Make America Read Again

Finishing a very important book while train-ing around Europe this summer, Photo credit: Jerry Oswalt III

Many people assume that because I am a librarian all I do is read all day every day. I wish. I won't go into all the roles a school librarian plays, especially a solo one exhaustively advocating for staff, but let's just say between all that, after school meetings (which, for some reason, this year seem to be in excess), supervising sports to try and subsidize my salary, and commuting over two hours a day (over 10 hours a week), there is not much awake time to read. Most of my "reading," at least during the school year, occurs through absorbing audiobooks on my commutes and keeping volumes of poetry in my bag to peruse whenever I have free minutes in Costco lines or Jiffy Lube waiting rooms. 

Imagine my disappointment when I contracted some pneumonia-like virus five days before winter break--a.k.a. Prime Reading Time--and I am STILL sick while writing this 2 days before returning to work. Jonathan Safran Foer's new novel, Here I Am, has been taunting me from the nightstand for months as my reward for making it through another semester, and I haven't even opened it (insert immense sad face) despite having saved it specifically for this luxuriously long break. I did make it halfway through Boy Erased by Garrard Conley, though, and he's coming to speak at Writers Week in February, so that's awesome.

Besides Here I Am, a few other titles high on my list to kick off 2017 include: Hold Still by Sally Mann, The Bad-Ass Librarians of Timbuktu by Joshua Hammer, The Dylanologists by David Kinney, and Night Sky With Exit Wounds by Ocean Vuong (another one I started and thought for sure, especially being poetry, I would have finished before the year's end).

Notable titles from 2016

Two books I had intended to read for years and unsurprisingly loved both of them: Devil in the White City and The Poisonwood Bible.

Two books I thought I wouldn't like but read (well, listened to) anyway and both, surprisingly, became favorites: The Goldfinch and Station Eleven

Two books that helped me better understand our country and its faults: Between the World and Me (racism, slavery, Black Lives Matter) and Most Dangerous (Vietnam War)

Favorite YA novels of 2016: Holding Up the Universe by Jennifer Niven and All American Boys by Jason Reynolds

Without further ado, below is the full list of 55 books I read in 2016, including two I re-read (Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close and Dylan's memoir, Chronicles). This also includes The Raven King, the last book in Maggie Stiefvater's The Raven Cycle series, even though the audiobook deleted itself off my phone while I was on a cruise ship in August, and I have yet to actually finish the last quarter of it in print format.

Last year, I kept intending on sharing my list of 2015 books but never quite got around to it, so that list of 58 is included below as well. Bolded titles in both lists are linked to Goodreads reviews or, in the case of Half a Life, I'll Give You the Sun, and Unorthodox, to previous blog posts. Stay tuned for a post inspired by Falling that I started over the summer but for various reasons delayed finishing until this week.

