought provoking novel.

This is a very British, very modern, edgy tale of a young woman trying to escape from the grim reality of her life, only to find that ultimately she cannot escape. Jo, the daughter of a trucker, becomes obsessed with a young singer and her band. When her father disappears, her obsession spirals out of control and she finds herself becoming more and more desperate. Eventually her desperation leads her to drugs and violence.

The New Job: An Update

I spent a very large part of today unpacking, answering email and tying up loose ends from my old job so I can't report on much about my new job except to say that everyone seems happy I am there. Toward the end of the day I got the worlds worst headache probably as a result of all the tension (and weather fluctuations). Apart from that it was a very good day. This morning my old job sent me another huge flower arrangement at work to celebrate. Then tonight I had the celebratory wine tasting event with some old friends and a couple of new ones. One friend may be scoring KU basketball tickets for Saturday so I may get to go. Woo Hoo!

Another friend and I call him our back up date. His girlfriend is on the east coast doing a medical rotation and he likes doing everything from wine tastings to concerts so she and I are always dragging him off to something or other. Next month he and I are off to the My Chemical Romance concert and he told me to send him my concert wish list and he would pick out some more to go to. Sadly he is thinking of taking a job on the East coast this summer for 2 years. Every time I find a good concert buddy they move to places like Switzerland and Philadelphia.

New Job

Today is my first day at my new job as branch manager. I thought I would post a picture so you will know where I spend most of my non-reading hours.

Favorite music of the year...

My top ten albums of 2006, plus one. Not always the most artistic that I listened to but these are the ones I played over and over. Of course, there were tons from other years but I will just stick with this year's list for now.

A.F.I. - Decemberunderground
Anna Nalick - Wreck Of The Day
Aqualung - Strange and Beautiful
The Black Keys - Chulahoma: The Songs Of Junior Kimbrough
The Format - Dog Problems
Goo Goo Dolls - Let Love In
Hoobastank - Every Man For Himself
Keb Mo - Suitcase
Snow Patrol - Eyes Open
Three Days Grace - One X
Train - For Me, It's You
My Chemical Romance - The Black Parade
Amos Lee - Supply and Demand

House of Meetings by Martin Amis

My, what a pretty, pretty book.

When I refer to House of Meetings as a pretty book I am not referring to the subject matter, plot or style of the book. I am instead referring to the lovely way that Martin Amis can string words together to make beautiful lyrical sentences, succinct and inventive turns of phrase and amazing descriptive passages.

Now on to the plot, which is one of the oldest, about two brothers and their love (or lust) of the same woman. Set in a Russian prison, both brothers are sent there, for being enemies of the state. Although their crimes are the same, each has a very different viewpoint about what it is to be human and how life is to be lived in an utterly bleak and unforgiving environment.

In the end, the plot loosens a bit too much for my taste and the ending is anticlimactic. If you love to wallow in language this is a book for you, if you read for a tightly plotted novel you may want to pass on this one.

The Start of the New Award Season

Here is my first list of suggestions for our final list for the Notable Book Award. As always, things will be added and drop off throughout the year. We should end up with approximately 25 books for the final list.

