Category Archives: books

Bibliophile Friday: Black & White by Dani Shapiro

“I should never call myself a book lover any more than a people lover.  
It all depends what’s inside them.” -Philip Larkin

Two Basic Rules for Bibliophile Friday:  Read a book.  Write about it.

You can write as little as two words (Thumbs up! or Thumbs down!), you can write a short blurb, or you can go all out and give a summary and review. It all depends on how you’re feeling and how much time you have.  Add your blog to Mr. Linky, below, and please leave a comment after you link.
Books suggestions or reviews are welcome for both kids’ and grown-ups’ books.
Keep it clean.  Be honest.

Bibliophile Friday is the 4th Friday of every month, so get reading!

My book selection:  Black & White, by Dani Shapiro
Recommendation:  Thought-provoking.  Worth a read.

Summary:
As Ms. Shapiro’s novel opens we meet Ruth, a young mother, struggling to find her identity.  Ruth discovers that she has a wonderful eye for photography, particularly for shooting nude, provocative, and unusual photos of her little girl Clara.  As Clara grows up, Ruth documents her life and reaches glorious heights of artistic fame.  At the same time, devastated and objectified by the constant glare of Ruth’s camera,  Clara’s shame soars.  Clara cannot separate her feelings about her mother and her feelings about being her mother’s “muse”: she comes to despise both.  When she turns 18 she swiftly runs away.


Clara breaks completely from her past and creates a new life for herself in rural Maine.  She refuses to look back until her terminally ill mother begs for her to return to Manhattan.  When she does, she unearths the emotions of her youth, explores the many facets of her relationship with both her mother and her father–who, she feels–should have spared her, and faces the past head on.

My thoughts:
When I was discussing this book with my book club, I shared that there were many times it deeply disturbed me.  One of the other women challenged me:  “Don’t you do something similar with your blog?” she asked.  I blanched.  I thought about it.  A lot.  And to some degree, I suppose I do expose my children–more often my thoughts about my children, or parenting in general–but I don’t believe it’s the same kind of exposure.  I’m very thoughtful and careful about what I post; I take care to consider my children’s feelings and what they will find when they inevitably Google themselves.  I don’t expose them for my sake.

That said, I did stop and think about it.  And any book that makes us stop and think is, I think, worth reading.  Yes, it’s a bit uncomfortable.  Yes, her mother is intense and her father folds.  As a parent and daughter, I wanted to shout at them and cry with her.  And, yet, as a woman I wanted to shake her, too.  “Deal with this!  Stop pretending it didn’t happen.”

Ms. Shapiro does a fine job of making the reader both think and feel.  And that’s worth a read any day.

What are you reading?  Add your link below.

Should Students Choose The Books They Read?

Motoko Rich raised this question in her NY Times article this week. My short answer to this short question is, no.  No, I don’t think so.  Students should not choose the books they read for class.  Teachers should choose those books.

But, as my loyal readers know, I’m not a big fan of superlatives, so please note, my answer was not, “No, not ever, students should never choose.

There are so many different types of students.  There are so many different types of teachers.  There are so many different types of books.

It seems to me that it’s pretty clear that education is not a one-size fits all proposition.  Some districts do it better than others, and some teachers do it extraordinarily well.  But often these schools they have more resources—they can pull kids out for extra help or enrichment; they have aides in the classroom; they have highly involved parents.  These factors make a difference for the teachers and the kids.

Regardless of school district, I think age is a big factor.  In discussing whether or not students should choose the books they read for class, I’m referring to older kids, to middle schoolers and high schoolers.  Elementary school kids should read whatever floats their boat.  The goal at that point isn’t to analyze the symbolism of red flowers or white hats, but to instill a love of reading. 

Also, I understand that some kids don’t have a love of reading by the time they enter middle or high school.  I realize that some schools are struggling just to get kids to pick up a book and that throwing Moby Dick at these kids is rather pointless.  So I will concede that, in those cases, allowing students to begin by choosing their own books is a good idea, with strong teacher guidance later.

But generally speaking, as kids get older, they need more.  When we read and discuss great books, classic books, with others, we learn more.  My friends had insights I didn’t and vice versa.  When we read and discussed assigned books, I learned from them and they learned from me.  Furthermore, students who have read and discussed these books have a shared history, a common understanding, a mutual point of reference for discussing the topics broached in classic literature.

The books that challenge and change us aren’t usually the books we read on the beach in the summer.  And the books that challenge and change our kids aren’t usually the ones they read for entertainment.  I totally support reading for entertainment.  It beats the heck out of another hour of TV.  But our kids aren’t in school to be entertained.  They’re in school to learn. 

Here are two books I read simply because they were assigned:

Lord of the Flies.  If you haven’t read this classic since high school, it’s worth another read.  As you find yourself on the beach with Golding’s boys, you think about the biases we hold today; you’ll think about our tendencies as humans and why order and laws are good for us and why, despite knowing better, people still hurt each other every single day.  If your kids are old enough, let them read it and talk about these ideas with them, too.