Self-Portrait, July 4th

2016 Books in order of date finished

1) Perfect Example by John Porcellino (graphic novel) - 2 stars 2) Under the Banner of Heaven by Jon Krakauer (audiobook, non-fiction) - 3 stars 3) Echo by Pam Ryan Muñoz (YA fiction, audiobook) - 5 stars 4) The Wild Truth by Carine McCandless (memoir, audiobook) - 4 stars 5) The Reason I Jump by Naoki Higashida (non-fiction) - 3 stars 6) H is for Hawk by Helen Macdonald (memoir, audiobook) - 3 stars 7) Devil in the White City by Erik Larson (non-fiction, mostly audiobook) - 5 stars 8) Nothing by Janne Teller (YA fiction) - 3 stars 9) The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver (fiction, audiobook) - 5 stars 10) My Friend Dahmer by Derf Backderf (graphic novel) - 4 stars 11) Challenger Deep by Neal Shusterman (YA fiction, audiobook) - 2 stars 12) Bone Gap by Laura Ruby (YA fiction, audiobook) - 3 stars 13) Furiously Happy by Jenny Lawson (memoir, audiobook) - 3 stars 14) 100 Sideways Miles by Andrew Smith (YA fiction, audiobook) - 4 stars 15) Half a Life by Darin Strauss (memoir) - 4 stars 16) Freedom by Jonathan Franzen (audiobook, fiction) - 3 stars 17) The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway (fiction) - 2 stars 18) The Martian by Andy Weir (fiction, audiobook) - 4 stars 19) The Poet Slave of Cuba by Margarita Engle (poetry) - 3 stars 20) Rude Cakes by Rowboat Watkins (picture book) - 4 stars 21) Dragons Love Tacos by Adam Rubin (picture book) - 4 stars 22) All American Boys by Jason Reynolds (YA, audiobook) - 4 stars 23) My Salinger Year by Joanna Rakoff (memoir) - 3 stars 24) First They Killed My Father by Luong Ung (memoir) - 4 stars 25) Falling by Elisha Cooper (memoir) - 5 stars 26) Salt to the Sea by Ruta Sepetys (YA historical fiction, audiobook) - 4 stars 27) Red Queen by Victoria Aveyard (fiction, audiobook) - 3 stars 28) Nightbird by Alice Hoffman (YA/children’s fiction) - 3 stars 29) Most Dangerous: Daniel Ellsberg and the Secret History of the Vietnam War by Steve Sheinkin (Non-Fiction, audiobook) - 5 stars 30) The Interestings by Meg Wolitzer (fiction, audiobook) - 3 stars 31) Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates (non-fiction) - 5 stars 32) The Raven King by Maggie Stiefvater (fiction, audiobook) - 33) Harry Potter and the Cursed Child by JK Rowling (fiction, play) - 3 stars 34) Bastards by Mary Anna King (memior) - 3 stars 35) The Cuckoo’s Calling by Robert Galbraith (fiction, audiobook) - 4 stars 36) Ghosts by Reina Telgemeier (graphic novel) - 4 stars 37) The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt (fiction, audiobook) - 5 stars 38) Grave Mercy by Robyn Lefevers (YA fiction, audiobook) - 2 stars 39) (re-read) Chronicles V 1 by Bob Dylan (memoir, audiobook) - 4-5 stars 40) Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda by Becky Albertalli (YA fiction) - 4 stars 41) Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel (fiction, audtiobook) - 4 stars 42) Tree of Codes by Jonathan Safran Foer (its own category) - unrated 43) (re-read) Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer (fiction) - 5 stars 44) The Nightingale by Kristin Hannah (fiction, audiobook) - 5 stars 45) Fake ID by Lamar Giles (YA fiction, audiobook) - 4 stars 46) Holding Up the Universe by Jennifer Niven (YA fiction) - 5 stars 47) Child of Books by Oliver Jeffers (Childrens) - 5 stars 48) All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doer (fiction, audiobook) - 5 stars 49) Gaston by Kelly DiPucchio (picture book) - 4 stars 50) Pug Meets Pig by Sue Lowell Gallion (picture book) - 4 stars 51) Up From the Sea by Leza Lowitz (novel in verse) - 3 stars 52) Emmy&Oliver by Robin Benway (YA fiction, audiobook) - 4 stars 53) Moonwalking with Einstein by Joshua Foer (non-fiction, audiobook) - 3 stars 54) Today Means Amen by Sierra DeMulder (poetry) - 4 stars 55) Prisoner of Night and Fog by Anne Blankman (YA fiction, audiobook) - 4 stars

Reading Old Man and the Sea while staring at the same sea in Cuba

2015 books in order of date finished

1) This One Summer by Mariko Tamaki (graphic novel) - 3 stars

2) The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater (YA fiction, audiobook) - 4 starts