Abulhawa, Susan - Scar of David
Aciman, Andre - Call Me By Your Name
Allende, Isabel - Ines of My Soul
Amis, Martin - House of Meetings
Armstrong, Jon - Grey
Auster, Paul - Travels in the Scriptorium
Bass, Rick - Lives of Rocks
Begley, Louis - Matters of Honor
Benni, Stefano - Margherita Dolce Vita
Bock, Dennis - The Communist's Daughter
Bohjalian, Chris - The Double Bind
Chandra, Vikram - Sacred Games
Cheever, Susan - American Bloomsbury
Chen, Pauline - Final Exam
Clinch, John - Finn: a novel
Crane, Robert - Scott of the Antarctic
Crosby, Molly - American Plague
Cusk, Rachael - Arlington Park
Dietrich, William - Napoleon's Pyramids
Doyle, Roddy - Paula Spencer
Drake, Monica - Clown Girl
Drennan, William R. - Death in a Prairie House
Dyson, Freeman J. – The Scientist as Rebel
Ehrenreich, Barbara - Dancing in the Streets
Giovanni, Nikki - Acolytes
Glendinning, Victoria - Leonard Woolf: A Biography
Gregory, Jill - The Book of Names
Haig, Matt - The Dead Fathers Club
Hall, Akbyn - The Rhythm of the Road
Holmes, Rachel - African Queen
Igo, Sarah E. - The Averaged American
Kadare, Ismail - Agamemnon's Daughter
Kehlmann, Daniel - Measuring the World
Lear, Linda J. - Beatrix Potter: A Life in Nature
Lowenthal, Michael -Charity Girls
MacMillan, Margaret - Nixon and Mao
Mailer, Norman - Castle in the Forest
Manning, Sean - The Show I'll Never Forget
Margonelli, Lisa - Oil on the Brain: Adventures from the Pump to the Pipeline
Matar, Hisham - In the Country of Men
McCann, Colum - Zoli
Moore, Christopher - You Suck : A Love Story
Nadeau, Jean-Benoit - The Story of French
Norman, Michael - The Commission
Posner, Richard A - Little Book of Plagiarism
Raban, Johnathan - Surveillance
Schaap, Jeremy - Triumph
Shakfa, Elif - The Bastard of Istanbul
Shawn, Allen - Wish I Could Be There
Sheffield, Rob - Love is a Mix Tape
Smardz Frost, Karolyn - I've Got a Home in Glory Land : The True Story of Two Runaway Slaves Whose Flight to Freedom Changed History
Smiley, Jane - Ten Days In The Hills
Stewart, Amy - Flower Confidential: The Good, the Bad, and the Beautiful In the Business of Flowers
Stone, Robert - Prime Green
Tammet, Daniel - Born on a Blue Day: Inside the Extraordinary Mind of an Autistic Savant
Teltscher, Kate - The High Road to China
Teo, Hsu-Ming - Behind the Moon
Thomas, Michael - A Man Gone Down
Todd, Kim - Chrysalis: Maria Sibylla Merian and the Secrets of Metamorphosis
Toibin, Colm - - Mothers and Sons: Stories
Tomalin, Claire - Thomas Hardy
Tyson, Neil - Death by Black Hole
Vida, Vendela - Let the Northern Lights
Washington, Harriet - Medical Apartheid

Staff Day Assignment

As a staff day assignment I had to go create a Runescape account and play the game. I know you are wondering why this should be a staff mandated activity. Luckily I am here to tell you. It is because 1) it is a popular computer game, 2) the library has computers and therefore staff are called upon to help solve computer related issues such as how to find the game.

Sadly, I ended up doing this from home because I couldn't carve out enough time during the day to get it done. Anyway, I created my character (she is very purple) and proceeded to play the game. I lasted about 20 minutes or so. I don't tend to get addicted to games because once I get the general idea I get bored. I like the idea of role playing and world building, after all, on my myspace account I go by the title Princess of the Universe, but somehow it all takes to long. I want to have a game that I just think the commands and it happens. Then I could have some fun. I just can't make my fingers move as fast as my brain wants to go. Someday I am sure it will all be possible:)

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.

Firmin: Adventures of a Metropolitan Lowlife by Sam Savage

Savage, Sam, Firmin: Adventures of a Metropolitan Lowlife, Coffee House Press, $14.95.

Firmin is a story of a rat who lives in a bookstore, eats books (words) and understands the text of the stories he reads. When the bookstore is torn down to make way for urban renewal he goes in search of a new home.

Firmin is, at it's core, an outsider story about someone who never really fits into the world in which he finds himself.

I have a theory about helping people find books. I think all of us are ultimately searching for our story recreated and retold in many different ways, so my personal goal when I match people and books is to understand the story they identify with. The longer I know someone the better I get at finding just the right book.

A small novel, it is a bit different and will be something that a lot of people don't get. A few however, will really identify with with this story. It is also a book that a reader who want to challenge himself will really appreciate because it is so different.

2006 Reading...

The final count is in. From March 2006 - February 2007 I read 155 books for the Notable Reading Council. This doesn't not count my periodic rebellions into chick lit, romance, vampire chick-lit romance, etc...

This is actually a really low number for me. I think I will have to own up to the fact that there were a couple of slacker months for me. Check back next week when I will start my 2007 Award reading.

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.

Book Award Rules

I am down to reading final nominations and there is a policy about "revealing" those to the public (or more importantly publishers) before the award is announced so I will not be posting my reviews until after January 22nd. Check back then for updates and the announcement of the final list.

The Translator by Leila Aboulela

The story of (oddly enough) a translator:) This is about a Sudanese widow who has embraced her Islamic religion. She is living in Scotland when she start working as an Arabic translator for an Islamic scholar who is not a believer. After they fall in love she must decide what is stronger, her love or her faith. What this novel explores with great finesse is the true nature of faith. What it means to be faithful and what it means to give your life over to that. The language in this novel is a joy to read and the story is lovely. Highly enjoyable and different look at the Islamic faith.