The Good Earth (Pearl S. Buck).  Despite my disdain for superlatives, I will go out a limb here and say that I as a student I never would’ve picked up a book about a Chinese farmer unless my teacher said, “Read this.”  But because she did, I read it, and in one fell swoop I understood why some books are called classic.  This one stood the test of time and I’ve read it at least 5 times since, most recently a year or so ago.  It never ceases to amaze me.  This book makes you think, think, think.

Both of these books raise questions and issues that resonate with readers today, even though they were originally published in 1954 and 1931.  Even if they don’t touch everyone in the same way they touch me—and they won’t—it’s still worth exploring the issues their authors raise.

Not every classic will affect and challenge us, or our kids.  I remember laboring through The Grapes of Wrath in the 11th grade and forcing myself to flip page after dusty, dreary page.  Ugghh.  It was such a chore.  But other kids may have felt differently.  Maybe Grapes of Wrath spoke to them the way The Good Earth spoke to me.  So if Grapes of Wrath wasn’t a favorite then, isn’t it my top ten now and never really grabbed my attention, so why do I still think it’s a good idea for my kids to read it in school?

School—like life—isn’t always about doing what you like.  Sometimes it’s about doing what’s good for you.  Reading the Grapes of Wrath introduced me to John Steinbeck.  If the only thing I got from picking it up was that it lead to my reading East of Eden years later, which is one of my all time favorites, then that’s worth every minute I spent analyzing its dry symbolism.

Reading classic books asks our children to explore issues beyond their schools, neighborhoods, and families.  It asks them to think, to really think, about poverty and prosperity, gratefulness and ungratefulness, age and class and humanity.  It begs them to consider equality and possibility; hope and hopelessness; it challenges every paradigm they have.

Don’t we want this for our kids?  I know I do.  I’d love to hear your thoughts on this one.

My Favorite Books: Ten Books That Make Me Think

The books speak to me.  As I look up from the table at the library, where I’m spending most of my day today, I glance up at this shelf of teen books, and I hear them.  They tell myriad stories:  some sad, some adventurous, some scary, and some very, very funny.  We read them, and they challenge us.  If we’re lucky, sometimes they even change us.
One of the reasons I enjoy belonging to a book club, is that it forces me to read books I may not choose otherwise.  I’ve never been a big fan of biographies, for example, but a few years ago we read John Adams, by David McCullough.  It surprised me—I liked it!—and it remains one of my favorite books.  David MuCullough brought their world to life for me in a way that no history class ever did.  As a mother and wife, I empathized with Abigail Adams and realized that she was made of much tougher stuff than I am.  I’m still amazed by her story, as much as his.  
But it’s not just serious stories that capture me.  I’ve loved reading for as long as I can remember.  As a child, I spent hours in libraries – in every town we called home, and in my grandmother’s town, too, which we visited several times a year. In those early days, I enjoyed a good mystery and I was especially fond of Nancy Drew.  I admired her courage and her wisdom.  I liked her friends, Bess and George; I thought having a boyfriend like Ned Nickerson was pretty cool, too.  But most of all, I loved their adventures.  They took me along with them, to discover the Secret of the Old Clock and solve the Password to Larkspur Lane.  When I read these books, I wasn’t a 10-year old girl reading a story.  The words of Carolyn Keene transported me, as I solved the mysteries right along with Nancy, Bess, and George.  Those stories changed me, as books would continue to right up to today, as I questioned and pondered and discovered new ideas.  Books open worlds we may never contemplate without them.  Don’t you agree?
If you’re in the mood for a good read—although not necessarily an uplifting one—here are a few others I count among my favorites.  This list is by no means exhaustive—there are many, many books I’ve enjoyed over the years.  However, these remain among my top picks because no matter how many times I read them, they always make me think.   They challenge me, and they change me.  I hope you’ll discover their magic, too.
·      Lord of the Flies, William Golding
·      The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald
·      Gift from the Sea, Anne Morrow Lindbergh
·      The Good Earth, Pearl S. Buck
·      A Fine Balance, Rohinton Mistry
·      The Glass Castle, Jeannette Walls
·      Three Cups of Tea, Greg Mortenson
·      The Life of Pi, Yann Martel
·      Huckleberry Finn, Mark Twain
·      The Red Tent, Anita Diamant
Are any of these among your favorites?  Are there books you love that I didn’t include?  Please leave me a comment and let me know.  I’m always up for a new read.
Footnote:
On one particular visit to my aforementioned grandmother’s library, I noticed a few Nancy Drew books I’d already read, that had different covers from the ones I owned.  As a frequent re-reader, I checked them out and was surprised to find that it wasn’t only the cover that was different.  The words were different, too!  The books in the Nancy Drew series have been updated throughout the years, and I’d stumbled onto a few earlier versions.  When I offered to replace the older books with new ones, the librarian agreed.  I couldn’t believe my luck.  I still have those books, and even though I haven’t read them in years, I won’t be parting with them anytime soon.