3) Brown Girl Dreaming by Jacqueline Woodson (poetry) - 5 stars

4) Blue Horses by Mary Oliver (poetry) - 4 stars

5) If I Wrote A Book About You by Stephany Aulenback (picture book) - 5 stars

6) A Thousand Mornings by Mary Oliver (poetry) - 4 stars

7) Reality Boy by A.S. King (YA ficition, audiobook) - 3 stars

8) Gordon Parks: How the Photographer Captured Black and White America by Carole Boston Weatherford (picture book) - 4 stars

9) We are in a Book! by Mo Willems (picture book) - 5 stars

10) The Jacket by Kirsten Hall (picture book) - 5 stars

11) The Adventures of Beekle: The Unimaginary Friend by Dan Santat (picture book) - 5 stars

12) Journey by Aaron Becker (picture book) - 5 stars

13) Hug Machine by Scott Campbell (picture book) - 4 stars

14) The Book With No Pictures by B.J. Novak (picture book) - 4 stars

15) The Dream Thieves by Maggie Stiefvater (YA fiction, audiobook) - 4 stars

16) Dog Songs by Mary Oliver (poetry) - 5 stars

17) Luckiest Girl Alive by Jessica Knoll (fiction) - 4 stars

18) The Girl On the Train by Paula Hawkins (fiction) - 4 stars

19) Blue Lily, Lily Blue by Maggie Stiefvater (YA fiction, audiobook) - 4 stars

20) Unwind by Neal Shusterman (YA fiction) - 5 stars

21) Izzy & Oscar by Allison Estes & Dan Stark (picture book) - 3 stars

22) We Were Liars  by e. lockhart (YA fiction) - 3 stars

23) Your First Word Will Be Dada by Jimmy Fallon (picture book) - 3 stars

24) Chicago Baby by Jerome Pohlen (picture book) - 4 stars

25) Food: A Love Story by Jim Gaffigan (non-fiction, audiobook) - 4 stars

26) I'll Give You the Sun by Jandy Nelson (YA fiction) - 5 stars

27) Unorthodox by Deborah Feldman (non-fiction, memoir) - 3 stars

28) Finding Jake by Bryan Reardon (fiction) - 3 stars 

29) Pig and Pug by Lynne Berry (picture book) - 3 stars

30) El Deafo by Cece Bell (graphic memoir) - 5 stars

31) The Strange and Beautiful Sorrows of Ava Lavender by Leslye Walton (YA fiction) - 3 stars

32) 11/22/63 by Stephen King (fiction, audiobook) - 5 stars

33) The Day the Crayons Came Home by Drew Daywalt (picture book) - 3 stars

34) Positive: A Memoir by Paige Rawl (YA memoir, audiobook) - 4 stars

35) The Family Romanov (YA non-fiction, audiobook) - unrated

36) Yes, Please by Amy Poehler (memoir, audiobook) - 4 stars

37) Drowned City: Hurricane Katrina and New Orleans by Don Brown (graphic history) - 4 stars

38) Stick and Stone by Beth Ferry (picture book) - 4 stars

39) Giraffes Can't Dance by Giles Andreae (picture book) - 5 stars

40) Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys (YA historical fiction, audiobook) - 4 stars

41) The Impossible Knife of Memory by Laurie Halse Anderson (YA fiction, audiobook) - 4 stars

42) Relish by Lucy Knisley (graphic memoir) - 5 stars

43) All the Bright Places by Jennifer Niven (YA fiction, audiobook) - 4 stars

44) Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt (non-fiction, audiobook) - 5 stars

45) Beautiful Ruins by Jess Walter (fiction, audiobook) - 5 stars

46) Wild by Cheryl Strayed (memoir, audiobook) - 3 stars

47)  Sketchy by Olivia Samm (YA fiction) - 2 stars

48) Assassination Vacation by Sarah Vowell (non-ficition, audiobook) - 4 stars

49) Glory O'Brien's History of the Future by A.S. King (YA fiction) - unrated

50) Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer (non-fiction, audiobook) - 4 stars