The Lay Of The Land by Richard Ford

I hate it when I read a book and can appreciate the good points of it but not really be able to identify with the characters or lose myself in the book. Richard Ford is a technically gifted author with a huge following of appreciative readers but I have never been that enamoured of his writing. Perhaps it is because he so often explores "boomer angst" and I cannot really relate to it.

In this novel, realtor Frank Bascombe, previously appearing in Independence Day and The Sportswriter, finds that his wife has left him, his children's lives are in upheaval and he has been diagnosed with cancer. Sprinkled with quirky characters, this novel explores what it means to confront your own mortality and make peace with it. This was an exceptionally well-done novel that does have humorous moments and clearly shows the affection the main character feels for his friends and family. It also clearly shows the impact the last election had on large numbers of Americans

The Road by Cormic McCarthy

Oh my goodness. Last night I got home from a play at 11 or so and thought I would read for a little bit. I can safely say that I read one of my best books of the year.

The Road by Cormic McCarthy was stunning and completely different than anything he has ever written before. This is the story of a father and son who are traveling through a post-apocalyptic world in search of food, warmth, survival. The father hangs on to the last shreds of his morality because of the son's continued faith in their goodness. It is an amazing journey that explores the power of love in a world of no hope. One of the most profound reading experiences of my year.

Local Author

Joe Miller, the author of Cross-X: A Turbulent, Triumphant Season with an Inner-City Debate Squad, did a presentation about the book at my Rotary club this morning. I knew he was a local author but I guess I hadn’t realized that the school he is talking about was one I visited when I was a children's/ya librarian and that he is the same guy that has a blog that I read from time to time. Funny what a small world it is.

Tigers In Red Weather: A Quest For The Last Wild Tigers by Ruth Padel

Chronicling two years, eleven countries and countless dedicated guides, the quest to find and observe the wild tiger obsesses Ruth Padel in this poetic narrative. The simple descriptions illuminate the natural world and the obvious love that the author develops for tigers shines through. Personal narrative and private heartbreak are sprinkled throughout the text but at its heart is always the plight of the ancient tiger in a modern world.

House of War

House of War is the story of the Pentagon. The author, a self-described beatnik, is the son of a general who spent his career at the Pentagon. Noting ironically that the birth of the Pentagon matches exactly the birth of the Atomic bomb he takes through the years showing how each president has effect the nuclear arms race for good and bad. He also make a point of highlighting Gorbachev's key role in ending the cold war and starting the disarmament process. Despite years of trying implement reductions each president has made it worse, so by accident, others by design. In the authors opinion George W Bush is singlehandedly responsible for the return of the nuclear arms threat and has significantly increased the possibility of a nuclear warhead being used against the United States.

This is one big, scary book that has me anxiously waiting for a new president to undo the damage that the current administration has unleashed.

Rough Crossings: Britain, the Slaves and the American Revolution by Simon Schama

Very readable nonfiction account of a little known migration that resulted in runaway slaves siding with England during the American Revolution and their struggle to become free. The promised land is Sierra Leone and the unlikely moses was Thomas Clarkson, an undistinguished second son. After getting to know some of the slaves who had risked their lives to fight with the British army, Thomas became a relentless advocate for and leader of over 1,000 ex-slaves.

Sadly, the dream of abolitionists and Thomas Clarkson of a free black self-governing colony in Sierra Leone did not come to pass but the tale is still riveting and the historical figures are well drawn.

There Is No Me Without You: One Woman's Odyssey To Rescue Africa's Children by Melissa Fay Greene

This is the book that is causing me to rethink my life and try to decide if I am living a meaningful life. Am I doing enough good or should I sell my possessions, move to Africa or India and dedicate my life to something more useful than having a socially conscious job and owning a home.

Haregewoin Teferra was a middle class woman in Ethiopia, a professional woman with an husband who was a teacher and two beautiful and beloved daughters. After her husband passes away she raises her daughters to adulthood. After one of her daughters contracts AIDS and dies, Haregewoin goes into mourning, believing her life is over. Her priest comes to her with a baby that has been orphaned by AIDS and starts her on a journey that transforms her life. She now runs an orphanage that is inundated with the children of the AIDS epidemic.

This is a appalling story of the utter waste of human life that the world has let continue long after successful treatments had been discovered to slow the disease and even reverse it in infants. It is also heartbreaking how painful death is for the millions of adults and children that have contracted the disease. The numbers of dead or dying are almost incomprehensible but threaded through it all is the reality that one person can make a difference.

This is a compelling story where facts are interspersed with personal stories of children that are alive, well and even in some cases, thriving because someone dared to ignore the stigma of AIDS to give these children a home and a chance. Better yet, it is also well researched and well written.