Another author visit this week....

Author Visit with Rebecca Stead

 

 
We had a lovely time at the Valley Ranch (Irving) Public Library with Newbery Award winning author, Rebecca Stead.  Rebecca read from WHEN YOU REACH ME (Newbery winner) and her most recent work, LIAR & SPY.

We had a great crowd (about 85) and Rebecca was delighted that most were young people who had read her books. So often, she explained, her library events are attended by teachers, librarians and future writers, so it was a treat to be able to discuss her books with readers who brought along their dog-eared, highlighted and annotated copies.  There were some well read tomes present that now include another line of text...Rebecca's signature.

Refreshment table.
















Custom water bottles and bundtinis with cover art work.

Custom cookies based on two key elements of WHEN YOU REACH ME

Backdrop based on the cover art of WHEN YOU REACH ME

















Rebecca speaking

The crowd

Rebecca with kids
































Me and Rebecca

I like this one because we are laughing...and you can't see my face...(ha)

"No flash photography please....!"

I learned it by watching YOU!

Recently I had a conversation with my son about reading.

As a librarian and avid reader I always tell my patrons, and friends, and children, that if a book doesn't grab you in the first couple chapters (say 50 pages) it probably isn't the book for you.  Not to worry...there are plenty more and life is too short to read a book that isn't right for you.

This theory was tested this summer when my son Owen, entering 11th grade, had to read IN COLD BLOOD by Truman Capote.

Now, I understand the importance of this book and appreciate the ground broken by Mr. Capote.  I also think the movie adaptations of his research fascinating.

But.

I don't like the book.

There, I said it.

Here is a case where the movie depiction is better than the book. IN MY OPINION.

Again, I can appreciate the build up and the pains taken to paint the close knit rural community.  I understand the shift in narrator.  I really do appreciate this as the birth of a genre.

But.

I still don't like it.

The overly descriptive, overly long set up drove me bat shit crazy.

I am a fan of voice and I appreciate good pacing, so it is easy to see how Capote's treatment of each of these elements jarred with my personal reading preferences.

So...back to Owen.

Me:  "Owen you have to read this book for summer.  It is a ground-breaking book that birthed a whole genre!" 
Owen: "I hate being assigned books to read."
Me: "I understand, but you are a good reader.  You can knock this out in a week."

Three days later
Me: "How's the book coming."
Owen: "Holy crap, what is this book even about?  I don't understand.  Nothing is happening."
Me: "Well, Capote uses this literary style to make a point and allow the reader to view things differently. It also is unique in that you have sympathy for the killers."
Owen: "What killers?  I haven't even gotten to that part yet."
Me: "Be patient."

Three days later
Me: "So, do you like the book any better?"
Owen: "I stopped reading it.  I don't like it and don't want to finish it."
Me: "Owen, you HAVE to finish it."
Owen: "Actually, I don't.  You always tell us that we have to read a book for the first 50 pages and if it doesn't work for me, I can put it down.

"I LEARNED THIS FROM YOU MOM. I LEARNED THIS BY WATCHING YOU."

No one ever tells you how hard parenting can be.  There is a constant war within your head.  There is the correct reply to this arguement and then there is the right reply.

The correct reply had me parceling out pages for him to read by certain dates. Not continuous pages, but samplings of chapters.

The right reply had me agreeing with him that I too thought the book kinda sucked and then purchasing SPARKNOTES.

In addition to IN COLD BLOOD he also had to read another recent nonfiction title. He read FREAKONOMICS, which he finished in two days and then asked me for more books like it.

He got a C on his back to school quiz on IN COLD BLOOD.

______________________________________________________________________

For your viewing pleasure...other cases where kids learn "bad" habits from their parents:


Do you remember this?





And then there was this...of which I am totally guilty.

Fake it til I make it 2

More droopy feelings in a post today. 

I read this piece from the Washington Post this am and it set me off. 

Most significant:

But with due respect to my son’s feelings, I have the worse of it. I know something he doesn’t — not quite a secret, but incomprehensible to the young. He is experiencing the adjustments that come with beginnings. His life is starting for real. I have begun the long letting go. Put another way: He has a wonderful future in which my part naturally diminishes. I have no possible future that is better without him close. 

There's the rub. 

Fake It 'til I make it....

Day 1.

There is no getting around it. I am depressed. I have been depressed before and it seems to me that it takes a couple of different forms.

Classic depression: I have been the kind of depressed where you don’t want to go out of the house, or get dressed or sometimes even bathed, depressed.

Postpartum depression: Why wasn’t life like the Pampers Commercial depressed? And by the way…who knew your nipples could ever look like this depressed.

Anxious and Depressed: I have also had times in my life when I experienced panic attacks so serious when leaving the house that I couldn’t go to the grocery store and my hair started falling out.

Surgically Depressed: A few years ago I had a surgery that threw my body through a loop. Everything went well, but for the longest time afterwards I felt disconnected from life and had trouble focusing.

Postpartum (but not really) depression: Finally last year after finishing a degree that ruled my life for six years, I was left wondering “is that is?”

Now, my second child has moved out of the house and into the dorm. I feel like crying.

Don’t get me wrong: he is doing well. I am so happy that he has navigated the social structure of school, met some friends, and likes his classes and professors. He is chomping at the bit and wants to be on dean’s list even though he knows it is going to mean working hard.

I am so proud.

Yet I can’t stop crying.

And here is the thing, and maybe people have said this before, but I haven’t read it (maybe I read it and didn’t’ believe it) : It isn’t that I miss my baby and want him home, although I do miss him and I look forward to seeing him in a couple of weeks.

I think it’s that part of my life is coming to a close and there are no do-overs.

I will never get back the elementary years, or the middle school years.

I never took them to Disney or the Grand Canyon.

Oh sure. I can still do that.

But they will never believe in Santa again.

And they are happy and healthy and navigating the waters of young adulthood just fine; so I guess we must have done something right. Right?

I just am a little bit mournful over moments lost; a little guilty over things not done, or not done well enough to my thinking; and for facing a reality of the next stage of life.

Thank god there is Owen. He will get our undivided attention for the next two years.

I am sure he will thank his brother and sister for leaving him home. Alone. With us.

BioShock

I did some figures for work the other day. 

We are tyring to justify the need for additional staff and in order to do so took a look at a comparable library close by. 

We looked at how many storytimes and events they did each month, and what their attendance was, and divided it over the number of employees they had to put things into perspective.

Their numbers were sort of comparable. The big difference was the staffing.  They have 2.5 FTEs (Full time equivalents) and we have me.

Boiled down the numbers look like this.

Their employees serve 219 kids a month.  That is they "see" that many individuals in storytime or programming a month.

Me: 769

Yes, you read that number correctly.

I think this goes a long way towards explaining why I seem to be getting sick so often.  1) I am tired and 2) I am exposed to many, many people (and runny noses).

I have an apt with my primary care physician on Monday (the soonest I can get it).

I think I have an ear infection.

TLA and Phantom Limb Pain....

Are you tired of hearing about TLA yet? 

I guess I really didn't say all that much about it, and I still have to post the photos I took of my panels.

But I wanted to discuss something else today. 

Why every morning at 2:30 I bolt upright in bed thinking: Oh My GOD!  I forgot to....."fill in the blank!"

Every morning since TLA.

I know this has been on my mind for some time and it will take me a while to "get over it."

Can you have post traumatic stress syndrome over a life event?