51) I Am Malala by Malala Yousafzai (non-ficition, audiobook) - 4 stars

52) Let's Pretend This Never Happened by Jenny Lawson (memoir, audiobook) - 5 stars

53) Animal Farm by George Orwell (fiction, audiobook) - 2 stars

54) March by John Lewis (graphic novel, memoir) - 5 stars

55) Please, Mr. Panda by Steve Anthony (picturebook) - 3 stars

56) Backlash by Sarah Darer Littman (YA fiction) - 5 stars

57) The Golden Compass by Philip Pullman (audiobook) - 5 stars

58) The Sculptor by Scott McCloud (graphic novel) - 4 stars

Half a Life

"Martin Amis has written that we all hope, modestly enough, to get through life without being murdered. A lot more confidently, we hope to get through life without murdering anybody ourselves." - Darin Strauss, p. 127

When my friend, Katie, moved to Arizona before 6th grade, we became pen pals to replace our neighborhood explorations and sleepover parties. AOL then replaced the letters. On December 17, 1998, less than a month after I turned 16, Katie and I chatted online on the eve of our winter break and talked about me flying out there to visit for spring break a few months later. She signed off after saying her friend, who had just gotten her driver's license, had arrived to pick her up for their first joy ride. Having recently experienced the freedom of being entrusted by the state to drive alone as a teenager, I probably replied with something like, "Have fun!!! It's the BEST feeling!" A few hours later, Katie, not wearing a seatbelt, lost her life after that friend of hers lost control of the car [while driving recklessly so I heard] on a winding mountain road.

I learned of this devastating news upon returning home the following evening from my first-ever concert with friends: Q101's Twisted 5, featuring Beck, Cake, Everlast, Garbage, Goo Goo Dolls, Soul Coughing, and Third Eye Blind. I remember my parents were both awake waiting for me when I got home. I remember the look on their faces, as the excitement of the live alternative music drained, replaced by disbelief, when I heard the seriousness of what they said: "We need to talk to you. Katie died in a car accident last night." I remember thinking, "Katie, who?" unable to process they were talking about my friend, Katie. 

I didn't fly out to Arizona for her funeral, and I ended up not seeing anyone from her family until 6 years later when I was on a cross-country roadtrip with my friend, Shawna, and we met up with Katie's twin brother for dinner. I can't remember now if we even spoke of Katie, both of us probably overwhelmed that we were hanging out without her, both now college graduates. 

Mr. Anderson, my English teacher at the time of the accident, knew about what happened because I imagine I wrote him e-mails about my devastation and how this loss impacted my own sense of being. Interestingly enough, he is the one who recommended this book to me about a month ago as a wise response to a "good memoir" collection development query. I read most of the book while time-traveling around Cuba in the back of a 1952 Chevrolet, which existed before the invention of seatbelts. I considered the discomfort of this detail throughout the trip with the book in my lap and Katie on my mind.

The memoir is a brutally honest self-reflection, beautifully written by Darin Strauss, who unintentionally at age 18, struck and killed a female classmate who swerved her bike in front of his moving car, how he strived to "live for the two" from that point forward, and how her death continued to affect his life and relationships. 

A handful of times I've considered Katie's friend, the driver, over the years and wondered where she is now. How did she deal with the weight of responsibility that I imagine comes with killing one friend and seriously injuring another? I know every circumstance is different, but if I knew I her, I would recommend this book. 

This past week, Katie would have celebrated her 33rd birthday. Over the past few years, I reflected upon the time I realized she had been both dead and alive for the same number of years and the fact that she has now been gone longer than she was here. It's a bizarre fact to try and process. She never got her own driver's license, never graduated high school, never went to college...what now seems like an infinite list of nevers. 

“Things don't go away. They become you. There is no end, as T.S. Eliot somewhere says, but addition: the trailing consequence of further days and hours. No freedom from the past, or from the future."

Unorthodox by Deborah Feldman

"For awhile I thought I could un-Jew myself. Then I realized that being Jewish is not in the ritual or the action. It is in one's history. I am proud of being Jewish, because I think that's where my indomitable spirit comes from, passed down from ancestors who burned in the fires of persecution because of their blood, their faith."

Some of my fellow agnostic/atheistic Jewish colleagues suggested reading this book as a department and engaging in a group discussion for our final Professional Development day back in May (because what I do love about being Jewish is that we see the humor in life and proceed self-deprecatingly). Well, major #librarianfail on my part--I only got about 20 pages in, and when I realized I wouldn't be able to make it to the book discussion, gave up trying to read the memoir for several months...until the new school year was about to begin, and I gave myself a deadline. 

When I did finally attempt reading this memoir for a second time, I had a hard time getting very far. First of all, I found the storyline to be fairly slow-moving in the sense that I wasn't immediately engaged enough to want to open the book again. But more so than that, I compare the experience to how I felt while watching the documentary, Jesus Camp,  a documentary about children getting indoctrinated to spread the Christian word (putting that mildly) that is only 87 minutes in length but took me about four hours to complete because I paused it what seemed like every few minutes to call my best friend for her insights. I remember feeling completely exasperated and saying something like, "Is this real life??" 

As I read this book, I kept thinking about how my dad used to make my sister and me watch Fiddler on the Roof on an annual basis and suddenly had a new-found appreciation for the milestones we've evolved. I assumed this book was written by someone much older than me until I got to a page that started with: "It was the 11th day of September, 2001..." What?! Hold the phone. The author is younger than me?! Also, she lived in Brooklyn and had no idea that the towers had been hit by airplanes and subsequently collapsed until her grandfather "sinfully" bought a Wall Street Journal and borrowed a radio to listen to the news about what was happening across the river?! 

I gave up on the concept of religion after being told at 12 years old that I would go to hell if I didn't accept Jesus in my heart. This pissed me off. I became an angry, life-questioning, early-menstruating pre-teen. I stopped wearing a Jewish star necklace, and I tried never to pay less than other people so as not to encourage the "cheap" stereotype; I no longer wanted to be identified by the only religion I knew and loved. 

As I got older, less hormonal and more political, my anger subsided and was replaced by a desire to understand:

-Why do Christians think they have the answers to everything?

-Why would Christians tell non-believers/gay people that they're going to hell if they're supposed to love everyone?

-Who cares if they tell me I'm going to hell because Jews don't believe in hell's existence and therefore I can't go there because I'm Jewish?

-Also, Jesus was a long-haired Jewish hippie socialist (right?), soooo....what the heck are we all disagreeing about in the first place?

My point being that although I had given up on aligning with monotheistic religious beliefs (I lean mostly towards Buddhism if I have to choose) or this god figure that supposedly "loves everyone" but has all these exceptions to that rule, I remember how significant the mind-shift felt about 20 years ago when the Jewish congregation my family belongs to, albeit of the reformed sector, transformed all of the prayers to be inclusive of the female players of biblical times. Instead of only listing the men in prayers, they added the women, and everyone received a special insert to follow along separate from the ancient prayer book. I remember thinking, "How has recognizing women never been a thing until now?" 

(We're weaving our way back to Unorthodox now.) What killed me while reading this book--my boyfriend recounted he would hear me yell, "WHAT!" followed by the sound of a book being angrily slammed shut--is that I never had reason to be exasperated at my own religion until taking the time to read about why one young woman made the decision to leave her Hasidic roots. 

As a female librarian, who was brought up by Jewish parents who revered the education of their two daughters above all else, it was mind-boggling to read Deborah's commentary about how secretive she had to be just to get her hands on reading materials:

"His mother has told him not to let me read any more library books, as if my illicit glimpses into their pages were the cause of all our problems."

