Alternately titled, “Abbie Hoffman Killed Himself Because of Idiots Like Me.”

We just finished watching “Chicago 10” and it was good. Better than good — it was great. (more…)

Today we had facials. Da-da-daaaaaaaaaaa. We did not go to church. Here are three books for you to read:

Recommended:

That’s all, just three books. Why do I like these? I say they’re good. Du-du-duuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuun.

(Edited with a note from her mother: I am looking forward to the new Pippi, with illustrations by one of our favorite artists and writers, Lauren Child. But the others? No, they are no good. That’s why I took them off my library shelves and discarded them all.)

I SAY THEY ARE GOOD. Cuz they are really good — the writing is nice and scary in Goosebumps. In Rotten School, it’s like… yeah. It’s really, like, um… I just like them. All kids do, actually. That’s all.

See you later,

Wacky Girl

You know who is an amazing writer? Lois Duncan. And she just has never, ever, ever, gotten her proper respect, as far as this humble reviewer is concerned. More on that in a minute. First off — why am I reviewing in a hodgepodge today? Because it’s my blog, that’s why. No, because I promised books to a reader who is expecting, and before I hand them over, I must review. (more…)

Finally, a memoir where someone doesn’t lie their head off. “Grace After Midnight” is the story of Felicia “Snoop” Pearson (who played Snoop on the acclaimed HBO series “The Wire”). (Grand Central Publishing, 2007, $22, 233 pages.) She is one amazing Baltimore woman. As a teenager, she landed in Jessup State Penitentiary for killing a woman in self-defense.

Whether Pearson is writing about her birth (as a three-pound, cross-eyed baby who was addicted to crack), about her mother tearing the dress off of her baby girl’s body and selling it for drugs, or about her knack for selling dildos and perfume in prison, she writes it raw, pure, and poignantly. She’s got a sense of humor, too, thank God for her. (more…)

First of all, girls only. Boys gone? OK.

Cannie’s back! Fans of Jennifer Weiner’s awesome first novel, “Good in Bed,” will remember Cannie Shapiro well. “certain girls” picks up thirteen years later, with Cannie, her husband, and Cannie’s about-to-be-bat-mitzvahed daughter. (Atria Books, $26.95, 386 pages.) The chapters alternate in voice, first Cannie, then her girl, and Weiner digs right into the drama. I was lucky enough to score an advance reading copy and was thrilled because it gave me the best excuse to ignore my Psych 311 textbook.

Who needs Psych? I’ve got Cannie. What to know how it ends? Psych! Won’t tell you.

I was also happily distracted by Bridget Asher’s book, “my husband’s sweethearts.” (I kinda like writing out the titles very ee cummings exactly how they’re written on the covers.) “my husband’s sweethearts (Bantam Dell, $22, 271 pages) opens with a little “what would you do about this one?” scenario. What would you do if your adorable, sexy, estranged husband was dying, and you found his little black book? Would you drunk dial? Sober dial? Dial at all?

Lucy decides to call each and every one of them, and what she discovers isn’t exactly what she thought she would find. Great book, and hard to put down. (And speaking of chick lit, since we are — I love these books because they satisfy my need for a girly, drama-filled book that is down to earth, but at the same time, the writing in both of these novels is so good. The storylines go zipping along and you find yourself getting really attached to all the various characters, major and minor. Nicely played, you two.)

Did I have a date to go with my sister to see Sex and the City: The Movie? Yes, I did. Did dear, dear Felicia send me an advance copy of the sister book, so I could pair things up a little? Yes, she did. Did I do my reviews? NO. But I am right now.

I ordered the DVD on Netflix. It arrived. I shipped the kids off to Grandma’s. I fixed a quite lovely brunch for my sister and now, even though it was just a short week ago, I have no idea what we had. Oh, wait! Some kind of coffeecake? Fried eggs on toasted homemade cheddar biscuits, with butter and sweet-hot chili sauce. Fruit salad. And an entire pot of strong, good Stumptown coffee. Because watching those skinny girls brunch, brunch, brunch makes me want to devour a lot of food.