"In school, I hear hushed rumors about a Jewish library in Williamsburg, hosted once a week in someone's apartment, where you can take out two kosher, censored books, all written by Jewish authors. If I can get books from a kosher library, I won't have to hide them under my mattress."

Judaism is a matrilineal religion, meaning a child is considered Jewish so long as their mother is also Jewish. If the religion itself is being passed down through the woman, how are women treated like second-class citizens and denied the right to education and knowledge? Call me crazy, but none of this makes any sense to me. Although I didn't love the book, I applaud Deborah for taking control of her own life and bringing to light this antiquated, shall I say misogynistic, way of life. I am proud to be a progressive Jew who loves to read and inquire about the world and am even more grateful now more than ever that my parents encouraged me to be a life-long learner. 

I'll Give You the Sun by Jandy Nelson

As a high school librarian, I am probably in the minority when it comes to loving Young Adult Realistic Fiction. Meaning, I don't love the genre. There are exceptions, sure, but generally speaking my brain has a hard time relating to the (forgive me) sometimes shallow plights of teens, which are often the epicenter of such novels. I'll Give You the Sun is one of those exceptions. I started reading this on the day Congress made same-sex marriage legal in all 50 states (which deserves a celebratory post all its own), appropriate given some of the story's content.  

The chapters switch off from the perspective of two twin siblings: Noah ages 13-14 and Jude at age 16. Right off the bat Noah gets bullied for being perceived as gay, which he is, but refuses to admit to anyone except his sketchpad. Jude is heterosexually promiscuous, her mom often saying, "Don't be that girl." The siblings have an inexplicable bond with each other and are both artists in their own right, striving to get admitted to a prestigious art school; however, the competition for their parents' attention and subsequent vindictive behavior toward each other creates a rift that only deepens after a family tragedy occurs. 

The focus on magic objects and superstitions, shapeshifting family dynamics and secrets that produce misplaced cruelty, coming to terms with the fact that your parents lead lives you don't know about, and loving someone who says "no one can know" were all themes that hit home, a little too nostalgically at times. 

What I love about this book is the poetic language and metaphorical images Jandy Nelson weaves seamlessly throughout the novel (something I loved about her first novel, The Sky is Everywhere, as well) and that the characters are way more evolved than a lot of realistic fiction novels on the YA spectrum. What I loved the most, though, was a repeated life motto echoed throughout: "Embrace the mystery."

Interconnectedness and the ever-present Universe Theory proving itself again and again in my own life felt akin with many of the more mysterious details of this novel that occurred while reading the story. Here are some "for instances"...

Jude has conversations with her dead grandmother, whom she claims to see and describes her fashionable outfits in great detail. The day after I started reading this book I was driving down Western Avenue when an elderly woman at a bus stop caught my eye. She was decked out in neon shades of green, but what made freak out was how remarkably she looked like my deceased grandmother, who has been gone for 15 years!

Later that week, my friend Shannon invited our friend Sean and me to a free pottery workshop. Having not played with clay since I took a 3D art class senior year of high school, I jumped at the chance to get my hands dirty (I failed miserably, just like in high school, but it nevertheless got my brain thinking in new ways, as experimenting with art is apt to do). In the book, Jude has to graduate to working with a master stone cutter because her clay sculptures keep shattering (which she blames on a ghost).

There is mention of a Ouija Board on more than one occasion, which is one of the only childhood artifacts that has consistently moved with me to and been on display in various apartments. And while reading this book, my boyfriend (that may be the first mention of him on this blog due to my embarrassing hiatus from writing regularly) and I discovered we harbored a mutual fascination with learning about the world of Tarot cards, which inspired him to buy a deck and a how-to book. 

And finally there is the theory one of the characters refers to as "split-aparts," a term apparently coined by Plato: 

“So Plato talked about these beings that used to exist that had four legs and four arms and two heads. They were totally self-contained and ecstatic and powerful. Too powerful, so Zeus cut them all in half and scattered all the halves around the world so that humans were doomed to forever look for their other half, the one who shared their very soul. Only the luckiest humans find their split-apart, you see.”

What's remarkable is that with all this talk in the news about same-sex marriage finally being recognized by law, I rediscovered and started listening to "Origin of Love" from "Hedwig and the Angry Inch" on repeat. Watch the video clip below? Look familiar? (If not, refer to italicized quote above.)

Love is love. Read this book. 

World Book Night, Year 2

I was ecstatic to be selected for the second year in a row to be a Book Giver on World Book Night and to once again give away one of my favorite novels: Where'd You Go Bernadette by Maria Semple. Below is my review originally posted on Goodreads:

Where'd You Go, Bernadette by Maria Semple

My rating: 5 of 5 stars


Is it a crime that I am a newly-ordained librarian and I fully admit to judging books by their covers? Probably. However, that is the exact reason I chose to read this novel: I love(d) the cover.
Add in a librarian friend's recommendation that she thinks I'd love the story because of its epistolary format (which is masterful, in my opinion, I must add), and voila! Jumped to the top of my to-read list.

Throw in consistently-outstanding character development, an enviable back-story, a missing-persons mystery, as well as facts and journeys to Antarctica, a magical place you don't tend to hear a whole lot about, and you've got yourself a prize-winning, 5-star novel. 

One of my favorite lines in the book happened to be a parenthetical statement: "This is why you must love life: one day you're offering up your social security number to the Russia Mafia; two weeks later you're using the word calve as a verb."

I mean, right?
The interweaving points of view, the humor, and the quirky characters inspired me to start writing again. Thank you, Maria Semple. I can't wait to read your debut novel, "This One is Mine."

I will end this review with another underlined quote, a P.S. if you will:
"My heart started racing, not the bad kind of heart racing, like, I'm going to die. But the good kind of heart racing, like, Hello, can I help you with something? If not, please step aside because I'm about to kick the shit out of life."



View all my reviews

This time there was no same-name city, wrong state situation box location mix-up (see last year's post: World Book Night). I chose to pick up my box from City Lit Books, a wonderful, independent book store in neighboring Logan Square. They were so kind (both via e-mail and in person when I excitedly picked up my box) and even hosted a reception for all of the Chicago-area givers who used their store as a flagship. Unfortunately, I was out of town and missed it, but I heard it was a lot of fun with great conversation.

This year WBN had a lot of new and exciting features for Givers:

* 3 free audiobooks from audiobooks.com

* a free ebook 

* an essay contest

Below is the essay I submitted for the contest, but you get the pleasure of seeing the visual version, which includes a photo of everyone who got a copy of Bernadette, as well as a short video clip of two girls who called me a "librarian evangelist."

The Librarian Evangelist

"My heart started racing, not the bad kind of heart racing, like, I'm going to die. But the good kind of heart racing, like, Hello, can I help you with something? If not, please step aside because I'm about to kick the shit out of life."

–Maria Semple, Where’d You Go Bernadette

The night before World Book Night, I inched my way towards one of the stoplights at the 6-corner intersection in the Wicker Park neighborhood. Through my windshield I watched a woman attempting to sell StreetWise magazines, a publication that supports and employs Chicago’s homeless community, to hurried passersby in front of a Starbucks. I cringed every time someone ignored her, which was every time.

Twenty-four hours later I approached the same intersection, this time on foot, with a backpack decorated with Book Giver paraphernalia and full of free copies of one of my favorite novels: Where’d You Go Bernadette by Maria Semple. 

While walking down Milwaukee Avenue I gave away my first copy to a woman who couldn’t believe the book was free, then to a man walking his dog. 

The third copy went to two girls who said they were roommates and that they would share one copy so I would have more to pass out to others. 