No Aidan, though, sorry. And the men were given pretty skimpy storylines. So were the women, come to think of it. But the movie was still pretty fun, although we found ourselves screaming, “Grow UP already!” at the TV several times.

“They’re still doing stuff we stopped doing in our early 30s,” my sister noted.

“Or late 20s,” I noted.

The book is shiny and perfect for the coffee table and looking through it is just like watching the movie all over again. (Amy Sohn and Melcher Media, Collins, 176 pages.)

Today’s books:

I like baby books, because they help make it so you (mostly) can’t remember all that goo. You just remember the goo-goo. “Baby’s First Year,” (Lydia Ricci, Random House, $19.95) a “milestone journal” that comes with its own nursery banner and stickers, is a lovely book. Compact, but not too compact. Precious, but not so precious that you’ll feel too intimidated to scribble in it. The pastel colors and backgrounds are unisex, and the book is accordion-pleated with space for photos, cards or whatever else you’d like to tuck in.

Now, on to something completely unlike all those pastels: “Coraline.” (Written by Neil Gaiman, with illustrations by Dave McKean.)

“Lunchtime, Coraline,” said the woman.
“Who are you?” asked Coraline.
“I’m your other mother,” said the woman. “Go and tell your other father that lunch is ready.”

That’s when my chills started. And the rats hadn’t even shown up yet to sing. The kids and I are looking forward to the movie coming out.

“Write Before Your Eyes” (by Lisa Williams Kline, Delacorte Press/Random House, $15.99) just came out. I knew I would love it the minute I read the opening quote, from “Half Magic,” by Edward Eager:

“If you have ever had magic powers descend on you suddenly out of the blue… You have to know just how much magic you have, and what the rules are for using it.”

Ain’t it the truth, Ruth.

Gracie Rawley picks up an old journal for a quarter at a yard sale. It has old, crackly pages, that are water-stained, with thin lines.

“Not that one! She mustn’t take that one!” a tiny old woman calls, as the woman’s son sells Gracie the journal anyway. Then what she writes in the book begins to come true — a kiss, a date, a Cheshire Cat… How is she going to deal with this one? Great for middle-school students.

Reviewed this evening:

…my friend just e-mailed me:

“Trust that your heart is in the right place, let your love of books and children guide you, and remember how important those adults were who inspired you when you were young. One day at a time….”

Always. And may you find something today that inspires and comforts you.

love,

wm

“When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in a flag and carrying a cross.”
— Sinclair Lewis, 1935

Governor Palin is a big reader, I hear! I’m thinking of sending her a copy of “The Witches,” by Roald Dahl. Because we all need to read more, no?

In honor of the ACLU’s celebration of banned books (an annual tradition since 1982), here are a few of Sarah’s and my favorites…

(These are books that regularly make the “hit list” for stodgy types who want to see books go bye-bye.)