As I crossed North Avenue, I was encouraged to see the same woman from the day before standing there with her stack of StreetWise. I regretted leaving the house without any cash but asked if she would like a free book to read. She seemed hesitant at first, but after I told her about World Book Night and insisted I wanted nothing in return, she took one, shyly smiled, and thanked me in a quiet voice.

I rounded the corner, intent on passing out some of the copies to commuters entering and exiting the Damen el station. I excitedly waved a few of them in the air, while announcing: “Free books! Take your mind off your commute!” No smiles. No eye contact. No takers. I approached a woman unlocking her bike, but she said, “I don’t have time to read! I have two 3-years olds at home!” and a man sifting through a trashcan, who replied, “I would love to read, but I can’t carry anything with me.”

This caught the attention of two girls, leaving a coffee shop next to the station, who waved me over to ask what I was doing. They each enthusiastically took a copy, asked how to become volunteers next year, and deemed me a “librarian evangelist,” after I said I was a librarian always looking for creative ways to get people excited about reading. I will continue to embrace that hilarious title with pride. 

A few steps further south on Damen I asked two more girls, who were walking together, if they would like a free book. While I was talking with them, I noticed that a group of girls inside a bar called Blue Line were watching us, curious about what was happening outside their booth’s window. Soon after, one brave soul ran out onto the blustery sidewalk, asked how she could acquire a book for herself and her friend, who was giving me the “thumbs-up” sign from inside. The best part of this interaction occurred when the girl from the bar said she needed a new book to suggest to her newly-created book club, said she would use Bernadette, and invited the other two, who had been strangers two minutes prior, to join the club! They all exchanged contact information, while I went on my merry way, eager to meet the second half of my recipients. 

            I crossed the street to stroll through Wicker Park and came across a group of teenaged boys. When I asked, “Do you guys like to read?” one of them stopped, a smile creeping across his face. He returned my high five, after I expressed my excitement that he answered “Yeah,” and didn't seem to care that his two buddies had already continued walking on without him. 

        Then I encountered a family visiting Chicago all the way from Germany. The son blushed when he said he’s “not a big reader,” and I said, “Then you’re a perfect candidate!” Eventually I convinced him to take a book, and he kindly said, “I wish you luck!” after I revealed once again that I’m a librarian and when they asked, “Where?” I said, “Nowhere yet, but I actually have an important interview tomorrow!”

            The next three books went to a woman in scrubs, a mother with her young son who said she’s trying to keep up with his impressive reading habit, and another woman, who, due to the train clamor overhead, thought I said I had written the book. I laughed and said, “I wish! But you should still read it. It’s a great, well-written story with a cast of quirky characters.”

            At a nearby bus stop I gave one to a girl coming from her yoga class, rushing to catch the approaching bus, who still happily posed for a photo. When the bus rolled up, I gave another copy to a young musician carrying a guitar, who thanked me in a British accent as he boarded the bus. 

I then stopped in a local Thai restaurant called Penny’s Noodle Shop to order carry-out for later and left knowing one of their servers now has some new reading material to indulge in during his slow shifts. 

My last book went to a couple with an adorable baby standing underneath the blue line tracks. After I described the plot of Bernadette, he joked, "Oh is this like the sequel to Gone Girl? Gone Mom?" A perfect way to end my second year as a Book Giver.

                        *           *           *

Two weeks later I crossed paths with the StreetWise seller again and said, "Hi! Did you get a chance to start the book?" She recognized me then, smiled, and quietly replied, "I haven't read a lot yet, but I like it so far!"

As a future librarian and proponent of free access to information, World Book Night satisfies that inner desire to connect with my community through literature and spread the love of reading one person at a time. I look forward to being a giver again next year for round three! 

(end of submitted essay)

For anyone counting, you may be wondering: She only mentioned 19 people! What happened to the 20th book? Congrats on being observant. The answer: My dear friend, Lindsay, who's been wanting to get back in the habit of reading, is now the proud owner of book #20, after I accidentally left it behind due to changing my mind about in what I was going to carry all of them.