A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle
Annie on My Mind by Nancy Garden
As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner
Blubber by Judy Blume
Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson
Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer
Carrie by Stephen King
Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
Christine by Stephen King
Confessions by Jean-Jacques Rousseau
Cujo by Stephen King
Curses, Hexes, and Spells by Daniel Cohen
Daddy’s Roommate by Michael Willhoite
A Day No Pigs Would Die by Robert Peck
Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller
Decameron by Boccaccio
East of Eden by John Steinbeck
Fallen Angels by Walter Myers
Fanny Hill (Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure) by John Cleland
Flowers For Algernon by Daniel Keyes
Forever by Judy Blume
Grendel by John Champlin Gardner
Halloween ABC by Eve Merriam
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Prizoner of Azkaban by J.K. Rowling
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J.K. Rowling
Have to Go by Robert Munsch
Heather Has Two Mommies by Leslea Newman
How to Eat Fried Worms by Thomas Rockwell
Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
Impressions edited by Jack Booth
In the Night Kitchen by Maurice Sendak
It’s Okay if You Don’t Love Me by Norma Klein
James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl
Lady Chatterley?s Lover by D.H. Lawrence
Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman
Little Red Riding Hood by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm
Lord of the Flies by William Golding
Love is One of the Choices by Norma Klein
Lysistrata by Aristophanes
More Scary Stories in the Dark by Alvin Schwartz
My Brother Sam Is Dead by James Lincoln Collier and Christopher Collier
My House by Nikki Giovanni
My Friend Flicka by Mary O?Hara
Night Chills by Dean Koontz
Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
On My Honor by Marion Dane Bauer
One Day in The Life of Ivan Denisovich by Alexander Solzhenitsyn
One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Kesey
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Ordinary People by Judith Guest
Our Bodies, Ourselves by Boston Women’s Health Collective
Prince of Tides by Pat Conroy
Revolting Rhymes by Roald Dahl
Scary Stories 3: More Tales to Chill Your Bones by Alvin Schwartz
Scary Stories in the Dark by Alvin Schwartz
Separate Peace by John Knowles
Silas Marner by George Eliot
Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burroughs
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
The Bastard by John Jakes
The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier
The Color Purple by Alice Walker
The Devil’s Alternative by Frederick Forsyth
The Figure in the Shadows by John Bellairs
The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
The Great Gilly Hopkins by Katherine Paterson
The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
The Headless Cupid by Zilpha Snyder
The Learning Tree by Gordon Parks
The Living Bible by William C. Bower
The Merchant of Venice by William Shakespeare
The New Teenage Body Book by Kathy McCoy and Charles Wibbelsman
The Pigman by Paul Zindel
The Seduction of Peter S. by Lawrence Sanders
The Shining by Stephen King
The Witches by Roald Dahl
The Witches of Worm by Zilpha Snyder
Then Again, Maybe I Won’t by Judy Blume
To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee
Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare
Webster’s Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary by the Merriam-Webster Editorial Staff
Witches, Pumpkins, and Grinning Ghosts: The Story of the Halloween Symbols by Edna Barth

A note from A.T., re: Snopes and Sarah Palin:

“It did not totally exonerate Palin. Snopes said that list of books was never banned, and Palin never banned books in Alaska. But, what is most notable is that there are confirmed reports from a librarian that Palin questioned her three times about the consequences of book banning. Palin said that was just informational. Palin also fired the librarian in 1997 because the mayor felt she didn’t have the librarian’s “full support”. The librarian was re-instated after one day due to public outcry.”

Just finished reading Sharon Creech’s “Love That Dog” aloud to the kids. Wacky Girl had to take over when I started crying.

Have added “Love That Dog” to list of books (“Charlotte’s Web,” “The Yearling,” uh, “Bambi”) that I will not be reading aloud to my students.

Also I think I will skip “Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret” and “Then Again Maybe I Won’t.” My sixth-grade teacher, Mr. Bell, bravely read both to us. I am not the man he was. Also, no “Wifey.” You’ve got to have some boundaries when reading aloud to students. “The English Patient”? Nope. Anything by Anais Nin? Nopey-nope.

No to “A Day No Pigs Would Die.” Ditto, “The Pigman.” Basically, no pigs. Nothing with “pig” in the title, nothing with a pig theme. Because even though Wilbur lives in “Charlotte’s Web,” it is not exactly a happy ending now, is it? Contrary to what my daughter would tell you.

Today’s books:

And:

And even more…:

No time to review — reading.

(Almost everything I’m reading the next few weeks came from the School Corps trainings I went to recently. School Corps is part of the Multnomah County Library system and you will find some of their incredible book lists right here.)

Bon appetit!

wm

Today’s books:

And:

And even more…: